The Essay Highlights The Importance Of Leadership And Management In Public Health Advocacy.

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Part A: Short Answer Questions

1. Explain the difference between leadership and management
2. Explain why public health advocacy is important
3. Explain the difference between lobbying and advocacy
4. Explain three reasons why evaluation of an advocacy strategy is important

You have not had experience working on this issue and are unaware of what strategies have been carried out in the past in Australia and internationally. You have been assigned to work on this issue along with two other colleagues and you are also working on other projects as are they. The cultural and professional backgrounds as well as the skillset you and your colleagues have is diverse. The budget you have for work in this area is small.

5. What initial steps might you undertake to embark on this project? Consider that you are working as part of a team?
6. Given the diversity within your team, how might this impact team dynamics and work outcomes?
7. Your supervisor asks you to provide a plan of action for taking this issue forward. You do not need to come up with an advocacy strategy, rather, you are asked to identify the key elements of an action plan taking into consideration the topic area.
8. One of the recommendations from the evidence is to ‘phase out alcohol sponsorship of sport that exposes young people to alcohol promotion’. Outline and briefly explain three individual strategies that you could implement in taking the issue forward that are feasible given the scenario. Provide the reasoning for your choice of strategy.
9. What challenges do you envisage coming up against based on the information in the above scenario?

Definition of Leadership and Management

1. Difference between Leadership and management

Leadership can be defined as the quality of an individual that influences people such that objectives are attained enthusiastically and willingly. Leadership can be termed as one of the element of the management. It is not a lesson that has to be taught but are generally possessed by individuals. It requires as good vision and directing the people to that shared vision (1). While management is the discipline of the managing things in the best possible way or it can be defined as the art of getting things done with the help of the others. Management is not confined to individuals only but a combination of the 5M- Men, material, money, machine and methods (2).

Leadership normally demands the foresightedness of a leader but the management has normally a short range of vision. In leadership, the guidelines and the principles are generally established but in case of management, the procedure and the policies are implemented. Management is reactive in nature and thrive to bring changes whereas the management is proactive and works to bring stability in an organization (3).

2. Explain why public health advocacy is important

Public health advocacy can be defined as the activities or the initiatives that attempts to contribute to the systemic changes in promoting health by influencing the policy processes. All the definitions of the public health advocacy involves some of the common elements like an emphasis on collective initiatives to bring about a desired systemic change (4). It also focuses on changing the factors like the policies, regulations, standard of care and any institutional practices.  

The main aim of health advocacy is to promote wellbeing and resilience in the community. The importance of the health advocacy is that it helps it helps in promoting good health to the community, to overcome the barriers that that limits health equality, to promote effective funding against any public health issue. It is the public health advocacy that helps to protect the health rights of the people and ensure a safe, healthy and a sustainable community, to empower the marginalized group who are susceptible to health risks due to family, environment and socio economic factors (4). It help to challenge stigmatization and stereotyping against physically challenged or the mentally challenged people, to sustain financial as well as political commitment. Moreover, the health advocacy helps to bring positive changes in policies, organization, legislation, health service delivery, attitudes and the community behavior. Public health advocacy also empowers the health care professionals to actively take part in the health promotion strategies and the policies. There are many examples of the public health advocacy in several health care areas such as smoking control, controlling of the substance abuse, diabetes advocacy program, injury prevention and the several more (5).

Definition of Public Health Advocacy

Lobbying involves activities that are direct in support or against a particular legislation and only makes up a small part of the advocacy efforts. Moreover it is an attempt to convince or influence a public professional or a politician on a particular issue and can be broken down in to direct lobbying, grassroots lobbying. Whereas advocacy is arguing about a particular cause or concept, i.e., environmental protection, health issues, minority rights and other issues that impacts on people every day. Lobbying attempts to influence a special legislation at a local, state and federal level, while advocacy mainly focuses about education about a particular issue (6).Evaluation of a advocacy strategy is important for the following reasons-

• To determine objectively and systematically, whether the strategies that has been advocated are effective or not.
• To determine how the advocacy strategies have been important in enhancing the funding from the funding bodies or to check their outcome on the funding bodies (7).
• To understand the gaps left in the strategies such that further improvement can be made in promoting health and safety for the public. It also enables health policy makers to understand what factors and the approaches actually leads to change, be accountable to the internal and the external stakeholders. It also helps the stakeholders to understand the complexity of the policy change. Real time information gathering and monitoring is required in health advocacy, as the political opportunities might change quickly, requiring the stakeholders to react and course correct the strategies quickly (7).

Before on this project I should get a clear idea about the project. Initially I need to check of the statistical significant percentages of the alcohol consumers in the community along with the media promotion that occurs on promoting alcohol consumption. It is necessary to recognize the needs of the community for the approach.

I would also make thorough research on the strategies that has been already taken in the past related to this issue. Since I will be working as a part of the team it is necessary to identify each and every members of the team to understand their perception about the removal of the alcohol consumption advertisements. Due to the cultural diversity among the team members any difference in opinion might lead to conflicts and that might hinder the progression of the health advocacy (8).

Being a team member and a leader it is necessary to provide a valid rationale behind the adoption of such strategies. There has been many evidences that have proved that alcohol ads increase the rate of alcohol consumption among the underage individuals.

Before any action has been taken it is necessary to determine why the change is necessary. It is necessary to analyze both the problems and the opportunities.

Then it is necessary to estimate the complexities that the change might bring from the alcohol manufacturers, paying attention to the internal aspects of the change and the probable outcome of the change among the alcohol consumers and the sellers (9). Before jumping in to this project it is necessary to list the stakeholders that has to be involved, or the list of the politicians that has to be lobbied for the implementation of health advocacy plan. Before, the implementation of the strategies it is necessary to select a proper implementation method. As a team leader I am supposed to encourage my coworkers more sensitive to pressure for the changes by the use of the people and the organization with different perspectives and viewpoints.

Lobbying vs Advocacy

Team dynamics is important for the success of a team based work. Without a positive team dynamics it is difficult to work in a diversified team. It is necessary to establish trust between each of the members so that each of the members can work towards a collective decision making. A team with an excellent group dynamics has to be productive and constructive and may demonstrate a mutual understanding and a self-corrected behavior (10).

A diversity in the team members helps to maintain the team dynamics by fostering mutual respect among the employees. Colleagues representing different cultures and generations create a synergistic work environment at the workplace. Each of the members might recognize several strengths and diversity at the workplace. According to a meta-analysis study by (10), although the effect of the cultural diversity depends upon the situation of the team, it has got no influence on the sense of trust between the coworkers helps to reduce workplace conflicts and provide an easier way to conflict resolution. Since two of the employees have different culture, hence each one of them might take the prevalence of the alcohol consumption in a different way and as per the norms of each of their cultures (10). In some of the culture, introduction to alcohol in the teenage years can be considered as a social norm and hence these two members might have different viewpoints regarding the displaying of the alcohol ads in in the television between the live Australian sporting events. With a diverse workforce, the employees would learn from the coworkers as of why those ads should not be displayed. High quality of interaction occur in a diverse team that includes listening to and respecting different perspectives, participating to achieve the goals of the team and handling the concepts collaboratively. These high quality of interaction and prioritization of the needs of the people is necessary for the success of the team.

Restricting or banning the alcohol consumption ads can bring about a reduction in the consumption of the alcohol among the youths. Live sports are seen by most of the youths and are likely to get influenced by the alcohol consumption ads between the live Australian sporting events. There had been reports of sophisticated alcohol advertising by the help of the mains stream media. It has been found that there is an association between these alcohol marketing ads and alcohol taken by the adolescents (11). Many studies have suggested that exposure to such advertising has a direct measure on both the drinking areas initiation and the consumption level. Since banning of the alcohol advertising might hamper the economy. Hence, in order to have an in depth idea about the pros and the cons of the initiative, it is necessary that we have a vivid knowledge about the number of youths addicted to alcohol to get a clear view about the target population and to understand how this initiative might affect the population (12).

Importance of Evaluating Advocacy Strategies

Secondly, before jumping in to any conclusion, it is necessary to understand the precursors of the alcohol consumption of the youths. It has been  stated that alcohol consumption among the youths are often seen connected to the social position (13). Again there had been evidences that has linked alcohol consumption with the peer pressure. With regards to the children dealing with alcohol, family plays a great role in such cases as in most of the cases, introduction to the alcohol consumption takes place in the family itself, may be events like birthdays and anniversaries. Furthermore, excessive academic pressure and the other disturbances like family and relationship disturbances, lack of proper education or rejection from friends and the families might be the reasons for the alcohol consumption among the adolescents. Placing the entire blame on the advertisements would not be sufficient as valid evidences are necessary for this advocacy plan. Hence it is necessary to recognize the evidence and the consensus that proves alcohol is a harmful, carcinogenic and addictive substance that is increased by advertising and sponsorship. Apart from the advertising it is also necessary to note some of the cost effective interventions. Apart from the media advertising it is also necessary to focus on the outdoor billboard advertisements and their proximity to the nearby schools and the colleges, as (14) have stated that adolescents are often attracted by the attractive advertisements on huge hoardings or the billboards. It also necessary to identify whether the advertisements are in violation of the alcohol industry’s national voluntary advertising standards.

Furthermore it is also necessary to assume and understand the perception of the local politician as many of them might justify accepting these advertisements based on the need for the revenue, a which amount of which comes from the advertising revenue. These factors can be refuted by the presence of valid data like- treatment services for the alcohol services far outweighs any potential revenue of the alcohol ads. Finally, before chalking out an action plan and lobby with the government officials about the issue, it is necessary to present forward some strong rationale for this initiative (15).

Banning of the alcohol advertisement among the sporting events might face several challenges. These challenges might come both from the side of the federal government, the companies and the direct media as banning of these sponsorships might have a direct effect on the treasury (16). Furthermore, the bulk expense of these sporting events are largely sponsored by the alcohol advertisements and hence a large amount of resistances might come from the side of the media and the advertising agencies. Hence, the three individual strategies needed in taking this issue forward is the collection of the consensus data about how alcohol advertisements are increasing the alcohol consumption. These consensus reports should be genuine and tallied with the WHO reports. It is then necessary to form a committee headed by the three members as mentioned in this case scenario, who will be checking the contents of the advertisements and whether they violet the standards set by the government. It is then necessary to analyze the percentage of risks posed by those advertisement on the target group of people (16).

A small scale survey can be conducted for the validation of the data, to enquire about the perception of the alcohol marketing ads on the alcohol consumption on the youths.

The third strategy would be to include the government professionals as one of the stakeholders of the strategy to further strengthen the strategies. It is also necessary to consider the legal proceedings that might be faced with implementation of the advocacy plan. Finally, it is also important to negotiate with the sports organization. There should be a major change in the electoral system for banning the alcohol sponsorship out of sports (15).

Several challenges might come in the implementation of this health advocacy plan. One of the prime challenges will be the resistance provided by the alcohol manufacturing companies as they invest a huge amount of money in the Australian sports. Furthermore, due to the huge influence of alcohol manufacturing companies on the politics it is necessary to have an electoral change which can be quite challenging and has to be implemented from the grass root level. Due to the huge revenue got from the alcohol advertising, the sports organization as well as some of the sectors of the government (17).

Other than these challenges some of the other challenges that can be faced are the conflict among the committee members, difference in perception about the goals and implementation strategies. Due to a diversified group there can be difference in the way of implementation. Further absence of a true leadership quality might lead to faulty implementation of the advocacy plan. In order to lead a team it is necessary to help out the other members to create a compelling vision for the future communicating the vision, helping the team members to understand the importance of the problems and their impact on the society.

References

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