To an average reader who is not entirely familiar with the way that health care institutions are rescued from an unstable marker, the article may proof a bit misleading from the start.
First, the author spends a considerable amount of time talking about a comparable industry that also sells goods and services while closely watching for costs and quality: the food industry.
The article starts by explaining the dynamics of consumerism (cost control), culinary tendencies, food preparation techniques (quality control) , and the different ways to get the goods (innovation) in the Cheesecake Factory corporation. While this is an excellent way to break the ice and keep the attention of the reader, there was an excessive amount of detail involved in the description of the dishes, in the dialogue with the waiters, and in the celebration of the food.
That, suddenly switched to the central question: What if the health care industry packaged its goods and services options in the same manner as The Cheesecake Factory. This means, can the health care industry provide goods and services that are made "from scratch" (with the recipient in mind), made into a variety of ways, be widely available, and from a selection that is sure to please everyone.
Then the author continues to get into more information regarding The Cheesecake Factory that could have been left out, if the central topic is to re-focus on how the healthcare industries conduct their business. For example, take a look at this paragraph and tell me how can it possibly tie in with the gist of what the author is trying to convey?
Factory’s major competitor, Darden, owns Olive Garden, LongHorn Steakhouse, Red Lobster, and the Capital Grille; [..]We can bristle at the idea of chains and mass production, with their homogeneity, predictability, and constant genuflection to the value-for-money god.
This is where it becomes tangential and very hard for a student of the matter to read.
Then you spend a bad night in a “quaint” “one of a kind” bed-and-breakfast that turns out to have a manic, halitoxic innkeeper who can’t keep the hot water running, and it’s right back to the Hyat.
The author makes a crass assumption that readers will relate universally to an experience in a Hyatt hotel, or elsewhere. I, myself, have never stayed in a Hyatt, as I am a Marriott and Hilton loyalty customer. I have not stayed at a Bed and Breakfast either, so I do not know the difference. The author must have been told at some point that the writing needs to have a lighter side to be digestible. The problem is that the lighter side went on to an extreme lightness. In not so many words, the details are unnecessary.
After this point, the author keeps attempting to make the point of offering more varied and effective goods and services in the industry, watching specifically for the variables mentioned before, of cost control, quality control and innovation.
The narrative was going well until, once again, the author waxed into another allegorical Cheesecake Factory and Darden group restaurants scenario. We know that the idea is to juxtapose the two industries. For once, to analyze how the food industry watches out for its products with a vigilant focus on quality and price. Then, to see how the healthcare industry can do the same thing following the same formulaic process.
It works fine, but the article continues to move across the food and the health industry in a way that blurs the lines and does not allow the reader to really focus on what they really need to know.
In all, the article is interesting, to say the least, but the confusing part stems from the excessive details on how the food industry does things. We want to focus more on the health industry and perhaps add snippets of other industries' protocols.
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