Maintain pressure on reforms to protect NHS
Jon Harvey
Buckinghamshire
Change facilitator and organisational development practitioner with 20 years experience across the public services and commercial world. My passions are: • Designing and facilitating ‘big’ meetings / whole system processes to shape the future & handle the present • Coaching & helping people to lead change & innovation • Creating away-days where lunch is not the highlight • And questioning - where I have a reputation for challenging people and organisations in ways that I hope makes them ‘wriggle but not squirm’
Recent activity
Comments (18)
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Comment on: Is it acceptable to refer to patients as bed blockers?
In answer - absolutely not. It is a classic case of victim blaming - rather than looking at the systemic reasons why the person may have to remain in a hospital bed for the time being.
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Comment on: How postcards that asked four simple questions improved patient feedback on safety
Great idea! The small and simple ones are always the best! One thought - why not ask for comments from the 'yes' answers too - understanding what people appreciate is also developmental! (And the staff get a welcome piece of positive feedback too!) Jon Harvey http://smallcreativeideas.blogspot.com/
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Comment on: Understaffing to blame for NHS productivity drop, says health minister
No chance that the 'purchaser provider split' might actually push productivity down and numbers of managers & bureaucracy up, I suppose?
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Comment on: Desperate times call for inventive measures
Absolutely agree. It seems to me that the most important ingredient in success for any organisation - large or small - is motivation. This is not just the motivation to turn up, or indeed the motivation to do good professional job. The kind of motivation I am talking about is the desire to think "how can we do this better?... how can we deliver even more to those we serve?... what do I and my colleagues have to do to achieve even more than yesterday?..." This kind of energy is rare in many organisations. Indeed, many of these organisations do not even know what they are missing. If organisations focus on bringing in outside "experts" - I think this kind of ordinary but rare motivation is neutralised (or at the very least it is not nurtured). At the worst - people are turned off and will maybe even seek to sabotage the organisation or harm it in some way. I know I am not alone in thinking this - but I and my fellow activists against the "bring in the expensive experts" approach to organisational development are sometimes marginalised. Perhaps this is because many senior people do not allow themselves to really believe in the boundless creative energy of more junior people - despite the oft favoured words of "our people are a greatest asset". Large consultancies, naturally, collude with this view and happily (and expensively) introduce cumbersome systems of performance management, target setting and human resource management strategies (etc.) which weigh down the organisations and squeeze out creativity. If people are interested - my blog has over 250 ideas on how to improve service and efficiency - gathered from public & third sector organisations. Please browse and some more - thanks! http://smallcreativeideas.blogspot.com/
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Comment on: Exploring the evidence on strategies to reduce teenage pregnancy rates
This is an excellent and provocative article that I hope makes policy makers and indeed the Teenage Pregnancy Unit sit up and think about their practices and assumptions. I am sure this will not be the end of the story - but the ball is now firmly in the Government's & TPU's court to evidence their continuing strategies. I only wish more Government (at all levels) strategies could undergo such scrutiny - we need more evidence based policy and practice - in every aspect of the public services (not just in health care). Indeed I would argue we need more whole system approaches to developing and implementing strategies that result in more ~strACTegies~ and fewer ~STRUTegies~ ! (See http://jonharveyassociates.blogspot.com/2009/05/have-stractegy-rather-than-strutegy.html for more on that.) But overall, again I would say - an excellent article - thanks for publishing this.
