In 2001, when almost no MOPH executives agreed that purchasers should be
separated from providers, only strong political leadership stopped them derailing
the reforms. Ministry opposition was unsurprising given that this would strip senior
Ministry civil servants of their financial power. The difficult relationship between
the two institutions arose partly from attempts by MOPH “conservatives” to slow
the pace of reform, but was worsened by some NHSO statements which struck an
unnecessarily critical and adversarial tone. For example, the use of language such
as “squeezing fat” or “get rid of fat in the system” to justify changes in patterns
of resource allocation went down badly in tertiary hospitals and large facilities
in the central region. This turned some professionals and senior administrators
against the NHSO.
An NHSO executive explains:
We used the wrong approach at the beginning, ‘squeezing fat’. This
implied that they were the problem and needed improvement. We
enjoyed too much power to deal with them […] In the later phases,
we changed the message to ‘the overall system needs improvement’
and adopted a ‘participatory approach’ with professional
groups. Then we got a better response from them.
In 2001, when almost no MOPH executives agreed that purchasers should be
separated from providers, only strong political leadership stopped them derailing
the reforms. Ministry opposition was unsurprising given that this would strip senior
Ministry civil servants of their financial power. The difficult relationship between
the two institutions arose partly from attempts by MOPH “conservatives” to slow
the pace of reform, but was worsened by some NHSO statements which struck an
unnecessarily critical and adversarial tone. For example, the use of language such
as “squeezing fat” or “get rid of fat in the system” to justify changes in patterns
of resource allocation went down badly in tertiary hospitals and large facilities
in the central region. This turned some professionals and senior administrators
against the NHSO.
An NHSO executive explains:
We used the wrong approach at the beginning, ‘squeezing fat’. This
implied that they were the problem and needed improvement. We
enjoyed too much power to deal with them […] In the later phases,
we changed the message to ‘the overall system needs improvement’
and adopted a ‘participatory approach’ with professional
groups. Then we got a better response from them.
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