The world of healthcare is home to countless essential roles and responsibilities, yet the field is so diverse it can be hard to know where to turn if you want a change of pace.
One of the reasons why so many people pursue a career in healthcare in the first place is for the many opportunities it provides in terms of progression and personal development.
If this is starting to sound familiar, and you would like to take your own healthcare career in a brand-new direction, perhaps it is worth turning towards the vast array of fulfilling administration roles available.
Whether you happen to be coming from a clinical role, you’re fresh out of college, or you’re a registered nurse who wishes to pursue a different type of care altogether, there will likely be an avenue to explore.
Whatever your background, the range of choice, and versatility the industry has to offer will probably be able to accommodate for your particular skill set.
If you need some support and some new ideas moving forward toward what will hopefully be the next exciting stage of your professional life, here are some top roles to check out.
Assisted Living Administrator
Assisted living facilities provide an essential role in healthcare for seniors across the globe, and due to an increasing elderly population, their existence has perhaps never been as important as it is today.
Working as an assisted living administrator can be an immensely fulfilling role, one that is not without its fair share of intensely tough work, but like many other areas in healthcare, this is one of the reasons why it is so worthwhile.
By getting yourself a state-required assisted living license, you can jump into the action in no time and start to provide a key role in the world of senior care.
You will likely make some profound connections and interact with individuals from all walks of life as part of your daily routine.
Some of your main responsibilities might include:
- Overseeing the day-to-day care of the residents in your facility
- Hiring new staff
- Budget management
- Writing new policies
- Interacting with the press and marketing the facility
- Coordinating staff
- Writing up care plans
The role is vital in ensuring the wellbeing of society’s senior demographic, an often tragically overlooked and denigrated population that deserves to be cared for.
You will almost certainly make meaningful connections as you work in a different kind of healthcare environment than the typical hospital setting, so if you wanted a change from the norm, it could be the perfect place to turn.
Human Resources Manager
Leaving the clinical side of healthcare for a moment, you may want to move your attention toward the possibility of becoming a human resources manager.
If you wanted a role that offered you the chance to move away from the patient-oriented side of a healthcare organization and instead leaned heavily into the admin side of affairs while still concerning plenty of human interaction, this could be the ideal path to explore.
Just because you may not be directly working with patients does not mean you won’t still be making a huge positive impact on the lives of many.
A human resources manager will typically be responsible for elements of the business such as:
- Hiring, firing, and training staff
- Onboarding new employees
- Writing and upholding company policies
- Acting as an advisor for employees
- Overseeing employee relations
- Interviewing staff and conducting investigations
- Resolving workplace disputes
As you can see, the role is heavily angled toward the employees and their relationship with the organization.
Suffice to say, this requires a good HR resources manager to possess a great set of interpersonal skills, including some valuable traits like integrity, dependability, and loyalty.
The role is essential in making the healthcare environment as streamlined as possible. It provides an irreplaceable cog in a well-oiled machine, and it often helps businesses choose the right people for the job, a factor that is especially vital when it comes to healthcare.
Complaints Manager
If you have a penchant for problem-solving, diffusing difficult situations, and remaining professional and collected under extreme pressure, a complaints management role could be suited to an aspiring administration professional such as yourself.
Complaints are fairly common in many walks of business, but in healthcare, they can be immensely damaging and lead to some serious legal issues, particularly since the industry is so heavily regulated.
This is where you would swoop in and save the day. By ensuring that your company is protected and the customer is appeased, your job is done.
This might be far more easily said than done, of course, but if you already have a history of working in healthcare, especially in a bedside role, you will likely be well-versed in the nature of patient conflict and complaints.
Your everyday responsibilities could consist of:
- Managing the handling of customer complaints, both formal and informal
- Monitoring investigations and forming valuable relationships with customers
- Providing advice to customers
- Recommending which actions a customer should take
- Supporting customers throughout the complaints process while following company protocol
- Recording information pertaining to complaints
- Conducting interviews with employees and customers
This is an area of administration in which empathy, patience, and perspective will likely get you a good distance.
Plus, if you happen to possess a good eye for detail and an ability to diffuse a situation without offending anyone, you are probably a strong candidate for the role.
How to Make the Transition
Making the transition to the world of healthcare administration might not be as difficult as one may have first thought.
Provided you have a few key transferrable skills, there is a chance you can start right away at a great entry-level position.
If you do have experience in the healthcare industry already, you’re probably in a superb position to branch out into a higher-paying role. However, so don’t hesitate to cast your net a little further afield.
Ultimately, healthcare administration is yet another essential part of an irreplaceable industry, one that offers its own unique set of rewards and challenges, often away from the bedside.
Throughout the year, our writers feature fresh, in-depth, and relevant information for our audience of 40,000+ healthcare leaders and professionals. As a healthcare business publication, we cover and cherish our relationship with the entire health care industry including administrators, nurses, physicians, physical therapists, pharmacists, and more. We cover a broad spectrum from hospitals to medical offices to outpatient services to eye surgery centers to university settings. We focus on rehabilitation, nursing homes, home care, hospice as well as men’s health, women’s heath, and pediatrics.
