The management of issues in community pharmacies

Abstract

Given the dynamic and changing nature of the business environment in the Republic of South Africa, into which the added dimension of social, political and economic complexities intrude, and given the dynamic business environment in which community pharmacies currently (1993) operate, it is imperative that community pharmacists, particularly owners and managers, anticipate, identify and analyze, as well as, manage issues impacting on the future viability of community pharmacies. However, uncertainty exists regarding the ability of owners and managers of community pharmacies to manage issues affecting community pharmacies. This poses a problem for the future viability of community pharmacies. This study attempts to outline the critical issues impacting on community pharmacies within their task, and macro-environments and attempts to find an answer to the question of how issues affecting community pharmacies should be managed. Four hypotheses are formulated and twelve objectives are stated in order to complete this study. Focused interviews, media reports on community pharmacies and pharmaceutical industry publications provided information on the issues impacting on community pharmacies. These issues were regarded as preliminary issues. Empirical research, confirmed that there are a number of issues impacting on the future viability of community pharmacies. Literature studies on issues management provided information on the concept of issues. The term issues as it applies to issues management is defined as: Emerging, current or unfolding conditions of pressure in the task, and macro-environments of organizations which, through the public policy process, impact on the future viability of organizations. The different categories of issues according to their stage of development, their social context and their strategic dimension were also analyzed. Apart from emerging and current issues, a new concept of 'unfolding issues' is introduced in this study. The diminishing ability of organizations to influence issues as they develop in relation to time, as well as the importance of identifying issues during the early stages of development is emphasized. Literature studies provided information on the concept of issues management. For the purpose of this study, issues management is defined as: A management process determined to identify and analyze issues which can have a strategic impact on the future viability of an organization as well as managing an effective response to such issues. From the theoretical deliberation of issues management, as well as deductions from the empirical research conducted in this study, the conclusion is reached that issues management, as a management process, can be applied by owners/managers of community pharmacies. From the descriptive statistical results it is further concluded that owners/managers of community pharmacies do identify and analyze issues, and that they manage responses to such issues. The quality of issues management, as applied by owners/managers of community pharmacies was, however, not determined. A factor analysis revealed that the media, communication, networking and strategic management are used as aids by owners/managers in the management of issues affecting community pharmacies. Other relationships among selected independent and dependent variables are also explored in this study. The empirical research conducted in this study indicates that pharmacists as owners/managers of community pharmacies are not adequately equipped to apply the process of issues management in community pharmacies. In this regard it is recommended that community pharmacists can be only become part of an issues identification program when trained to identify issues by effectively applying environmental scanning techniques. In conclusion, recommendations on how to apply the process of issues management within professional pharmacy organizations are provided.