Measuring organizational flexibility in community pharmacy: Building the capacity to implement cognitive pharmaceutical services

BackgroundCommunity pharmacy is undergoing transformation with increasing pressure to build its capacity to deliver cognitive pharmaceutical services (“services”). The theoretical framework of organizational flexibility (OF) may be used to assess the capacity of community pharmacy to implement change programs and guide capacity-building initiatives.ObjectiveTo test the applicability of an existing scale measuring OF to the industry of community pharmacy in Australia.MethodsA mail survey was used to test a preexisting scale measuring OF amended from 28 items to 20 items testing 3 underlying factors of operational, structural, and strategic flexibility in the Australian community pharmacy context. The sample was 2006 randomly-stratified community pharmacies. A confirmatory factor analysis was conducted to assess the validity and reliability of the 1-factor models for each underlying construct and the full measurement model.ResultsResponses were received from a total of 395 (19.7%) community pharmacies. The 1-factor models of operational, structural, and strategic flexibility fit the data with appropriate respecification. Overall, the favorable fit of the individual factor constructs suggested that the multiple-factor measurement model should be tested. However, this model did not yield an interpretable response. Operational flexibility covaried negatively to the other factors, whereas structural and strategic flexibility shared covariance. Despite this, the results highlighting the individual factor fit suggest the constructs have application to pharmacy.ConclusionsThe individual OF constructs were useful in the development and initial testing of a scale adapted for community pharmacy. When further developed and validated, the scale could be used to identify group of pharmacies that require individualized assistance to build capacity and integrate services and other new endeavors.