Comparison of Two Dissertations - Essay Example

?COMPARISON OF TWO PAST DISSERTATIONS OF 16th APRIL Comparisonof two past dissertations This essay involves a comparison of two dissertations done in the past in different institutions. One of them is a case study on how Chichester cinema at New Park can use social media to engage with their audiences online and the second one is a research carried out by Nuffield Institute at the University of Leeds to identify an adequate tool which can be used in assessing partnership relationships. The partnership dissertation dwells much in the research carried out by the Nuffield Institute in an effort to find a partnership assessment tool for assessing strategic partnership. This partnership assessment tool has been acclimatized by different institutions such as the local government and health partnerships. The purpose of the Partnership Assessment Tool is to offer cost effective, quick and simple way of assessing efficiency of partnership working. This enables quick identification of areas with a problem and thus avoiding costly, exhaustive, and lengthy investigations. The tool would also be referred to by people interested in setting up partnerships. They would know the matters to be included or to be avoided in the agreements. The institutions have mostly focused on strategic partnership since it has proved effective in understanding many complex relationships and issues between partners. Project managers, senior officers and others have used it as a practical way for implementing essential partnerships that make differences to the lives of the general public (Hardy, 2003). On the other hand, a case study of Chichester New Park Cinema was carried out to identify the efficiency of social media in increasing customer turnout. Chichester Cinema is a single screened cinema located in the heart of the city. Most of the films shown are of small-budget, cultural values and are collections of foreign and older language films. It has comfortable and comfy bar area with passionate, knowledgeable and friendly staff largely made up of volunteers. The research would help Chichester New Park Cinema in making conversant decisions. It would identify ways of improving the customer retention and experience as well gaining insight into the demographic of the customers. It is from this research that they would know whether to continue engaging with their audiences online or to maintain their conventional advertisements. In order to gather essential information that would be successfully implemented, the Nuffield Institute used the West Sussex Joint Commissioning Unit to assess the degree of partnership. The institute also wanted to evaluate the perceptions of the West Sussex Joint Commissioning Unit on the barriers hindering improvement of partnership working. After the assessment and evaluation, the institute would recommend to the commissioning unit on how to perk up partnership working unit. The institute decided to use different partners within the internal management team in order to achieve the objectives of the research. The partners used were; six principle managers, sixteen commissioning managers and the interim director. In order to gain views from a wide range of staff, a purposive stratified sample was proposed. The staffs proposed for completions of the tool were; four of the twelve West Sussex County council commissioning managers and two of the four NHS Sussex Commissioning Managers. The six principle managers composed of three NHS Sussex and three WSCC as well as the Director of the Interim. From this research, the institute would identify the effectiveness of partnership working in achieving the objectives and the aims of the Unit. In addition, the objective of the research also focused on the wider organizational partnership of the Joint Commissioning Unit. These partners are derived from North West Sussex GP Commissioning Association, Coastal West Sussex Federation and West Sussex County Council. Another team was also drawn from (JCMG) Joint Commissioning Management Group to do purposive stratified sample. This team composed of; the Director of adults’ services, one member of every GP Consortia management team and the chair of each GP Consortia. The Director of the Joint Commissioning Interim led a team composed of different principle managers in charge of various service users. They included principle managers for; children and families, adults and other people, learning disability, mental health and substance misuse, planning and contracting, and specialist support. The case study of Chichester Cinema tends to have disparities in objectives as compared to the research carried out by the Nuffield Institute. In the case study, a number of objectives were laid down In order to come up with a reliable conclusion for the research. Using these objectives, a good relationship between the customers and cinema using social media would be improved. After the research, various ways of improving and maintaining the relationship would be recommended to the Chichester Cinema. The potential efficiency of developing the use social media as a medium for communication between the cinema and the customers would be determined. This study would be useful in investigating the source of customers’ information about the cinema and the effective strategies needed in order to increase the awareness. Availability of the internet access and the elements of cinema information valued by the customers would be investigated. Taking into account that there are many competitors, it would be important for the study to focus on the reasons why the customers preferred the Chichester Cinema at New Park. The study would reflect the future prosperity of the Chichester Cinema. It would tell whether to continue engaging with their audiences online or to maintain their conventional advertisements. It is good to take into account that everything that have merits have demerit too. Although Partnership Working has proved so effective in understanding multifaceted issues between partners, it has faced a number of challenges (Hardy, 2003). It is difficult, time consuming, and frequently complex. Partners may spend a lot of time reviewing objectives, developing business plans or agreeing. In some occasions, the difficulties which may be associated with a single partner end up dissolving the partnership or amending the constitution. In many cases, the barriers to partnership have proved more difficult to conquer compared to others. The barriers identified in partnership working are; professional, cultural, financial, structural, procedural and legitimacy. However, in partnerships that maintains excellent understanding amongst the parties involved, such disparities are minimal since they are readily ameliorated once identified (Hardy, 2003). The research by the Chichester Cinema is not exceptional. From the case study, a number of challenges facing the cinema industry are outlined. They include; Increased numbers of downloads which lead to a loss of about five hundred million pounds yearly, reduction in the expandable income, and the economic impact of recession. Increase in the number of downloads also causes a reduction in the number of audiences for a couple of years. This results to competition with mainstream multi-screened cinemas which are able to show a multiple of films simultaneously. Small independent cinemas cannot cope with this stiff competition and therefore, end up recording significant losses. The Partnership Assessment Tool is based on six principles. The principles include; recognizing and accepting the need for partnership, developing clarity and realism of purpose, ensuring commitment and ownership, developing and maintaining trust, creating clear and robust partnership arrangements and, mentoring and measuring (Hardy, 2000). In order to understand the first partnership principle, several elements were laid out. They included; identification of the principle partnership achievement, identification of the barriers associated with partnership working and identification of the factors allied to efficient partnership working. They also needed to acknowledge the extent of interdependence and independence amongst the partners and whether the policy context would create persuaded, mandatory or voluntary partnership working. The laid down elements were used to conduct an interview which would help to gather information. From the second principle, a number of elements were also formulated. These elements were used to gather information from the partners. From the interview conducted, they wanted to investigate whether the partnership had shared values, agreed services and a clear vision (Hardy, 2000). They would also identify whether the joint objectives and aims were realistic or clearly defined. In addition, they would identify whether all partners had clearly understood the reason why they were in partnership and whether they were focusing on areas with likely success. The third principle was concerned with ensuring a widespread commitment and ownership of partnership working. The elements laid down would help in identification of whether the partners had appropriate seniority or consistency of commitment or even widespread ownership outside and within partner organizations. They would also identify and recognize the ones having networking skills. From the fourth principle, the data collected would tell whether the partners had developed and maintained trust amongst themselves (Hardy, 2000). This would help in ensuring fairness, equal recognition and just distribution of partnership benefits. The fifth principle would help in the identification of whether robust and clear partnership arrangements were created. This would be an appropriate measure of transparency in the resources contributed by the partners as well as distinguishing whether collective responsibilities were clearly understood. The sixth and the last principle referred to the insightful component of partnership working. It is the integrity part of every management and planning process. This principle would help in monitoring and measuring the levels of commitment, doubts or benefits to individual partners. In conclusion, while both dissertations focus on problems facing institutions, their motive for carrying out the study are different. A case study of Chichester Cinema was carried out to investigate whether one method of engaging audiences would work best over the other one. The research on the Partnership Working was carried out in an effort to find innovative ways of improving public service by use of partnership. Both of them analyzed areas faced by problems but at the end, recommendations were put in place in an order to eliminate them. From the two studies, it is justifiable to say that they successfully achieved their goals since they were able to come up with good recommendations of solving the challenges identified. The two dissertations varied in methodology used to collect data. The partnership working research used principles that were used to come up with questionnaires for interviewing the population sample but the case study used population samples. In addition, the dissertations varied in conclusion since one was positive and the other one negative. From the case study, the research proved outstandingly good at increasing awareness of services and goods but not through increase of social media. This is considered negative since Chichester Cinema wanted to know the use of social media in engaging customers online. On the other hand, Partnership Working research gave a positive conclusion since an effective tool of assessing partnership had been identified. References List Hardy, B, Hudson, B & Waddington, E 2000, What makes a good partnership? a partnership assessment tool. Nuffield Institute for Health, Community Care Division. West Yorkshire. Hardy, B, Hudson, B & Waddington, E 2003, Assessing strategic partnering taskforce, Office of the Deputy Prime Minister, West Yorkshire. Read More