The human resource director wants to forecast how many registered nurses they will need. The human resource director realizes she must determine the relationship between size of hospital (in terms of number of beds) and number of nurses required. She calls eight hospitals of various sizes and gets the following figures: Size of Hospital (Number of Beds) Number of Registered Nurses 200 240 300 260 400 470 500 500 600 620 700 660 800 820 900 860 1200 ? 1600 ?
Tasks 1. Plot these figures within WORD on a scatter plot. Estimate a regression line. That is, draw a line that cuts straight through the center of the points (one that minimizes the distance between the lines and the plotted points).
2. Using your plot estimate the number of nurses needed for 1200 beds and 1600 beds respectively.
3. Answer in paragraph form: Given the trends and the nature of the healthcare industry, what other advice can you give the HR Director? Consider the availability of registered nurses, workloads of registered nurses, and considerations for quality of care for patients.
4. Answer in paragraph form: Why might using the plotted information alone be risky?
5. Answer in paragraph form: What other factors should you consider? Why?
6. Describe one quantitative and one qualitative technique that can be used to forecast human resources demand (discuss in complete detail). Do not define or explain quantitative or qualitative forecasting techniques in general terms. Explain and discuss one type of quantitative forecasting technique and one type of qualitative forecasting technique.
