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The Attitudes of British National Health Service Managers and Clinicians Towards the Introduction of Benchmarking
Author(s) -
Jones C. S.
Publication year - 2002
Publication title -
financial accountability and management
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.661
H-Index - 44
eISSN - 1468-0408
pISSN - 0267-4424
DOI - 10.1111/1468-0408.00149
Subject(s) - benchmarking , context (archaeology) , business , white paper , relevance (law) , process management , service (business) , process (computing) , health care , activity based costing , resource (disambiguation) , operations management , accounting , marketing , political science , computer science , engineering , economic growth , economics , paleontology , law , biology , operating system , computer network
This paper describes an empirical study, conducted in three acute hospitals, of the attitudes of central managers, medical managers and clinicians towards the adoption of benchmarking. Benchmarking was portrayed in The New NHS White Paper (1997) as an important means of improving efficiency over the next decade. The present paper examines the context of change and nature of benchmarking. Findings are presented in seven sections including: the understanding which respondents had of benchmarking; their willingness to be involved in benchmarking; the existence of strategies and policies for implementing benchmarking; the relevance of existing costing information; and the role of networks in facilitating benchmarking. The study concludes that the process of change adopted contradicted most of the factors associated with creating receptivity to change. Also, that the publication of the National Reference Costs seemed to have more relevance to resource planning at central National Health Service Management Executive level, than to effecting improvements at operational level in acute hospitals.