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The Performance of an NHS Trust Board: Actors' Accounts, Minutes and Observation
Author(s) -
Peck Edward
Publication year - 1995
Publication title -
british journal of management
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.407
H-Index - 108
eISSN - 1467-8551
pISSN - 1045-3172
DOI - 10.1111/j.1467-8551.1995.tb00090.x
Subject(s) - corporate governance , accounting , business , public sector , private sector , on board , health board , public relations , service (business) , political science , marketing , finance , law , engineering , medicine , nursing , aerospace engineering
SUMMARY The corporate board is a common feature of both private sector and public sector enterprises. The roles undertaken by boards are therefore a significant area of interest for writers on organizations. This paper makes two contributions to the study of corporate hoards. First, it presents the results of an intensive study of the performance of the board of directors of a first wave National Health Service (NHS) Trust based on three sources of data: actors' accounts; minutes; and observation. This study concludes that the board has made only a marginal contribution to the governance of the Trust. Second, it provides a critique of the three methodological approaches which are available to researchers undertaking such studies and argues that most reported studies of boards are unreliable as they are based on only one, or at best two, of the three available sources of data.