Carrington Sherman Sr.
The UnitedHealth group is a healthcare organization that has two primary platforms, the UnitedHealthcare and Optum. The organization deals primarily with insurance coverage and related healthcare services. The organization specializes in providing health care coverage and benefits services (Ashenfelter, Hosken, & Weinberg, 2011). The other division is Optum Health Care. UnitedHealthcare is dedicated to assisting people live better and healthier lives by making the system effective for everyone. The organization simplifies healthcare experience; meets all wellness and health needs of consumers, and ensures its relationships with care providers are trusted and well sustained.
In the US, the organization offers a variety of health benefits programs for beneficiaries of Medicare and Medicaid, employers, care providers, and individuals. More than 1.2million physicians and healthcare professionals contract with the UnitedHealthcare. The organization extends it health benefits to people in South America, through operated and owned care facilities. Optum generally comprises of the care givers and health providers that service customers. This discussion will analyze the diversified organizational and governing structure of the UnitedHealth group.
Discussion
The mission for UnitedHealthcare group is providing quality and affordable health insurance for Americans. Americans have suffered when it comes to securing health insurance services, but the organization makes it less complicated for them . Americans not only spend a lot of time searching for the best policy, they also end up frustrated trying to find a policy that balances quality and affordability. Therefore the UnitedHealth group helps solve these issues. It mission statement states that, “UnitedHealth Group is committed to meeting the highest standards of ethical behavior and appropriate business conduct in everything we do, every day. “ The organization uses corporate governing principles that ensure performance is excellent and all aspects of operation are conducted with integrity. The organization values their stakeholder, which is why it has to operate with utmost integrity and professionalism (SCHNEIDER, 2010). The organization deals with physicians, suppliers, employers, the government, and the general public.
The organization needs a vast and strong leadership structure (The Official Board, 2019). The recent years have been successful due to the strong and fierce leadership UnitedHealth group has. Under the leadership of J Hemsley, The organization has expanded its business and acquired many smaller insurance companies. It is now the recipient of the nation’s largest health care insurance, Tri-care. The leaders of the organization have currently adopted a functional organization strategy to manage the company. The boards of directors of the organization are ten in number, and they all play a role in managing this vast organization.
The strategic tool suitable for UnitedHealthcare group is a SWOT analysis. This tool can be used to do a situational analysis of the organization and plan on ways of dealing with the current business environment. The UnitedHealth Group is one of the leading companies in the insurance industry ((Greaney, 2010). It maintains this prominent position by understanding its critically analyzing its situation. SWOT analysis tool will provide an interactive process that will help the organization coordinate its various departments towards an effective strategic planning process. The framework will enable UnitedHealth Group to analyze its external and internal strategic factors.
As a leading organization in the healthcare industry, it has numerous strengths. The strengths helps the group thrive in the market by protecting its markets, both existing and new markets. The organization has a high level of customer satisfaction which can help the organization develop strong brand equity. Over the years, UnitedHealth group has developed a strong brand portfolio which can be useful if it was to expand into new products, or diversify the existing. The cash flow for the organization is strong, thus it can afford the resources to expand into new projects. UnitedHealth group uses a reliable distribution network that helps reach the majority of its customers. Mergers and acquisitions are the major strategic tool the organization uses to streamline its operations.
There are various weak areas that UnitedHealthcare need to improve on. The organization needs to have strategic positioning which can only be achieved if it builds a competitive advantage for its products. If you camper the organization with competitors such as Milliman, Anthem, and Inc., you will realize that UnitedHealth group lacks a good demand forecasting. This results in the organization keeping higher inventory. Terms of sale for the insurance services provided by the organization are excellent, but there is no clear selling and positioning strategy.
The organization needs its selling strategy to be unique. The firms that the organization has merged and integrated have a common culture. The organization needs to integrate firms with different work cultures. Culture is important when it comes to managing changing and UnitedHealth Group needs that advantage. Technologies are evolving each day, and the scale of expansion for the organization is huge. Thus, the organization needs to invest in technology that is at par with its vision. The vision involves revolutionizing healthcare insurance services, and technology will play a part in this vision.
The United States is known for its slow growth in the healthcare industry, after the long years of recession. This is the opportunity UnitedHealth group needs to capture new customers and improve its market share. The government has agreed to the free trade agreement and new technology standards proposed by the BOD. Thus, this is an opportunity for the organization to enter new markets. There are new environmental policies which will most likely improve the playing field for all players. This is an opportunity for the organization to harness its technology towards a new and unique product category. The government has also introduced the green drive and the UnitedHealth group procurement will benefit from this drive. From the organization’s financial records, it has managed to reduce its transportation costs due to its reliable distribution. This is an opportunity to gain both market share and improve profitability. Developing its market will help the organization dilute its competitors and increase its competitiveness.
Just like other organizations, the UnitedHealth group has some external threats it needs to watch out for. The global market is experiencing a shortage in skilled workforce, threatening the profits the group gets from the affected markets. Competition is also becoming intense as the numbers of players in the interesting are increasing. Competition affects overall stress and puts downward pressure on an organization. Laws and standards of operation in the industry are improving; thus, UnitedHealthcare group needs to watch out for law suits. The not only threatens profits but is also bad for the organization’s image. In China, pay levels are rising. Considering this is one of its major markets, the threat puts pressure on the company profits. Local distributors are becoming strong and the organization might need new and low costly distribution channels. The American economy is experiencing a trend of isolation, which is affecting other governments. This trend is negatively impacting international sales. Another threat that the management of the company needs to look out for is the liability laws. Such laws differ from country to country,; thus, the directors need to work closely with policy makers in those countries.
SWOT analysis is a widely implement strategic planning tool, despite its limitations. An organization need to be able to analyze its environment critically to avoid any threats to its long-term plans. The vision requires UnitedHealthcare to have a competitive advantage, and the SWOT analysis tool guides the organization towards it. UnitedHealth group boards of directors need to have an implementation plan for the proposed strategies. The implementation plan will help UnitedHealth Group achieve the strategic competitiveness it needs to thrive in the market. SWOT analysis is a static assessment that reveals a few prospective changes. It reveals the dynamics of the environment, threats, capabilities, circumstances, and strategic changes in a single matrix.
UnitedHealth Group BOD will identify an external or internal factor and use it in formulating strategies. Corporate managers will have to provide weightage to each internal strength and weakness of the UnitedHealth Group. They will also assess the likelihood also assess the likelihood of events taking place in the coming future and how strong their impact could be on company's performance. This will be weighted SWOT analysis. UnitedHealth Group managers can focus on the most critical factors and discount the non-important one. It also solves the long list problem where organizations ends up making a long list but none of the factors deemed too critical.
Conclusively, the UnitedHealth Group is an international organization based in the United States. It aims at providing quality health insurance services at affordable prices. The governing structure for the organization is corporate. The proposed strategic tool to help the organization meet its vision is SWOT analysis. The BOD is responsible for implementing the strategies proposed in the SWOT analysis tool.
References
Ashenfelter, O., Hosken, D., & Weinberg, M. (2011). The Price Effects of a Large Merger of Manufacturers: A Case Study of Maytag-Whirlpool. doi:10.3386/w17476
Greaney, T. (2010). Competition Policy and Organizational Fragmentation in Health Care. The Fragmentation of U.S. Health Care, 115-134. doi:10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195390131.003.006
The Official Board. (2019, July 4). Org Chart UnitedHealth Group. Retrieved from https://www.theofficialboard.com/org-chart/unitedhealth-group
SCHNEIDER, M. E. (2010). UnitedHealth Group Owes Doctors $350 Million. Internal Medicine News, 43(10), 47. doi:10.1016/s1097-8690(10)70541-2
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