Merge is really not the term I would use!

I had spoke about a possible merger between my smaller hospital and a larger organization in a previous blog and it is final! I have to say I am concerned. It was not a merge it was a buy out. I knew we had been looking at several organizations that had made offers and the one my organization had picked was the one I did not want. I do some moonlight work with employees that work for this larger organization and in fact their Chief MRI Technologist works with me from time to time. We happen to went to same school in Tampa and now we both work in Western North Carolina which shows what a small radiology world we have! I hear her struggles and they are the same I was concerned about as in previous blog. She really has little to do with staffing and budgeting or how her department works. I guess I better get use to it. I just have a hard time understanding that decisions are made in departments from people who never worked in them. There is an interesting show on TV about CEO'S going undercover in their organizations and doing jobs that their policies have influenced and always they come out of it showing how much they do not get it. They seem to be humbled by how the front line workers do their jobs. Well it is what it is and I will blog more when I know more.

New Changes in Marketing Plan

We have decreased the amount of marketing we usually do in the past year. This was most likely due to several reasons; such as, a new imaging director and decrease in funding due to the economic crunch we have all felt. We just had a meeting and now we are stepping up with marketing. I have always been an intricate part of this but now I am in charge of all marketing for MRI services at the hospital. We are a smaller hospital so my job is primarily outpatients, making it critical to reach the outside referring doctors. I like the idea of focusing on just MRI's when we go out because I think if we touch on all modalities at same time it can be overwhelming. I can not help to be a little nervous. If we go and devote all this time, energy, and money toward marketing and at the end it does not result with a increase of volume, I can not help, but feel partially responsible.