The interview partners
Prof. Dr. Patrick Da-Cruz is Professor of Business Administration and Healthcare Management at the Faculty of Healthcare Management at Neu-Ulm University of Applied Sciences (HNU) and Academic Director of the MBA program Leadership and Management in Healthcare.
Before joining the HNU, Mr. Da-Cruz worked for renowned strategy consultancies in the pharmaceutical/healthcare sector and in management positions in companies in the healthcare industry in Germany and abroad.
Prof. Dr. Sylvia Schafmeister is Dean of the Faculty of Healthcare Management at Neu-Ulm University of Applied Sciences and Head of the MBA Leadership and Management in Healthcare and the Bachelor's degree course in Management for Healthcare and Nursing Professions. Among other things, she represents the subjects of hospital, personnel and organizational management. Prior to her appointment at the university, she was responsible for the areas of personnel and organization in a specialist hospital.
What does “New Work” actually mean?
Prof. Dr. Sylvia Schafmeister: In my opinion, the term “New Work” is interpreted very differently and, with its current hype, has only a limited connection to the term as coined by Bergmann in his socially romantic work in the 1970s. With his concept of “New Work”, he ultimately turned against an industrial working world characterized by assembly lines, standardization and mass production, which shaped the execution of work with a division of labour and a high degree of work compartmentalization. Accordingly, uniform working hours were dominated by shift systems in which employees had to carry out their work in one place at the same time according to highly regulated specifications, which had little to do with participation and the creation of meaning. In contrast, Bergmann developed an “idealized” utopia of work in which the creation of meaning and participation of employees was a central component and “gainful employment” was no longer the sole focus, but rather self-determined, meaningful work. The guiding principle of “working in order to live” instead of “living in order to work” goes back to Bergmann's idea and has become a strong social driver of “work-life balance” and new working time models over the last 20 years.
As a result of the digital transformation, today's concept of “New Work” is closely linked to the start-up scene and the world of work in technology companies, which saw the potential to implement meaningful work within “gainful employment” and to abandon the close link between working hours and location through the use of digital tools. In addition, the agile manifesto emphasized participation in development and decision-making processes in product development.
Today, we ultimately understand “New Work” to mean the decoupling of working hours and location; the flexibilization of employment volumes and working hours; employee participation, i.e. the involvement of employees in decision-making processes - this requires a participative management style - and last but not least, a changed office and work process design. The pandemic experience was ultimately the catalyst for the implementation of these decoupling processes.
What relevance does the topic have in the healthcare sector, especially in hospitals and doctors' surgeries?
Prof. Dr. Sylvia Schafmeister: New Work has also arrived in the healthcare sector, but we have to differentiate between actual patient care and administrative areas. In the administrative area, decoupling working time and location is possible without any problems and is also implemented today as part of modern office work. In patient care, it can understandably only be implemented to a limited extent. Administrative tasks such as duty scheduling or the preparation of quality reports can be carried out from home. Thanks to telemedicine, all digital evaluations of radiology images, skin images or laboratory parameters can also be carried out by doctors from home, and medical staff can be called in digitally at any time during patient visits. These developments are only limited by technical equipment and ultimately financial resources. These activities can also be carried out remotely in doctors' surgeries.
Unfortunately, New Work often only focuses on this technological driver. Much more exciting, however, is the question of the extent to which these technological possibilities of flexible working hours actually contribute to participative, meaningful work in the healthcare sector. It is therefore more about participation and leadership.
In your opinion, which “New Work tools” are particularly suitable for the healthcare sector?
Prof. Dr. Sylvia Schafmeister: In my opinion, the central element of New Work is the topic of “culture of trust”. Do I trust my employees and appreciate their work, even if I can't check on them directly on site? To what extent am I prepared to really recognize the skills of my employees and include them in the daily process? To what extent can I, as a manager, allow a “creative and decision-making space” here and thus make the employees their own designers, which ultimately creates meaning in their own work? In this way, leadership does not become “laissez-faire”, but leadership becomes leadership: managers inspire employees to contribute their ideas and set out together with the manager to realize their vision for the hospital, for the medical practice. The term “transformational leadership” perfectly reflects this understanding of leadership: away from a culture of mistrust and towards a culture of trust.
What challenges do hospitals and medical practices that want to implement “New Work” approaches face?
Prof. Dr. Sylvia Schafmeister: In my opinion, the central challenge is to change the much-vaunted “mindset”: on the one hand, that employees are prepared to change and take responsibility for change as experts in their processes, and on the other, that managers are prepared to actually hand over responsibility for the change. Only in such a culture of trust can the New Work approach be effective in terms of “shaping meaning” and “new forms of work”.
How does a “New Work environment” in healthcare facilities affect employer attractiveness and employee satisfaction?
Prof. Dr. Sylvia Schafmeister: When a culture of trust has been authentically created as a new New Work concept, employees experience their work as meaningful because they make an accepted contribution to the vision, help shape it and are not told exactly when and how they can do their work successfully. The great thing about the healthcare sector is that most employees are very happy to work in patient care and see this as their true vocation, i.e. the fulfillment of meaning. The change in working culture and working hours in the sense of “New Work” increases the fulfillment of meaning and thus strengthens employer attractiveness through increased employee satisfaction.
Thank you very much for the interview!
