Intangibles are invisible but their presence is known (Phillips & Phillips,
2009). Intangible value can be very challenging to measure in a healthcare
organization, but they still need to be measured (Wager, Lee, & Glaser,
2013, p. 557). The three intangible values I will discuss are improving in
communication, improving in collaboration, and improving in decision
making.
Improving in communication will lead to an improvement in collaboration,
which will also lead to an improvement in decision making. Since all three of
these intangible values coincide with each other, coming up with approaches
for how they can be measured can be easier. When it comes to measuring
these intangibles, it is important to include the healthcare workers. You need
their values and opinions. Improving in communication, improving in
collaboration, and improving in decision making can all be measured with
surveys within the healthcare organization (Phillips & Phillips, 2009). These
surveys can consist of a simple, short ranking system. The survey would
have a few questions and the healthcare workers would just answer the
simple questions. For example, one question could be “How effective is the
healthcare organization’s communication skills?” Then there would a scale of
1-5 to rank how effective the communication skills are. You could also add a
question that allows suggestions and thoughts. Another approach to
measuring these intangibles is to
References:
Phillips, J., & Phillips, P. (2009, July). Intangibles: Measuring the Hard to
Measure and the Hard to Value. Retrieved October 7, 2017, from
https://www.hrexchangenetwork.com/hr-technology/columns/intangibles-
measuring-the-hard-to-measure-and-the
Wager, K. A., Lee, F. W., & Glaser, J. P. (2013).
Health Care Information
Systems: A Practical
Approach for Health Care Management
(3rd ed.). San
Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
