Understanding innovators' experiences of barriers and facilitators in implementation and diffusion of healthcare service innovations: A qualitative study

This article is made available through the Brunel Open Access Publishing Fund - Copyright @ 2011 Barnett et al.Background: Healthcare service innovations are considered to play a pivotal role in improving organisational efficiency and responding effectively to healthcare needs. Nevertheless, healthcare organisations encounter major difficulties in sustaining and diffusing innovations, especially those which concern the organisation and delivery of healthcare services. The purpose of the present study was to explore how healthcare innovators of process-based initiatives perceived and made sense of factors that either facilitated or obstructed the innovation implementation and diffusion. Methods: A qualitative study was designed. Fifteen primary and secondary healthcare organisations in the UK, which had received health service awards for successfully generating and implementing service innovations, were studied. In-depth, semi structured interviews were conducted with the organisational representatives who conceived and led the development process. The data were recorded, transcribed and thematically analysed. Results: Four main themes were identified in the analysis of the data: the role of evidence, the function of inter-organisational partnerships, the influence of human-based resources, and the impact of contextual factors. "Hard" evidence operated as a proof of effectiveness, a means of dissemination and a pre-requisite for the initiation of innovation. Inter-organisational partnerships and people-based resources, such as champions, were considered an integral part of the process of developing, establishing and diffusing the innovations. Finally, contextual influences, both intra-organisational and extra-organisational were seen as critical in either impeding or facilitating innovators' efforts. Conclusions: A range of factors of different combinations and co-occurrence were pointed out by the innovators as they were reflecting on their experiences of implementing, stabilising and diffusing novel service initiatives. Even though the innovations studied were of various contents and originated from diverse organisational contexts, innovators' accounts converged to the significant role of the evidential base of success, the inter-personal and inter-organisational networks, and the inner and outer context. The innovators, operating themselves as important champions and being often willing to lead constructive efforts of implementation to different contexts, can contribute to the promulgation and spread of the novelties significantly.This research was supported financially by the Multidisciplinary Assessment of Technology Centre for Healthcare (MATCH)

A career of choice: attracting talented young people into house building

The purpose of this research was to establish a better understanding of how young people view house building as a career choice and to provide insights to improve recruitment of those with enthusiasm and talent into the sector. It collected the views of over 500 teenagers and young men and women between the ages of 14 and 24, and the views of those who advise them on careers.NHBC Foundatio

Planning Forum Volume 16

Table of Contents: The Naked Practitioner: Participatory Community Development in Peri-Urban Mexico /by Dr. Patricia Wilson (p. 5) -- Skopje, Macedonia, 1965 to 2014: In Search of a Modern European Capital /by Dr. Cynthia A. Lintz and Lauren Bulka (p. 19) -- Preparing Planners for Economic Decline and Population Loss: An Assessment of North American Planning Curricula /by Maxwell Hartt (p. 33) -- Development and Displacement: Single Family Home Demolitions in Central East Austin, 2007 to 2014 /by Sara McTarnaghan (p. 47) -- Imagining Austin: Political Economy and the Austin Comprehensive Plan /by Adam Ogusky (p. 67) -- Piñata Power: Reflections on Race, Love, and Planning /by Elizabeth Walsh (p. 83) -- A Reflection on Exploratory Research in Pointe-Saint-Charles /by Aditi Ohri (p. 91) -- The Neighborhood and the Park: Drumul Taberei, Bucharest /by Maria Alexandrescu (p. 97) -- A Case for Regional Planning in Energy Access Delivery /by Vivek Shastry (p. 101) -- Marketing Magic: The Tourism Ministry’s Pueblos Mágicos Program and Historical Preservation in Mexico /by Gibrán Lule-Hurtado (p. 107) -- The Spectacularization of Urban Development on the Las Vegas Strip /by Kurt Kraler (p. 115) -- Author Biographies (p. 121) -- Acknowledgments (p. 123)Community and Regional Plannin

Practical, appropriate, empirically-validated guidelines for designing educational games

There has recently been a great deal of interest in the potential of computer games to function as innovative educational tools. However, there is very little evidence of games fulfilling that potential. Indeed, the process of merging the disparate goals of education and games design appears problematic, and there are currently no practical guidelines for how to do so in a coherent manner. In this paper, we describe the successful, empirically validated teaching methods developed by behavioural psychologists and point out how they are uniquely suited to take advantage of the benefits that games offer to education. We conclude by proposing some practical steps for designing educational games, based on the techniques of Applied Behaviour Analysis. It is intended that this paper can both focus educational games designers on the features of games that are genuinely useful for education, and also introduce a successful form of teaching that this audience may not yet be familiar with

Doctor of Philosophy

dissertationThis dissertation is a qualitative case study of organizing for sustainability, which is an ambiguous term that has been part of public discussion of environmental issues since at least 1987. A growing number of organizations employ sustainability officers responsible for communicating with internal and external audiences. Since this sort of work is becoming more common, scholarship investigating the intersections of sustainability, organizing, and communication is needed. This study followed the development of an office of sustainability at a large U.S. public university from the fall of 2007 to the spring of 2010. The author engaged in longterm participant observation, conducted 20 in-depth individual interviews, and two group interviews with employees and partners of the office of sustainability. This study's research questions focus upon lay theories of communication, organizing, and persuasion. The author develops a uniquely interpretive approach to reconstructing and assessing lay theories of communication. Employing this analytic framework, the author addresses participants' lay theorizing of intraorganizational advocacy, voice, and communication ethics. Findings show that study participants navigate at least three tensions when cultivating a collective environmental voice on campus, and theorize communication in ways that discourage or disparage overt influence and the direct engagement of communication ethics in discussions about sustainability. The study demonstrates the value of inquiry into sustainability advocates' metacommunication in addition to their communication strategies and practices