Implementing Change in Health Professions Education: Stakeholder Analysis and Coalition Building

Abstract

The challenges facing the health sciences education fields are more evident than ever. Professional health sciences educators have more demands on their time, more knowledge to manage, and ever-dwindling sources of financial support. Change is often necessary to either keep programs viable or meet the changing needs of health education. This article outlines a simple but powerful three-step tool to help educators become successful agents of change. Through the application of principles well known and widely used in business management, readers will understand the concepts behind stakeholder analysis and coalition building. These concepts are part of a powerful tool kit that educators need in order to become effective agents of change in the health sciences environment. Using the example of curriculum change at a school of veterinary medicine, we will outline the three steps involved, from stakeholder identification and analysis to building and managing coalitions for change.

Is two a crowd? A qualitative analysis of dyad learning in an OBGYN clinical clerkship

“…This provides new pedagogical challenges, but also potential for innovation of medical education in times of increasing productivity demands and medical personnel shortages. Stakeholder theory offers a toolbox to guide this process, 23,25 which has been used in other areas of medical education and healthcare already 17,24,35,57 . Our results suggest that the implementation of dyad learning may in some cases challenge stakeholders’ preferences and perceptions of what is valuable to them 58 .…”

Prospects for the sustainability of delivering the basic package of health services in Afghanistan: a stakeholder analysis

“…Then the stakeholders' roles stakeholder analysis [15] was used to address the study aims. Stakeholder analysis is a tool used to examine the feasibility of future policy directions, or to develop strategies to manage important stakeholders [16,17]. The analysis used in this study involved identification of key stakeholders and exploration of their interest in sustainability of the BPHS, their power and authority for action, their position taken on BPHS sustainability and the impact of a decline in donor funding on the stakeholders [18].…”

Political Feasibility Analysis of the New Financing Scheme for the National Health Insurance Reform in Taiwan: An Application of Stakeholder Analysis

“…In another case, the entire political process of health reform in the late 1990s was documented to reveal the interdependence of the reform team and all other actors in the policy networks (Gonzalez‐Rossetti & Ramirez, 2000), with the authors clearly capturing the complex and interactive nature of the overall reform process. Numerous studies on health policy reforms have been carried out in various other countries, such as India, Israel, South Africa and the UK (Aarons, Wells, Zagursky, Fettes, & Palinkas, 2009; Baum, Resnik, Wu, & Roey, 2007; Gillespie, Florin, & Gillam, 2004; Horev & Babad, 2004; Hyder et al., 2010; Nandraj, Khot, Menon, & Brugha, 2001; Thomas & Gilson, 2004). In all cases, the selection of ways of systematically collecting and interpreting “political information” is the key to implementing a “strategically useful” political feasibility assessment, a prerequisite in the analysis of all data during periods of health sector reform (Walsh & Simonet, 1995).…”