Sustainable Management, Instable Legislation Regarding Wages, and Employee Satisfaction/ Motivation in Two Romanian Hospitals

The aim of our study is to evaluate the employees’ level of satisfaction/motivation in two Romanian public hospitals in the context of numerous changes of the legislation concerning the level of payment of the employees working in the healthcare system, and to reveal the characteristics of a proper, sustainable management in this type of public healthcare unit. During 2015–2018, 4945 questionnaires were distributed to the staff of both hospitals, processed, and analyzed. In the Clinical County Emergency Hospital of Oradea, the analysis of the questionnaires showed a decrease in motivation (from 94.63% in 2017 to 79.14% in 2018). In the Timisoara County Clinical Emergency Hospital, for all the categories tested, there was a slight increase of the motivation. All the professional categories showed a degree of satisfaction with ascending evolution. Motivations of a different kind than the financial one, reinforced by the hospital’s management in recent years, have led to a general degree of employee satisfaction, 96.95% of them being satisfied that they work in the hospital. In the current unstable legislative context, financial motivation cannot be influenced by the management of public hospitals; therefore, the most appropriate measures that are needed must be geared towards increasing non-financial motivation.