Enhancing management quality: the potential for productivity growth after the recession

Improving the way firms are managed could have a big impact on the UK's national productivity, says Rebecca Homkes

Analysing the role of public-private partnerships in global governance: institutional dynamics, variation and effects

While the promotion and growth of global public-private partnerships (PPPs) is indisputable, the same enthusiasm has not fuelled their disciplined study; thus, their potential to deliver on their promise of being effective and legitimate governance entities is far from established. Addressing this lack, this work investigates the universe of transnational PPPs in form, functioning and effects. It suggests that as PPPs are institutional innovations, partnership analysis can benefit from applying theoretical constructs from international regime research complemented with adjacent literature from management and organisational studies. Building an analytical framework based on the notions of input and output legitimacy, the work analyses how variation in partnership inputs (focus, actors involved, organisational dynamics and institutionalisation) interacts with varying internal management processes to result in varying outputs. The thesis utilises the operational notion of effects rather than the more subjective notion of partnership effectiveness, and considers effects related to goal attainment and problem solving. Applying a systematic methodology, the work also defines and describes the universe of PPPs, creating a transnational partnership database (TPD) which pulls together all existing sources, thus encompassing 757 partnerships. The resultant analysis reveals a marked variation across the universe of transnational partnerships as well as distinct differences in their operational capacity. It also highlights that while highly institutionalised PPPs are more likely to produce tangible outputs and effects, the extent of these is highly dependent upon internal management. By building a cumulative understanding of these institutional models, the work furthers debates regarding the role of PPPs as legitimate and effective governing actors

Good hospital management can save lives and increase much needed productivity at a time of budget constraints

Budget savings imposed through the government’s deficit reduction agenda have tended to focus on cutting out management costs and reducing layers of bureaucracy in public services. However, Rebecca Homkes presents evidence to show that in fact good management is key to increasing productivity and improving performance in hospitals, and that increasing the numbers of managers who can combine clinical and managerial skills should be a priority for the government