FINALS: CHANGE MANAGEMENT

Change is inevitable and essential. Change Management is the discipline that guides how we prepare, equip and support individuals to successfully adopt change in order to drive organizational success and outcomes. It goes along the latest trends for it to achieve its goal and purpose, as well as meet the needs of people. It requires understanding how people experience change and help them make a successful transition.

Change might be simple but it never comes easy unless you get rid of barriers or decide to accept what is new and up-and-coming, especially when you're a part of a generation where we continuously and simultaneously evolve.

So how do we relate this in laboratory managment?
It requires strategy, right measurements and certain improvements that makes change in the laboratory easier and organized. Either it is for technological advancements in order to get a satisfactory, fast and accurate result whenever there is a need of laboratory exam, or on how the employees and patients adopt to the environment. At the same time, it takes effort to build up what a laboratory lacks and cannot be simply handled by one individual. An initiative to change should be lead by competent leaders, eager and willing to help his or her enterprise or organization to  meet that change and be able to meet people's needs. Each employee should know the strategies of achieving change and should have the right motivation in order to be consistent in applying change.

  

FINALS: FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT

It always tend to get critical whenever we handle money, most importantly when it come to managing it. Having that responsibility of operating and budgeting finances means it needs more careful and firm planning.
Making decisions on whether how it is spent and how it is invested for future use must be decided wisely.

Funds and budget play important role on managing the finances of a laboratory. Funds are described as a sum of money of its equivalent, accumulated or reserved for a specific purpose while budget is described as a forecast of expenditures necessary to perform the anticipated workload (meaning every money being spent or being considered to be spent shall be delegated according to what limits an individual has set before deciding to purchase or buy a certain item or desire).

I believe that funding and budgeting does not only apply in how you handle finances in the laboratory, but should also be practiced in our everyday lives. Budgeting and funding helps us to be disciplined of managing money the right way and spending it on the right and reasonable purpose.

FINALS: SAFETY MANAGEMENT

Safety management is an essential and vital part of managing a laboratory, because most of the ones we are going to handle requires careful and keen actions. We will be encountering a lot of situations where our health is at risk and makes us prone to exposure of various harmful substances or radiations. The workplace, facilities and the how the clinical laboratory is constructed greatly affects the safety management of an organization or hospital. 

The primary concern of safety management is that its employees and clients (patients, costumers etc.) are both comfortable and assured that whatever happens, their health would not be compromised and most importantly, not going to cost their own lives.

Safety programs should include the prevention and precautionary bits of information on how to be prepared when a certain situation happens in the laboratory. The chemical, biological and fire prevention measures should be discussed and demonstrated to every employee who would be performing certain tasks that puts their health at risk.

Hazards, protective methods and procedures, safety equipment, safety codes all comprises the safety management that a laboratory and its employees shall comply. It should be all based on the standards and regulations that the authorities have stated to be carried out by a clinical laboratory.

MIDTERMS: Communication

What is communication? What does it mean? Why is it very important?

According to my source, “communication is a process of transferring information from a sender to a receiver with the use of a medium in which the communication information is understoodby both the sender and receiver. It requires that all parties understand a common language that is exchanged.”

Communication is very vital when it comes to management. How you deliver and how it is carried out plays an important role in the laboratory because everything that functions inside is responsible for the expected outcome. Let’s say I said something directed to someone and that someone acknowledged what I just said, then that means the communication went well. But if what I just said was not understood by the other party, then that will otherwise be called “miscommunication”.

Miscommunications could lead  you to A LOT of trouble. And in order for you to save yourself from embarrassment, it’s always best to ask and have people repeat what they say and what they mean because sometimes we tend to assume that what they said is according to what we perceive.

So in every situation, always be careful of how you deliver and express what you want to be understood in order for you to avoid mistakes and miscommunications, especially in the laboratory. Also in your love life ;)

*Everything that I listed and pointed out here are all based from my notes given and discussed to us by our lecturer on Laboratory Management. We were given a task to choose three topics from both our preliminary term and midterm, to which we all get to share and express all the things that we’ve learned for this second semester. *

MIDTERM: MASLOW’S HIERARCHY OF NEEDS

Maslow’s hierarchy of needs theorizes how the primary and basic needs of human must be prioritized in order to meet satisfaction before pursuing the secondary needs.

 “The growth of self-actualization (Maslow, 1962) refers to the need for personal growth and discovery that is present throughout a person’s life. For Maslow, a person is always “becoming” and never remains static in these terms.  In self-actualization a person comes to find a meaning to life that is important to them”

I personally believe Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs simplifies the practical needs and priorities of an individual. It helps you figure out how you manage your life in a way where  you develop a sense of understanding and learning to accept your choices that leads you to what you need to become.

*Everything that I listed and pointed out here are all based from my notes given and discussed to us by our lecturer on Laboratory Management. We were given a task to choose three topics from both our preliminary term and midterm, to which we all get to share and express all the things that we’ve learned for this second semester. *

MIDTERMS: BARRIERS TO COMMUNICATION

There are 5 considered barriers to communication and here are the following:

• Structural barrier is based more on the organization’s design and bureaucratic patterns, the number of employees and managers and supervisory layers. From the term itself, it is more focused on the structure of one particular target receiver.

• Semantics barrier is the branch of communication science that studies aspects of words and messages.

•  Technical barrier is affected by the defect in equipment, in the environment and in the medium being used.

•  People barrier is more on how the receiver interprets the message received. Communications is affected by differences in background and perception. It embodies the quote “ Say what you mean and mean what you say”.

• Outcome barrier is when the receiver cannot perform the requested task, then that means the communication has not been entirely successful.

All of these represent almost all of the often experienced barriers when it comes to communication, that is why being aware and doing something to make that barrier be built into a bridge, then successful communication will be attained.

*Everything that I listed and pointed out here are all based from my notes given and discussed to us by our lecturer on Laboratory Management. We were given a task to choose three topics from both our preliminary term and midterm, to which we all get to share and express all the things that we’ve learned for this second semester. *

Prelims: SMART

What is SMART?

Speaking from experience, these abbreviations have helped out a lot of people, including me, to meet the goals and plans we have set in order to accomplish our main mission in life, at the moment.

• Specific                  

 - What exactly needs to be accomplished?

 - Who else will be involved?

 - Where will this take place?
 - Why do I want to accomplish the goal?

• Measurable          

 - How will I know I've succeeded?

 - How much change needs to occur?
 - How many accomplishments or actions will it take?

• Attainable               

- Do I have, or can I get, the resources needed to achieve the goal?

 - Is the goal a reasonable stretch to me? (Neither out of reach nor to easy)

 - Are the actions I plan to take likely to bring success?

• Relevant                

 - Is this a worthwhile goal for me right now?

 - Is it meaningful to me- or just something others think I should do?

 - Would it delay or prevent me from achieving a more important goal?

 - Am I willing to commit to achieving this goal?

• Time-bound           

 - When is the deadline for reaching the goal?

 - When do I need to take action?

 - What can I do today?

*Everything that I listed and pointed out here are all based from my notes given and discussed to us by our lecturer on Laboratory Management. We were given a task to choose three topics from both our preliminary term and midterm, to which we all get to share and express all the things that we’ve learned for this second semester. *