The role of a human resources department in a psychiatric hospital.

Abstract

The aim of this study is to explore what is the role of a human resources department in a mental hospital. Can a human resources department help in tackling specific problems encountered in the psychiatric setting? If this is possible, how can it be achieved? To investigate this hypothesis a review of the existing literature was studied and following the literature review, interviews with the heads of the personnel sections I human resources departments of our hospitals are carried out Once the interviews were carried out, they are analysed against the background of what was stated in the literature review. Following the analyses suggestions was provided on what could be implemented in our psychiatric hospital. The main findings of this study were that our hospitals have competent people running the human resources I personnel sections. However, the general administration procedures are not as they should be and old-fashioned management and administration are hampering improvement. Our personnel I human resources departments are still dependent on their respective central units; St Luke's Hospital has the Valletta Health Department, and St Vincent De Paule Residence has Casa Leone. Since the personnel I human resources departments are dependent on these central units to take action, things are moving extremely slowly. This is having a domino effect on almost all other areas, like discipline procedures, staff motivation, rewards system, productivity, staff training and education. Not expected, this study also brought to surface the fact that staff in the our hospitals do not know what is the role of the personnel sections, and the employees working in the personnel sections and human resources department do not know what is the difference between a human resources departments and the traditional personnel sections.