Stakeholder Analysis of Kaiser Family Foundation
Kaiser Family Foundation is the US based not-for-profit organization that deals with medical research, health policy analysis and journalism connected with health related matters. The KFF deals with the issues of HIV and Aids, abortion, Medicare, insurance and health costs. The foundation's mission focuses on the supply of trusted health information to the people throughout the world. It majorly relies on the external funding as opposed to earning its profits. The major stakeholders of the organization, therefore, include the employees, universities and colleges, major media companies, policy makers, the government and the public at large.
To start with, the public as a major stakeholder is keen on getting health information to protect themselves from diseases. The foundation, for example, provides the one for the youths to help them avoid the HIV and Aids (Ranji, Salganikoff, & Wyn, 2005). It also furnishes many facts regarding maternity health and other upcoming health issues affecting the society at large. Moreover, the organization makes a deep analysis of information and statistics regarding the diseases to enable the public to make a wise decision on how to escape from the illnesses or how to cope with them (Ranji, Salganikoff, & Wyn, 2005). It is worth stating that the public gains all the information provided free of charge because that is the very essence of the KFF. The Kaiser Family Foundation is funded by external donors to do this (Rideout, 2007). Without the public, therefore, its mandate would not be capable of realization.
The second most important stakeholder is the government. The main interest of the Kaiser Family Foundation is to present information to the public to draw the attention of the relevant establishments. The government of the United States of America is interested in the information and research regarding healthcare and diseases to enable it to evaluate its health policies and measure their impact on the public. The data received also helps them to learn about the areas which need urgent attention and intervention. The foundations focus is on doing an in-depth research on diseases and coming up with findings and fact sheets which the government can use to gauge the reality. . The government, therefore, needs this data to plan its budget and control illnesses (Ranji, Salganikoff, & Wyn, 2005). Finally, the KFF also questions the suitability of the laws enacted by the parliament on healthcare for amendment or enactment of other regulations to cover up a certain health problem in the society.
The third significant stakeholder of the Kaiser Family Foundation is the employees. Being interested in building their lives based on the salaries they earn, they are also a very important pillar for the provision of accurate and quality information. A well- supported and paid workforce translates into quality service delivery and supply of data. Obviously, the Kaiser Foundation is focused on providing the most accurate information to its stakeholders, and that comes from its employees. The establishment, therefore, motivates its workers to ensure that they do their best in doing quality research to ensure that the government acts based on the right data, and the public also gets to make health decisions based on proper facts (Ranji, Salganikoff, & Wyn, 2005). To finish, it is necessary to state that professionals from the healthcare sector, information communication and technology areas, accountants and lawyers also get hired for quality delivery of service.
The fourth most essential stakeholder is the policy makers. These include the government, the legislators, hospitals and health regulators. The legislators, for example, are interested in the information provided by the organization to come up with clear laws to manage certain diseases and also set the pace for the government to regulate the health industry. Furthermore, the health policy makers always need the identification of health problems to provide the relevant solutions that usually take the form of a policy or law Thus, the Kaiser Foundation plays a big role in the distinguishing of health issues in the society for the policy makers to be able to act on them for the betterment of the general public (Tarlov et al., 1987).
To continue, the fifth stakeholder is the media. The mass media is interested in the information provided by the foundation for its further dissemination to the public. No doubt, they take pride in the distribution of the quality facts to the society, and therefore, they must ensure that they come from a credible source. The KFF has been working on its image of a trusted healthcare information provider since 1948, and consequently, the media regard the data coming from it as being more reliable compared to others (Tarlov et al., 1987). Since it is an organization whose activity is health journalism among others, other media companies are interested in a partnership with it to be able to stay up to date with the health news as the KFF dedicates most of its resources to the research and policy analysis.
The last stakeholder is the higher learning institutions. Since the primary goal of the NGO is research in the health field, it uses the universities and colleges in carrying out the activities of this type. Universities get established on the foundation of research, and therefore, do the biggest part of the research later submitted to the public. The Kaiser Family Foundation partners with these universities and colleges to enable it to save on costs while, at the same time, providing quality research to the concerned parties (Rideout, 2007).
In conclusion, the Kaiser Family Foundation which started as a mere private society and has now developed to a charity organization has revolutionized the health policy analysis and research sector. Through its stakeholders who are comprised of the employees, the government, the media, the policy makers and the universities and colleges, the establishment has been able to fulfill its mandate.
Center for Policy Analysis on Trade and Health