Managing in Mixed Economy - Assignment Example

NEW MME STUDENT NAME INSTRUCTOR INSTITUTION DATE Case-study report: Managing in Mixed economy 1.0 Introduction The introduction of NHS services in England has served to improve trauma care organisation in England. NHS services are managed and run by NHS trusts. The responsibility is to ensure high quality care and effect utilization of resource. The strategic decision of the hospitals is also done by them. NHS hospital handles treatment and emergency services. There is organised treatment by dentists, opticians and GP. There is free treatment at the hospital facilities. England residents are only entitled to free medical care. Referrals in the hospital d not last more than 18 weeks as this against the constitution threshold. There is a requirement to initiate the treatment process a there requires urgent and immediate medical attention. Patient Advice and Liaison services are useful in handling complains and advice clients as appropriate as possible. Ward managers are the right people to handle patient complains and there exists a NHS complaints procedure(Great Britain, 2004). NHS maternal services need transformation to reflect local people needs and this I through levelling hospital services of the people. There is inclusion of patients’ responses in designing programs relating to patient HealthCare. Feedback is necessary in active transformation of hospital services. The display of Friends and Family Test programs will catalyse hospitals and trusts to improve service offered to patient. This is through quality checks and maintenance of available services to the clients. NHS trusts are responsible for providing community, acute, mental and quality health care services in England. Healthcare services have been designated to the private providers to improve efficient in quality and response to urgent needs of the patients. Case 1: Markets, Competition and Regulation 2.0 Evaluation of Case 1 Q1.Why have concerns been raised about the recent changes to public services, with respect to competition? Concerns have been raised that through exposing public service to competition, then the quality of service will depend on the standards that are in the market. There has been competition in the desire to deliver quality health care services to the public. In order to enhance quality service delivery, there is need for efficiency, effectiveness and economic applications. Through exposing public service to competition, then the standard of quality of the service will be left in the hands of the market. This means that competition will drive which provider will offer the services, and the quality of the service will depend on the service provider who has outdone others in the competition. This risks public service quality to get down, especially in the context that the right provider wins in the competition. The UK Government often offers most of the public services, for the purposes of ensuring equal access to these services by the public. Concerns have been raised in relation to the issues of cost of the public services in the future. Exposing public service in the hands of competition means that the costs of delivery will depend on the best bidder. This means that the service providers will offer their services at competitive prices, a strategy that is not employed by the Government. When public service is offered within the framework of competition, then there is a risk that costs of the services may go up, leading to affordability problems. The most source of competition is from the private sector and this emanates from the quality of service in the public sector. Q2.What may be the advantages and disadvantages of a public organisation outsourcing or contracting out most of its services? Are there alternatives? Outsourcing of services will allow business to create a competitive advantage and focus on core business function. There are options to either outsource a whole or portion of a function in a business. Outsourcing will reduce operational costs. For example, outsourcing of network management services but keeps the end-user services to support in-house. This will provide an organisation with a balanced approach to employees support and effectiveness in job delivery. Organisation do use outsourcing as a strategy to enhance customer services, reduce costs and quality of service. For instance it can be either a temporary or permanent strategy to bridge gap in relation to learning better quality techniques, staffing and improvement of product design in an organisation. Outsourcing opportunities are there to penetrate business presence in an organisation. The 21st century has seen public organizations considering outsourcing or contracting most of its services from outside. The move to outsource or contract most of the services of a public organization has a number of advantages, and disadvantages. The first advantage of outsourcing for a public organization is that outsourcing brings on board additional experts from the private sector. Outsourcing provides room for public organizations to bring on board additional experts who deal with the service. Outsourcing will attract many of the service providers interested in the given services, which allows public organizations to have access to the top experts in the market (Ferlie, Lynn & Pollitt, 2005). The second advantage of outsourcing/ contracting out services is the minimal costs as compared to hiring and training staff for the given assignment. Public organizations engage in huge costs in terms of the cost of hiring, and training staff. The option of outsourcing public services will significantly help public organization to minimize the costs that would otherwise have been committed to hiring and training of staff. This is because the company that has provided the services will cater for the costs of hiring, and training of staff. The cost that was saved in terms of hiring and training can be used to do other purposes. This will lead to increased accountability on the expenditures, which use the tax-payer money (Hughes, 2012). Thirdly, outsourcing/contracting out our services in public organizations has the advantage of having a ‘team-based approach’. Outsourcing is always a team-based approach in dealing with service delivery, because the company that will be offered the tender will come with a refined team. Through the team-based approach, then better outcomes are achieved from service delivery. The objective of public organization is to ensure that best service is provided to the public, at a cost that is affordable. This is exactly what outsourcing does to public organizations, for it is a team based approach to service delivery. The result is that better and affordable services are availed to the public (Flynn, 2012). On the contrary, outsourcing of services in public organizations has a few setbacks. The first challenge is that of trust, where companies that provide the services may fail to deliver to the expected standards. In this context, there is always a challenge of trust and the risk to failed projects in the event that the company that won the contract fails to deliver to the expected standards of work. This may be a challenge to solve in the public organizations, considering that the funds that will have been lost are sourced from the public kitty. It may lead to many problems since public funds have to be accounted for by the public who generate the money (Richards & Smith, 2002). The second disadvantage of outsourcing is the challenge of unemployment, especially in the context where such a system is introduced. Public organizations employ a large number of people who carry out a number of roles. Outsourcing means that employees who previously carried out the roles that will be outsourced will lose their jobs. This has been a challenge for public organizations, considering that public organizations have employed many people who depend on the jobs they are doing for their living. The challenge of balancing the benefits that will come from outsourcing and the adverse impacts of outsourcing has been a challenge affecting many of public organizations that look forward to taking on the outsourcing option. Public organizations do not have many alternatives when it comes to the delivery of public services; it is either they provide the service by themselves or outsource service providers to offer the services on their behalf. The challenge has been that both alternatives have key benefits and setbacks. This puts pressure on the leadership of public organizations to make clear choices on choices that would serve best the public and their interests as an organization. Outsourcing in public sector will be common in informational technology, human resource, and payroll processing and facility management. Q3.Markets requires choice; what issues may this raise, for example in Health care? Choice of market for health care product will raise issues such as quality, moral hazard manifestations, affordability, economic, efficiency and effective of service providers to meet the market requirements. When people demand health care products, they form expectations which need to be met by the health care service providers. For instance, there is the challenge of offering quality medical care for referral patients. This is a form of price discrimination in the market. Different clients in the health facility are charged different prices and offered varying medical attention. Indeed, markets require choice if they have to serve the interest of the people. However, the issue of choice brings challenge when it comes to essential services, such as, healthcare. This is because allowing essential services, such as, healthcare in free markets, where the healthcare providers have a choice on the nature of service to offer comes with many challenges. In many of the open markets, the service providers as well as consumers have a choice on things to supply and to consume. This gives the consumers increased freedom to select from the available choices, the choices that best suits their need. Markets for health care products demand regulation so as to enhance efficiency and efficacy. Health is a social function which requires high standard of quality checks and regulation. Choice of health care service providers depends on the available information. There is a moral hazard manifestation in the access and delivery of health care services. Lack of perfect information mean that, patients can be charged relatively high prices as compared with what the government is charging. This is a malpractice. The decision to choose a private health care provides will have implication. Most of the private healthcare provider will charge high prices as the demand for medical services is also high and this mean that the supply will be low. In healthcare, the issue of choice in the markets raise key issues because this is a sensitive and essential public service sector. Healthcare deals with the provision of quality and affordable healthcare services to patients, and the people in need. This puts pressure on the services providers to take on a standard approach in terms of quality service required by the public. First, issue of choice brings out the issue of inequality in the society. For instance, if there is free choice for providers to offer healthcare services according to affordability raises a challenge. For instance, if the there is much choice among healthcare insurance service providers to rate their services according to the ability of the payer; this leaves a challenge to the poor who cannot afford the service. In addition, free choice in the management of the healthcare services to the public may compromise the quality of health care service delivery in the society. Having a market where healthcare service provision is more liberalized to give the providers a choice on the service to offer, and the consumers a choice on the service to seek may be risky for the people. Such a context may lead to a situation where the market is full of health care malpractices that may affect the health of the public. Conclusion Outsourcing will reduce operational costs. For example, outsourcing of network management services but keeps the end-user services to support in-house. This will provide an organisation with a balanced approach to employees support and effectiveness in job delivery. Organisation do use outsourcing as a strategy to enhance customer services, reduce costs and quality of service. For instance it can be either a temporary or permanent strategy to bridge gap in relation to learning better quality techniques, staffing and improvement of product design in an organisation. Outsourcing opportunities are there to penetrate business presence in an organisation. Case 2: performance management Performance management seeks to look insight of understanding of the health care systems and improve the standards of health care in the whole of England. Performance management will be crucial in shaping policy introduce behavioural change and shape policy in the NHS. Performance management will also be considered in service improvement and leadership development. Performance management covers sharing of information in relation to resources in the health care and subsequent learning ad exchange of ideas so as to enhance service delivery. The UK government seeks to improve performance of public services through quality checks, benchmarking of programs and support of consultancy services (Great Britain, 2004). For instance aids in the procurement of expensive medical care equipment. It is the responsibility of government to initiate healthcare insurance programs so as to support need citizens. Quality health care will strengthen standards of health in the country. The government is there to subsidise health care product and waive taxation on expensive medical equipment so as to enable the NHS perform it mandate with little difficult. The setting of targets did assist in enhancing the effectiveness of health policy. For example, issuance of a maximum 2 years for those surgeries which are not emergent. This will reduce death rates and spread of diseases. The government policy documents did spell priorities in funding health care programs. Stabilisation of emergency department and initiation of a 4 hours department requires a need to focus on home based solution and this increase flows of patients. There I need to establish effective nursing and medical teams to enhance effective bed utilisation. In order to reduce waiting time, there is evident improvement in medical staffing effective moving patient machinery oiling. There is sufficient knowledge in relation to emergency patients. Direct surgical and medical referrals heads to medical assessment unit or to the ward. This is as a result of reduction in elective surgery. Corporation from specialities and availabilities of senior medical staff will reduce patient waiting time. This will solve the issue to do with problem solving and management intervention. Efficient response to accident and emergency (A&E) patent needs especially those who require admission. Creation of trust wide awareness will enhance response to needs of accident and emergency patient’s needs. Measurement of performance will result in better outcomes. Importance of measuring the public sector performance The stakeholders in the public sector performance include politicians, regulator, public service managers, central government agencies, and user groups. Central government departments’ uses measures of performance to allocate resources and politicians are there to inform in relation to public policy. Performance will be used to evaluate the possibility of value for money in service delivery. The essence of measuring performance is to include result oriented management in public sector as it is in the private sector. This will spread managerialism. Measures to expand public programme will depend on the effectiveness of public performance. For instance effective performance management will aid in allocation of resources, reduction in borrowing and taxation. Economic, efficiency and effective in NHS hospital on Leeds Efficiency in the NHS hospital services refers to the ability to reduce patient waiting time. Economic in this facility refers to affordability of medical facilities. The cost of insurance covers, bed space and remuneration of medical staff will determine service delivery in the hospital. Effectiveness in the hospital refers to ability of managers to come up with policies which will streamline service delivery to the target patients. Barriers to the performance management Some of barriers to study of performance management include performance timelines, existing of conflict of interest in the managing of a public facility. There is reluctance to adapt to new way of doing things and there is fear that organisation changes are meant to intimidate workers. There are some constraint which relate to availability of resources and lack of organisational cultures which will encourage worker to focus on quality services to the intended clients. 3.0Conclusion It is the responsibility of government to offer improved quality social service. Health care providers need to monitor performance in the access and delivery of health care services. It is clear that UK public service has greatly changed due to the policy change allowing public service to fall in the hands of the competition. Serious concerns have been raised about the recent changes to public services, as regards competition. It is evident that exposure of public service to competition leads to concerns over safety, costs, affordability, and quality of the public service to the public. Concerns have been raised that such changes may water down public service provision by pushing the costs higher, and leaving quality in the hands of the market. Performance management will be crucial in shaping policy introduce behavioural change and shape policy in the NHS. Performance management will also be considered in service improvement and leadership development. Performance management covers sharing of information in relation to resources in the health care and subsequent learning ad exchange of ideas so as to enhance service delivery. The UK government seeks to improve performance of public services through quality checks, benchmarking of programs and support of consultancy services. For instance aids in the procurement of expensive medical care equipment. It is the responsibility of government to initiate healthcare insurance programs so as to support need citizens. Quality health care will strengthen standards of health in the country. The government is there to subsidise health care product and waive taxation on expensive medical equipment so as to enable the NHS perform it mandate with little difficult. References Bovaird, T and Loffler, E. (2009) Public Management and Governance, second Edition. London: Routledge Coulson, A (2005). A plague on all your partnerships: theory and practice in regeneration International Journal of Public Sector Management Vol. 18, No.2 pp.105-163 Ferlie E, Lynn L. & Pollitt C. (2005) The Oxford Handbook of Public Management, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Flynn, N. (2012). Public Sector Management, 6th Edition, London: Sage GREAT BRITAIN. (2004). Improving emergency care in England. London, Stationery Office. 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