Missing: Voices, action and subtraction
The NHS Innovation Ecosystem Programme is an amorphous blob destined to gather dust on the shelf of good intentions. What's missing and where should we focus?
When I was a management consultant, there was a certain style used to write reports for general publication. Virtually everyone who mattered was either a client or a target. So the trick is to create thought leadership that sounds intelligent, purposeful and meaningful. Without actually saying anything.
The new NHS Innovation Ecosystem Programme report is written exactly that way. I have now read the report and three different commentaries on it by Clive Flashman, Keith Grimes and Hassan Chaudhury.
Each welcomes the report and does their best to spot some good news. The trouble is, you can take anything you want from this kind of writing. In one case, one of the commentaries has taken the exact opposite meaning that I did from a specific paragraph.
It's actually impossible to critique an amorphous blob of buzzwords, intentions and serious minded emptiness. So I thought instead, I would answer another question: What's Missing?
Apparently there was extensive stakeholder consultation. Yet there are many voices missing. I hear nothing that sounds like it comes from patients, from NHS staff or from actual innovators.
"The NHS faces a pivotal moment of risk and opportunity and there is an urgent need to act."
Perhaps. Then again the recommendations have no sense of urgency or action. Alignment, accountability, skills and architecture. Admirable and intelligent but not actually doing anything.
Subtraction. There is a whole series of structures, governance and capability building. Training in skills, leadership and so on. Where is the time for all this to be found? Real strategy is about what you don't do as much as what you do. This reads like just another collection of bodies and initiatives. More friction in an already overburdened system
Most likely Clive is right to ask "so what?" This will end its days gathering dust on the shelf of good intentions.
No-one is trying to do a bad thing. So there is little point in wasting energy on anger or disappointment. As innovators, all we can do is keep trying.
I go back to those voices. The NHS people I listen to tell me there are four ways Triscribe might be able to help:
Better data to manage the challenges of drug shortages.
Automation of clunky and inefficient processes around billing and reimbursement of high cost drugs.
Taking analysis of antibiotic use in hospitals to the next level by integrating labs data with EPMA data.
Using medicines data to help accelerate net zero programmes.
That's the agenda we will be working to next year. We may not have the resources to do everything but we will at least focus on real problems and execution.
If you or your hospital would like to work with us on any of the above problems, please get in touch.
Thanks for reading.