Unit 25 Influences on HSC Organisations Assignment

Purpose of this assignment

This unit covers the theoretical concepts used to explain how organisations function and investigates the role of leadership within organisations. Current thinking in management theory will be discussed with particular reference to health and social care organisations. Learners will be encouraged to apply theoretical concepts to organisations with which they are familiar and to analyse the leadership roles within these organisations. The relationship between individual and organisational effectiveness and their impact on health and social care services will also be discussed from the perspective of care workers and those who use services.
Learners will be encouraged to explore the influences that the external environment has on service delivery and organisational effectiveness, using a range of business theories and analysing how these theories apply to health and care services.

Task 1 - 10 Slide presentation with slides notes Case Study &/ or use your own experience.              

Voluntary Service Overseas (VSO) is a UK based Charitable organisation, Its services relies on volunteers and it has active volunteers in Asia, Africa as well as the UK. Dr Philip Goodwin, Chief Executive of VSO is described as optimistic and positive with a mission to make people think differently.  He is also committed to challenge dogma from all sides and is happy to question the views of all stakeholders.  Dr Philip Goodwin's secret is that he can bring people of very different disciplines and skills together, get them to brainstorm and collaborate and come up with the extraordinary.
The charity has attracted high-flying educationalist, doctors, nurses, health care workers, businessmen, and scientists, from all over Britain. 'It feels like a renaissance organisation' says one woman who left a senior management job to work there as a director and has been amazed both at what gets done and the way it works. It's attracted a critical mass of people, and there is this passionate belief, right through the charity, that it belongs to everyone who works there, that it's a team thing. I guess it demonstrates that you can have an organisation that is highly effective both in ethos and values. 'This is a stage for change,' says Dr Goodwin who admits that Many people have made life choices to deliver health and social care in remote parts of the world. It’s a kind of experiment to show you can work in different ways. Many volunteers have made life choices to come here. Most could earn five times as much elsewhere. This goes to show that  if you want to make real change, you must not own it. You have to make sure that it's owned by more than one person.

Task 2 - Interview with a colleague who has a different work experience.

• To achieve Task 2, please hold an interview with another colleague, who has a different work experience. You can develop 3 questions around each of the following assessment criteria: 2.2., 2.2., 2.4. As an example only, please see some questions below, although is advisable to develop your own interview questions:

• What kind of culture does your organisation have?
• Can you describe how your organisation deals with individual or group behaviour?
• Describe how the delivery of services is are impacted by your organisational culture.

You need to record the interview (10-20mins) - audio or video (the names of both or more students have to heard clearly) - recording can be made using (phones, voice recorders etc). Write a short essay  use information extracted from interview as well as previous knowledge from Unit1 COM and Unit 4 PPD

Your arguments will need include a theoretical part as well as a practical part, which will be connected to the information extracted from the interview as well as comparing and contrasting (2.1) your own experience with that of your interviewed colleague in regard to the different organisational structures. For 2.2 you will have to describe, outline some theoretical concepts around organisational culture and then analyse how does your colleague experiences their own organisational culture.

• To achieve (2.1., 2.2): you can also relate to evidence from COM 2.1, PPD LO1 and 2.1., 2.2.

• To achieve (2.3): you can also relate to evidence from COM 1.1. and use the information from the interview to analyse how individual and group behaviour is dealt with in other organisations as well as academically back up your points with some concepts from known theories used in health and social care.

To achieve (2.4): you can also relate to evidence from COM 2.1., PPD LO1 and 2.1., 2.2, 3.1 and use information from the interview to explain how the service delivery in another organisations is/ could be impacted by a specific organisational structure and culture.

Task 3 - Executive Summary and a group discussion (can use own experience, the above case study from Task 1 and previous knowledge).

You will be able to relate to this work in future units of study.

• To achieve 3.2., 3.3., - produce a 1 page Executive Summary (around 500-1000 words). Use previous evidence from other units: PPD 3.2., 3.3. , 4.1., 4.2., COM 2.3., 2.2. Analyse how leadership can influence the effectiveness of health and social care organisations and then evaluate the role and specific contributions of leadership in health and social care organisations.

To achieve 3.1. - read and discuss your executive summary with other colleagues in the group, i.e. you will discuss specific concepts and approaches to leaderships in health and social care organisations. Your discussion will be filmed and also you need to refer in writing to your discussion within your executive summary.