Unconventional approaches to primary care

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Tim Morrell at ?What If! on the upcoming Intrapreneur Program, aimed at supporting both executive and frontline staff in NHS provider trusts to adopt and scale innovation in their everyday roles.

Primary care professionals across the health sector are under an increasingly intense demand for services at a time when key staff are in short supply. Now, Imperial College Health Partners (ICHP) are partnering with ?What If!, one of the world’s leading innovation companies, to help primary care providers improve services for patients in North West London. Read more below to find out how to get involved!

For the past three years ICHP and ?What If! have been helping Trusts across North West London build the skills they need to reinvent the way they meet patient needs through the Intrapreneur Programme, aimed at provider Trusts. This has been delivered through a capability and capacity building programme for both executive and frontline staff in these trusts. The programme aims to support them to scout for and adopt next practice and innovation in their everyday roles.

?What If! Are leaders in this field, bringing 25 years’ experience at the sharp end of innovation, delivering breakthroughs for clients across multiple industries. Their work has included helping Easyjet dramatically improve turnaround times for aircraft, helping Boots deliver double digit growth in over-the-counter drugs, and helping Castrol bring a radical new oil change technology to market.

Now, for the first time, ICHP and ?What If! Are offering their Intrapreneur programme to professionals from across the spectrum of primary care and commissioning, throughout London and the South East. The focus of the programme is on helping practices and networks to deploy the right people in the right ways, times and places to have the greatest impact on the population they serve.

About the programme

The programme is a blend of:

  • practical input from three successful primary care innovators
  • classroom learning to help participants lead breakthrough conversations with colleagues and patients
  • low-risk experimentation with new approaches in the real world.

The programme is a unique learning journey, held across five evening events from January to April 2018.
Participants will need to protect time for practical work between the sessions, supported through a combination of peer learning squads and coaching.

The five events cover the following areas

    1. Introduction to service re-invention: Unvarnished stories from proven innovators; crash course in fundamental concepts and behaviours for breakthrough thinking. Following this session participants will discuss potential innovations with colleagues and identify others that could help with service pressure.
    2. Co-creating solutions: techniques for building potential solutions with patients, colleagues and stakeholders. Following this session participants will run short co-creation sessions with key people in their network.
    3. Designing experiments: designing quick, low cost experiments to test your thinking in the real world. Following this session participants will run two short, safe experiments to test their thinking.
    4. Building the service: practical advice for scaling up the innovation and pitching ideas. Following this session participants will continue to experiment and plan their pitch.
    5. Dragon’s den: pitching to execs and CCGs to help shape proposals. Following this session a range of additional support options are also available.

Getting involved

To express an interest in the programme, or to find out more, please contact Shirlene Oh, Director of Commerce, Innovation and Capability Development, on Shirlene.Oh@imperialcollegehealthpartners.com

There will be a formal application process for the programme, where applicants will need to demonstrate a keen interest in how innovation can help them deliver services more effectively, as well as a determination to experiment with new approaches.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]