Performance Management at Queen Elizabeth Hospital Birmingham - Case Study Example

MME Student Name Tutor Institution Course Date Introduction Queen Elizabeth Hospital Birmingham was build for the purposes of replacing the Queen Elizabeth Hospital and Selly Oak hospital. The hospital was constructed to provide a wide range of medical services including the secondary services. The project is also part of the NHS scheme and it is located in Edgbaston, Birmingham in England. Initially, the hospital was to be named Birmingham Queen Elizabeth Hospital but this was changed after the Ministry of Justice ruled that no word can precede a Royal title. The construction plans for the new hospital was unveiled in 1998 but it was approved by Birmingham City Council in October 2004. The project was the first acute hospital to be built in Birmingham since 1937. The project was part of the Private Finance Initiative with Consort Healthcare Limited. The project experienced some delays when Consort failed to sign the deal in March 2005. The deal was signed in early 2006 and it began in June 2006. The hospital was designed by BDP Architects and it was undertaken by Balfour Beatty. Heavy machinery was used during the construction process with one of the cranes standing at 90.2 meters. The new facility is composed of 1,215 patient’s beds. The hospital also has 30 operating theaters with 23 inpatients and 7 day case. The hospital also has 100 critical care beds and the hospital also has the largest single floor unit in the world. 44% of the beds are in single room. The hospital is spacious as no room has more than four beds. This is important for the hospital in terms of improving on its efficiency when treating the patients (Queen Elizabeth Hospital Birmingham, 2014). The total cost of the hospital was £ 545 million and it was part of the £ 1 billion urban generation plan for Selly Oak and Bournbrook. The construction of the hospital ended in 2p010 and it was opened to the public in the same year. The first part of the project to be completed was the multi-storey car park at a cost of £ 12 million. £ 30 million was also spent on the preparation of the site. The car park has 3,800 car parking spaces for the purposes of catering for the needs of the high number of people visiting the hospital. The finished complex is 63 meters tall and it has a total of 9 storeys. The atrium of the building has a glass roof. On the other hand, the hospital also has an educational center as well as retail outlets that serve the people visiting the hospitals as well the members of staff and the patients. The hospital is also the home to 36 bed trauma for both the civilian and the military personnel while on deployment (Queen Elizabeth Hospital Birmingham, 2014). The Royal center for Defense Medicine is also housed within the new facility. Chaplaincy and prayer facilities are also found in the hospital. This is for the purpose of catering for the needs of people from different religions. The hospital has prayer facilities for the Christians, Muslims, Jews and Hindu. The Army, Navy and Airforce medical staff are usually trained at the hospital. The new facility has 6, 900 members of staff who serve more than half a million patients every year. The members of staff are highly competent for the purpose of ensuring that better services are delivered to the patients. The hospital has an emergency department and the NHS care system is usually used in the hospital. The services of the 2 former hospitals have now been moved to the new facility. This is its beneficial to the people as they can access the services of the two former hospitals in the same facility. On the other hand, the project is beneficial to the military. This is because it offers treatment to the solders that have been severely injured during deployment. It is also important to note that the facility provides highly specialized medical services. The medical staff in the military usually undergoes training at the facility. This has impacted positively on the provision of medical services in the military. The trauma ward also offers specialized treatment to the civilians and the members of the military (Queen Elizabeth Hospital Birmingham, 2014). On the other hand, the hospital has had notable incidences. A schoolgirl and education activist from Pakistan who was shot in the Head by the Taliban received treatment at the hospital. This is an indication that the hospital is also beneficial to the patients from different countries. The hospital is beneficial to the students learning medicine as it provides training for the medical students in the country and other parts of the world. This is for the purposes of ensuring the number of medical personnel is increased and well trained. The high number of bed capacity has also improved the access to treatment of the people in the region. It has also reduced the congestion that was witnessed before when the patients were accessing treatment. Seminar 1 The management of the PFI hospitals should ensure that the value of money expected during the signing of the contracts is achieved. This is through putting in place proper management practices and process. The Trust managing the contracts has to ensure that adequate resources are devoted for the management of the hospitals (Bevan, et al, 2006). The management at Queen Elizabeth hospital Birmingham has put in place measures that ensure that it enhances its performance. This has positively impacted on the management of the hospital. The concepts of performance management, evaluation and learning organizations are applied at the hospital. Performance management practices are for the purposes of ensuring that the goals and objectives of the organization are met. The government institutions also performance management for ensuring that service delivery to the people is enhanced. At the hospital, the performance management usually focuses on the overall execution of the services of the organization, the departments and the employees. This is considering that the hospital has a high number of staff members. Performance planning is usually carried out for the purposes of ensuring that the goals and objectives are established (Doherty and Horne, 2002). This is usually carried out by the management. Giving feedback and adjusting performance is also carried out through performance coaching. This is for the purpose of ensuring that the performance of the employees is obtained and improved in order to meet the goals and objectives of the organization. Performance appraisal is usually conducted among the employees of the hospital. This is for the purpose of ensuring that the performance of the employees is determined. The results of the appraisal are used for rewarding the good performers and also identifying the training needs of the employees. The government usually encourages the management to carry out the performance appraisals so as to ensure that the performance of the employees is improved. Performance problems are usually identified through the process of carrying out the performance management (Bevan and Hood, 2006). The presence of such problems impacts negatively on the operations of the organization as it affects the provision of services to the members of the public. The hospital always involve experts is some of the performance management activities this is for the purposes of ensuring that hospital is able to deliver high quality services to the patients. The performance management process is beneficial to the hospital management in improving the management control. The employees are also motivated through the use of the performance management concepts. The evaluation is the process of determining the merits of an organization. The National Audit Office usually carries out evaluation of the government departments and also the Private Finance Initiatives. The evaluation is also carried out at the hospital for the purposes of determining the quality of the program. This is also useful to the organization in ensuring that the resources are well utilized. The evaluation reports from the National Audit Office indicates that the hospital is using the resources well and the Trust management has put in place adequate measures to ensure that the organization is able to meet its goals and objectives. The hospital usually relies on the reports of its internal and external auditors. The use of the external auditors is usually important for the hospital for the purposes of ensuring that the any conflict of interest is eliminated (Hartley, et al, 2008). The evaluation process should show the actual results related to the organization. High levels of standards are usually used during the process. This is for the purpose of ensuring that the evaluation process is credible. The codes of conduct are usually applied in order to enhance the process of evaluation. The evaluators at the hospital are usually of high integrity and honesty. This is for the purposes of ensuring that the results of the evaluation are credible. The principle of freedom from bias is usually practiced during the process in order to ensure that the evaluation report is credible. The stakeholders usually rely on the information of the evaluation for the purpose of making decisions. Independent judgment is also involved during the evaluation process. This is for the purposes of ensuring that the evaluation process is not influenced by any party. The independence of the evaluators is also important in ensuring that the stakeholders are able to determine the efficiency of the program (Hood, 2006). A learning organization is a term that is used for describing an organization that facilitates the learning of its members for the purposes of continuously transforming itself (Proper and Wilson, 2003). In the field of healthcares services, new concepts and challenges usually emerge from time to time. The knowledge that the doctors and nurses acquired during their training at the universities and colleges is not enough to deal with the challenges in the field of medicine. Continuous learning is thus required for the medical personnel in order to enhance their knowledge and skills. At the hospital, the doctors are usually sponsored to undertake continuous learning. This is for the purposes of ensuring that they are able to deal with complex medical situation in order to save the lives of the patients. On the other hand, the hospital is also involved in research in the medical field. Continuous learning is usually carried out by the doctors and other medical professionals in the field of research. The medical laboratories in the hospital also provide an important avenue for continuous learning. The continuous training at the hospital has impacted positively on the skills of the doctors and other medical professionals. The doctors have been able to save many lives in complex medical situations due to continuous learning. On the other hand, new medical equipment is being developed at a fast rate. The continuous learning is for the purposes of enabling the medical personnel to be able to use the new equipment (Bache, 2003). On the other hand, the fast rate of technological advancement has lead to the continuous change in the methods of carrying out treatment and research. The employees of the hospital have also achieved innovativeness due to the concepts of continuous learning. Most of the doctors are also fully committed to the process as they always want to improve on their knowledge and skills. In conclusion, the hospital has been able to achieve its aims and objectives through putting in place the performance management. This has been useful in ensuring that the internal processes of the hospital are streamlined. On the other hand, the evaluation process has enabled the stakeholders to know about the progress of the hospital. On the other hand, the continuous training has enabled the doctors and other members of stall to enhance their skills and knowledge which has impacted positively on the treatment of the patients. Seminar 2 The innovations in the healthcare industry play an essential role in ensuring that the hospitals are able to meet the challenges. The future challenges are also dependant on innovations at the hospitals. The medical professional should therefore be innovative when carrying out their duties in order to deal withy different situations. This is also considering that the medical situations may differ from each other and in most cases does not have a defined method of carrying out the procedures. The service transformation is also important in improving the quality of healthcare services in hospitals (Baxter, 2011). The innovations in the hospitals are highly valued as they are meant to ensure that the lives of the patients can be saved. On the other hand, it is also important to note that the doctors in the hospital have been able to solve complex medical problems through the use of innovations. On the other hand, the growing demands for the healthcare services have played an important role in ensuring that the doctors and other healthcare staff are innovative. New products and services have also been developed at the hospital due to the innovative nature of the staff members at the hospital (Chen, 2010). The management always encourages the staff members to be innovative. The management usually ensures that the continuous training and development of the skills of its staff members enables them to be innovative. The clinicians at the hospital usually work closely with the business experts at the hospital who are in charge of the business activities. The cooperation between the clinicians and the business experts is important as it ensures that the clinicians are able to obtain the funds for enhancing their innovativeness. Partnership with the other organizations has also played an essential role in enhancing the innovativeness of the hospital. This is especially in the area of medical research. The partnership with the universities has promoted innovations at the hospital. The service transformation process is also important for the organizations as it plays an essential role in improving on the delivery of services to the customers. The quality of services delivered by an organization is dependant on the processes that are in place. The service delivery at the hospital has been improved through the use of technology and innovations. This has impacted positively in saving the lives of the patients with different medical problems (Groenewegen, 2011). The use of innovative techniques has played an essential role improving on the care of the patients at the hospital. Through the use of innovative technology, a conducive environment that enhances the recovery of the patients has been created. The mechanisms to reduce noise in the hospitals have been put in place. The use of alarms has been replaced by innovative technology that ensures that the patients are not distracted during treatment. The state of the art technology is also used during the treatment of the patients. This has played an essential role in ensuring that the safety of the patients is enhanced during the treatment process. On the other hand, the continuous development of the skills of the doctors has also played an essential role in ensuring that the modern technology is used during the treatment of the patients (Romero-Alonso, 2013). The hospital has also been able to develop systems that enable the patients to receive care with a lot of comfort. The caregivers at the hospital are also dedicated to innovations when offering their services to the patients. Educating the patients is also an important process that is usually carried out at the hospital as part of the efforts of transforming the services delivered to the patients. This is usually enhanced through the use of innovative technologies like the apps which enables the patients to obtain information regarding their health and treatment. The innovative technologies are also in use at the hospital for the purposes of managing the records of the patients. This has led to the improvement in access to the records of the patents. The patients together with the medical professionals can easily access the information of the patients. The use of the technology has promoted innovations within the organization which has contributed to the transformation of services (Bair, 2013). The service transformation has impacted positively on the clients of the hospital. This is because the co-production concepts have also been put in place for the purposes of ensuring that the quality of the service is improved. Co-production involves the production of services in an equal and reciprocal manner between the professionals using the services (Bovaird, 2007). The concepts of co-production were embraced by the hospital as it is applicable in the provision of services in the public sector. Through co-production, a close working relationship has been developed between the patients and medical professionals. The treatment of the patients has also been enhanced through co-production. This is because the patients are empowered in order to ensure that their quality of the treatment is enhanced. The patients are usually informed of their healthcare needs and hence enabling them to understand the treatment process. The use of co-production has been useful in the treatment of patients suffering from different illnesses including the patients with mental illness. The utilization of the resources at the hospital has also been impacted positively by the use of co-production concepts. However, although the hospital has been impacted positively by the concept in terms of service provision, it has also been faced with some challenges. Some of the people view the concepts as adding additional demands to them. This is considering that most of the patients are already burdened by the treatment. However, the creation of awareness has played an essential role in enabling the people to understand how the concept operates and hence improving on the service delivery. The NHS policies also encourage the use of co-production in the Private Finance hospitals so as to enhance the relationship between the members of the community and the hospital. The effective use of the co-production concepts has improved on the delivery of the healthcare services (Fotaki, 2011). The use of innovations and service transformation has played an essential role in enhancing the treatment and delivery of services to the patients (Jordan, 2006). This has impacted positively on the operations of the hospitals. The training and development of the skills of the doctors and other members of staff has also led to the improvement of services. The policies of the hospital have also enhanced innovations in the hospital. The close working relationship between the medical professionals and the other professionals has also impacted positively on the innovations and service transformation. Conclusion In conclusion, it is evident that Queen Elizabeth Hospital Birmingham has played an essential role improving the healthcare provision among the people. The hospital treats both the civilians and the members of the military. The capacity of the hospital has also been increased which has played an essential role in increasing the number of patients receiving treatment at the facility. This is an indication that the PFI projects have the ability of improving on the livelihoods of the people. It is evident that the hospital has been able to post good performance due to the initiatives that have been put in place. The performance management practices at the hospital have enhanced its operations. This has ensured that the employees are motivated and hence improving on their performances. The organization has also been impacted positively by the performance management as it improves on its efficiency. It is also evident that the evaluation process is important in the organization and it provides in formation to the stakeholders regarding the progress of the hospital. The evaluators are also independent which impacts positively on the outcome of the evaluation process. The learning organization concepts are also used by the hospital for developing the knowledge and skills of the doctors and other professionals in the hospital. The innovations in the hospital have also contributed to the improvement of services at the hospital. Service transformation has been impacted positively by the co-production processes that are used at the hospital. The quality of services o9ffered to the patients has also been improved through the innovative technologies at the hospital. It is also evident that the relationship between the patients and the hospital staff has been enhanced through co-production. List of References Queen Elizabeth Hospital Birmingham, 2014, Home, Retrieved on 8 May 2013 from, . Bevan, G, et al, 2006, ‘What’s measured is what matters: Targets and gaming in the English Public Health Care System’, Public Administration Vol. 84, No. 3, 517-538. Bevan, G and Hood, C, 2006, ‘Have Targets Improved Performance in the English NHS?’, British Medical Journal 332 419-422. Doherty, T and Horne, T, 2002, Managing Public Services- implementing change, London: Routledge. Hartley, J, et al, 2008, Managing to Improve Public Services, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, - Ch’s 5/6/8. Hood, C, 2006, Gaming in Targetworld: The Targets Approach to Managing British Public Services, Public Administration Review 66 (4), July/August 515-521. Proper, C and Wilson, D, 2003, ‘The Use and Usefulness of Performance Measures in the Public Sector’, Oxford Review of Economic Policy Vol.19, No.2, pp 250-267. Bache, I, 2003, ‘Not Everything that Matters is Measurable and Not Everything that is Measurable Matters: How and Why Local Education Authorities ‘Fail’, Local Government Studies Vol.29, No. 4, pp.76-94. Baxter, K, et al, 2011, ‘The implications of personal budgets for the home care market’, Public Money and Management Vol.31, 2, pp. 91-98. Bovaird, T, 2007, Beyond Engagement and Participation: User and Community Coproduction of Public Services, Public Administration Review September- October 2007 pp.846-860. Fotaki, M, 2011, ‘Towards developing new partnerships in public services: Users as consumers, citizens and/or coproducers in Health and Social Care in England and Sweden’, Public Administration, Volume 89, Issue 3, pages 933–955. Jordan, B, 2006, ‘Public Services and the Service Economy: Individualism and the Choice Agenda’, Journal of Social Policy Vol. 35, Issue 1, pp. 121-162. Groenewegen, P, 2011, Understanding organisational development, sustainability, and diffusion of innovations within hospitals participating in a multilevel quality collaborative, Implementation science, 6(1), 18. Romero-Alonso, M, 2013, The acceptance of information technology innovations in hospitals: differences between early and late adopters, Behaviour & Information Technology, (ahead-of-print), 1-13. Bair, A, 2013, Board 103-Program Innovations Abstract The Code Blue Training Initiative: Phase One (Submission# 869), Simulation in Healthcare, 8(6), 402. Chen, D, 2010, An examination of the antecedents and consequences of organizational IT innovation in hospitals, The Journal of Strategic Information Systems, 19(3), 154-170. Read More