Contents:
1. Putting Purchasing in Context 2. Commissioning 3. Involving Users and Carers 4. Care Management 5. Contracting 6. Costs and Prices 7. Purchasing Quality Care 8. Next Steps in Commissioning

"A landmark in the debate on the future of public policy."—The Washington Post.

Outlining the origins, motivations, strategies, implementations, and effectiveness of reform policies and programs, Handbook of Public Management Practice and Reform examines changes and challenges in major areas of public administration, including budgeting, finance, human resources, and organizational management, reviews the lessons of reform, and addresses new ideas and emerging issues. Discussing the development and contribution of public administration education, research, and professional associations, the book covers decentralization and deregulation, institutional arrangement and support, and cooperation between public and nonprofit organizations.

Since the late 1980s the international relief community has seen its resources and personnel stressed beyond capacity by humanitarian crises--large-scale, man-made catastrophes such as the conflicts in Somalia, Bosnia, Rwanda, Chechnya, Zaire, and elsewhere. Waged within collapsing states, political and ethnic strife targets civilians, causes mass population dislocation and widespread human rights abuses, and impedes the efforts of relief organizations to respond effectively. Covering topics ranging from emergency public health measures to the psychological trauma of relief workers, this volume presents both a seasoned assessment of current practice and proposals for improving operational efforts in the future. The discussion also raises important questions relating to the definition and direction of the overall humanitarian mission.

`The author presents a plethora of infomation on users as individuals, their communities, research, healthcare markets and health service myths - old and new. It's a cool academic appraisal of where the power lies and how more might be shared with the patient' - Health Service Journal `Anything that helps us to understand the complexities of healthcare provision and what issues are important to users is therefore helpful. I welcome Christine Hogg's excellent summary of the issues raised by users about healthcare services. It clearly informs readers of the debates that need to take place and of the issues that healthcare practitioners should address in order to better serve their users.... So read the book to gain a better understanding of some of the issues that users feel strongly about' - British Medical Journal Making an original contribution to debates on health policy, this accessible and engaging book critically examines the future of health care and public health policy from the perspective of users and citizens. Consumerism, partnerships with patients and user involvement are seen as key to future health care and healthy public policies. The book outlines how individuals as patients, healthy people and research subjects relate to health services and how the public, as citizens, influence health care and public policies at local, national and international levels.

Inter-organizational collaboration is becoming increasingly significant as a means of achieving organizational objectives in turbulent environments. Yet it is not an easy process to implement successfully. Drawing on the work of authors with a high level of relevant experience, this volume provides a thought-provoking and accessible introduction to the theory and practice of `creating collaborative advantage'. The first part of the book develops a framework of key dimensions for understanding collaboration. Different perspectives highlight the diversity of rationales and contexts involved, and the range of elements which need to be considered and addressed when embarking on collaborative endeavours. The second section focuses in more detail on collaboration in practice. It examines the problems that can occur when different `stakeholders', who frequently hold different aims, cultures, procedures, professional languages and power resources, work across organizational boundaries. The last section addresses specifically the processes of acting as a facilitator to collaborative groups. It discusses how and why a third party facilitator role can be helpful, and explores the various processes and techniques that can be used.

Drawing together key contributions to the field, this innovative Reader provides a broad-ranging overview of both the theory and practice of public service management. The book: outlines the social, political and economic contexts in which management has emerged as a crucial issue in the public sector of modern democratic countries; introduces the major theories, issues and concepts involved in defining and understanding public sector management; analyzes some of the key values underpinning the idea of the public domain; and examines some of the main challenges in terms of particular strategies, techniques and competences which have been proposed to improve management for public services. Public Sector Management is a Course Reader for The Open University course B887 Managing Public Services.

Change Management: Manage Change or It Will Manage You represents a substantial core guidance effort for Change Management practitioners. Organizations currently contend with increasingly higher levels of knowledge-driven competition. Many attempt to meet the challenge by investing in expensive knowledge-driven change management systems. Such systems are useless, and sometimes even harmful, for making strategic decisions because they do not distinguish between what is strategically relevant and what is not. This Management-for-Results Handbook focuses on identifying and managing the specific, critical knowledge assets that your organization needs to disrupt your competitors, including tacit experience of key employees, a deep understanding of customers' needs, valuable patents and copyrights, shared industry practices, and customer- and supplier-generated innovations. The authors present two aspects of Change Management: (1) traditional Change Management as it impacts the project management team's activities and (2) a suggested new approach to Change Management directed at changing the culture. The focus is to prepare the people impacted by the project and change activities to accept and adapt to the new/changed working conditions. The first half of the book deals with traditional Change Management, which covers the topics of remembering, understanding, and applying. The second half presents the authors' new approach to changing the culture, which deals with analyzing, evaluating, and creating.

Compiling the most influential papers from the IEICE Transactions on Communications, this text/reference examines critical breakthroughs in the design and provision of effective public service networks in areas including traffic control, telephone service, real-time video transfer, voice and image transmission for a content delivery network (CDN), and Internet access. This book explores system structures, experimental prototypes, and field trials that herald the development of new IP networks that offer quality-of-service (QoS), as well as enhanced security, reliability, and function. The text offers hints and guidelines for future research in IP and photonic backbone network technologies and covers both sophisticated traffic control equipment and advanced hardware technologies. This is truly unparalleled guide to the development of high-quality, reliable, and manageable IP centric networks. TOC:

Battery Park City in Manhattan has been hailed as a triumph of urban design, and is considered to be one of the success stories of American urban redevelopment planning. The flood of praise for its design, however, can obscure the many lessons from the long struggle to develop the project. Nothing was built on the site for more than a decade after the first master plan was approved, and the redevelopment agency flirted with bankruptcy in 1979.
Taking a practice-oriented approach, the book examines the role of planning and development agencies in implementing urban waterfront redevelopment. It focuses upon the experience of the central actor - the Battery Park City Authority (BPCA) - and includes personal interviews with executives of the BPCA, former New York mayors John Lindsay and Ed Koch, key public officials, planners, and developers. Describing the political, financial, planning, and implementation issues faced by public agencies and private developers from 1962 to 1993, it is both a case study and history of one of the most ambitious examples of urban waterfront redevelopment.

Over a million nonprofit organizations, from day-care centers and neighborhood churches to major research universities and metropolitan hospitals, are currently relied upon to deliver an array of essential social services. This is in keeping with a historical conviction that private voluntary action, as opposed to government intervention, should address as many of the nation's social needs as possible. But just how much to rely on the nonprofit sector is the question at the center of a growing debate. Critics challenge the assumption that nonprofit organizations have successfully directed much of their benefits toward the poor and disadvantaged - an assumption that has to date justified favorable tax treatment for donations and nonprofit operations. Who Benefits from the Nonprofit Sector? examines all the major elements of the nonprofit sector - health services, educational and research institutions, religious organizations, social services, arts and cultural organizations, and foundations - describing each institution and its function, and then exploring how their benefits are distributed across various economic classes. The book's findings indicate that while few institutions serve primarily the poor, there is no evidence of a gross distribution of benefits upwards toward the more affluent. The source of an institution's funding is also shown to be an important determinant in how its benefits are distributed. They show, for example, that: . Nonprofit nursing homes and drug treatment centers have a lower concentration of Medicaid patients than their for-profit public counterparts do. Twenty-seven percent of social service agencies serve primarily the poor, and the large majority ofthese received most of their income from the federal government. The effective educational subsidy (i.e., cost of education less tuition) per person at both public and private univenities increases with income. The analysis of this data makes for a book with profound implications for future social and tax policy.

Peterson’s Master the Public Safety Dispatcher/911 Operator Exam test prep guide provides everything you need to succeed on the exam: Discover 461 pages of targeted test prep to jumpstart your career! Expert test prep for beginner and advanced- level emergency personnel positions. Two full-length practice tests with detailed answer explanations Comprehensive review of every question type on the exam. Proven test-taking strategies to help you score higher. Also, you will find expert tips on how to analyze job announcements and then interview successfully, giving you an edge over the competition in the 4th edition of Peterson’s Master the Public Safety Dispatcher/911 Operator Exam test prep guide.

Why are government workers in India so frequently transferred? The official explanation is that this policy was adopted to prevent corruption and promote efficiency. In reality, according to this thought-provoking new analysis, this policy is a cause of corruption and inefficiency. The author wonders why frequent transfers persist if they defeat their own aims. Using extensive fieldwork data and literature analyses, he discusses politics, history, culture and principals of organisation, and presents a clear and vivid picture of India's political and bureaucratic life.

Presents the best of what the Net has to offer in healthcare management and medicine. Designed to save computer users' time, money and frustration, this resource summarizes the most creative and practical sites on the Net and provides an up-to-date listing of how to find them. The work includes the online address and a brief summary of each site, along with highlights of notable downloads and forums. It also features a rating system for evaluating each site, including response time, content, graphics, interactivity and overall value.