Assignment Submission & Learning Outcomes Analysis

All students must submit an electronic copy via Turnitin UK link on this Canvas site via Turnitin by 12:00 (noon) on the deadline day (Monday 10th January 2022).

Turnitin UK is a plagiarism detection system which compares submissions to a wide range of data sources from the internet, journals, textbooks and other student submissions.

Any work that is not submitted their work by 12:00 (noon) will be treated as a non-submission.

Please ensure that you submit early enough and anticipate there may be times when there is a high volume of traffic through Turnitin. If you are experiencing problems submitting, please keep screenshots as evidence.

Please be aware that once you have submitted your continuous assessment work, you are not permitted to make any changes to the submitted work. Please ensure that your work is complete and checked before you submit.

On completion of this module, students should be able to demonstrate:

1. Critical and analytical abilities so that students are better able to think and act strategically in health and social care

2. An awareness of techniques and approaches relevant for appraising evidence relevant for planning and decision-making

3. An ability to understand and evaluate the use of differing commissioning strategies to achieve strategic objectives in health and social care

4. An ability to make strategic decisions relating to the values and objectives of health and social care organisations.

Students are required to select and present an analysis of a strategy for improving the performance of some aspect of health and/or social care. Remember strategy is a pattern of behaviour - specifically, a pattern in a stream of actions. Strategy is consistency in behaviour, whether or not intended.

Choice of strategy for the assignment

1. Students may select a strategy with which they are familiar through their employment or previous employment. 

Here, you are being asked to reflect on a strategic change you have yourself been involved in. You should refer to yourself as "I" when writing about your part in the strategy you're analysing. This also applies when writing about your own reflections and how they affected you. You should not refer to yourself as someone else, such as 'the researcher' or 'the writer', as it is confusing to your reader. To use the third person is slightly devious - presenting something as if it were an objective account when it isn't. The APA guidance on this is clear. (Links to an external site.) 

Assignment

Alternatively, students may select a national or local strategy where sufficient published evidence is available, such as; PFI; use of independent sector treatment centres (ISTCs); privatisation; immunisation or prevention strategies; use of targets to improve performance (performance management); use of annual reporting, such as quality audits; use of IT to improve efficiency or quality of care; integration strategies, or public consultation in restructuring or reconfiguring local services.

It may help if you can select a strategy that can be evaluated with hindsight – whether it has been realised, or to some extent failed! or has emerged piecemeal. However, you may also choose to analyse a strategy in an earlier stage of planning, that can be evaluated in terms of its formation, context, resources, objectives, need, business case, and whether (independent) review and evaluation are incorporated within the strategy. Strategies may be explicit, but they are not always. They may be planned in great detail, but they may be more accurately described as a perspective, a pattern, or a ploy. In short, you may select any sort of activity that can be analysed as a strategy or has some apparent strategic intent.

The issue is simply whether you can use your example to demonstrate strategic thinking

Examples of strategy used in previous years for this assignment

1. The Wales Cardiac Disease Strategic Framework

2. Performance measurement in French health care

3. Analysis of the NHS obesity strategy

4. Basic medical reform in China

5. The Saudi strategy for infection control and management

You may wish to analyse the strategy you select in terms of:

1. Does the strategy have clear identifiable aims?

2. If there are no clear identified aims, can the strategy succeed? (and how will we know it has succeeded?)

3. Are the aims achievable?

4. Will the aims be considered desirable by a significant number of people affected?

5. Can you identify any sources of conflict or opposition?

6. Does the strategy include methods of addressing opposition, or reducing potential conflict?

7. Does the strategy include effective means of communication between key stakeholders?

8. What additional resources might be required to ensure the success of the strategy?

9. What are the risks?

10. What are the risks of failure and have alternative courses of action been identified?
(Is there a Plan B?)

Students should demonstrate

1. critical awareness, appraisal, and reasoning

2. an ability to structure their arguments and communicate their ideas effectively, and an ability to apply concepts and ideas to work-based situations.

3. an ability to manage their resources and time, and to learn independently and effectively