All articles by Helen Bevan
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HSJ KnowledgeThink differently: Nine ways to adopt good ideas for NHS change
The Change Challenge campaign
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HSJ KnowledgeScrap the programme: Successful change starts with a change platform
The change challenge campaign
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HSJ KnowledgeFrom compliance to commitment: build energy for change
Practical tools to achieve team buy-in
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HSJ KnowledgeRising Stars: Why 80s kids will transform the NHS
A new set of values will define the next generation of leaders
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HSJ KnowledgeHelen Bevan: Three steps to a new innovation strategy
How to achieve better healthcare services from existing resources
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Blogs
Resources for transformation are abundant, even in an era of austerity
Social movement leaders typically don’t have the economic resources of conventional leaders so they have to grow their own
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BlogsWhy you should reframe your strategy as transformational
Leaders need to combine coercion with a sense of shared purpose to bring about real change in their organisations
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Blogs
What can civil rights leaders teach us about strategy for transformation?
Healthcare leaders can learn greatly from civil rights and anti-apartheid leaders who typically had few economic resources, yet were able to strategise to change their worlds and enable profound change
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Blogs
Debunking some myths about disruptive innovation in the NHS
As the focus on innovation grows inside the NHS, some leaders have suggested that the really radical “disruptive” innovations that the NHS needs can only come from external sources. But where do the most radical, disruptive innovations come from?
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Blogs
Demystifying the I in QIPP
We regard innovation as a critical part of the QIPP equation for delivering NHS quality and cost improvement goals. Yet in NHS reports and in the wider academic literature, the term gets used in a thousand different ways, with different meanings. In this blog, I describe a framework ...
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Blogs
Thinking differently about quality and cost
"Revolution begins with a transformation of consciousness". Innovation, doing things differently, is becoming a high priority activity in the NHS. Innovation has a critical pre-requisite: thinking differently. If we are going to sustain a universal healthcare system for future generations, we need to think differently about the ...
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HSJ KnowledgeTrust me, I'm a leader: creating a climate for higher performance
Managers will need to build a culture of mutual ownership and trust, rather than leading from the front, to affect the breadth of change to combat the cold economic front sweeping across the NHS, say John Drew and Helen Bevan.
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CommentHelen Bevan: Who’s afraid of the big bad wolf?
NHS managers live in fear, which saps creativity and productivity. The antidote is hope
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Blogs
Community organising, leading change and shifting power: why the NHS needs to build weak ties NOW
This piece aims to introduce some fresh perspectives on NHS change from civic campaigners and community organisers. Much of the conventional wisdom of NHS improvement is based on “strong ties”, peer to peer spread of ideas for change through “people like us”. However, history suggest that we might get the ...
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Blogs
NHS targets: from compliance to commitment
The NHS is moving away from the “compliance” system of top-down national targets and standards. What should it be replaced with?
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Blogs
Does the NHS need management consultants?
As NHS management expenditure tightens, management consultancy costs are in the spotlight. Over the past period, the NHS has been big business for the consultancy industry. Whilst management consultants have made a significant contribution to NHS transformation, there have been many situations where the NHS investment in consultancy has not ...
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Blogs
Diary of an intrepid arctic marathon runner
However meticulously you plan for big events, there are some things you just can’t plan for. Last weekend, Helen Bevan was due to compete in an extreme marathon in sub-zero temperatures in the Arctic Circle, something that she had prepared and planned for intensively for the last six months. Three ...
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Blogs
On organising to change the world: from Californian farm workers to Obama’s election campaign to NHS transformation: part two
The wisdom of Marshall Ganz, unofficial mobiliser-in-chief of Obama’s election campaign on how we can challenge the status quo, the vested interests and perverse incentives in the current NHS system that get in the way of delivering high quality, high value care for all.
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Blogs
Confessions of an ex-amorphous blob
In a couple of days, Helen Bevan will be leaving for Kangerlassauq in the Arctic Circle to take part in the Polar Circle Marathon, one of the toughest marathon races in the world. She reflects on her journey over the past six months from unhealthy “amorphous blob” to extreme marathon ...
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Blogs
On organising to change the world: from Californian farm workers to Obama’s election campaign to NHS transformation - Part one
The ideas of Marshall Ganz, Harvard academic, community organiser and unofficial “Mobiliser-in-Chief” for Obama’s election campaign, offer some poweful perspectives for NHS leaders.