Efficiency Promoting Innovation in Social Care: Social Services Departments and the Elderly

Abstract

Like all output-producing organisations, social services departments must be concerned with efficiency, this concern being redoubled in the new era of budgetary retrenchment. In these circumstances, the fostering of innovations which will contribute to greater efficiency becomes crucial. In an attempt to analyse this process, we first of all list various ‘signs’ which indicate the presence of greater efficiency and then produce ‘scores’ for authorities on this basis which we predict through various modelling procedures. We conclude that the most successful approach to the study of the improvement of efficiency through innovation sees such behaviour as largely motivated by the search for external finance. In these circumstances the construction of appropriate organisational incentives, such as Joint Finance, takes on a new significance. We then analyse the process of implementation of such innovatory schemes and locate two cut-off points; the initial floating of the idea and the transition to mainstream practice. The latter blockage can be best explained through internal bargaining procedures among established producer groups. Our conclusions are threefold. First, reviews of service provision clearly increase the propensity to innovate. In this case, it would appear to be most unwise to ask for disproportionate cuts in research, planning and development staff who usually playa major part in such reviews. Second, external financial incentives do playa major role in improving efficiency through innovation. Recent decisions to increase the level of Joint Financing must therefore be welcomed. Finally, internal barriers to innovation can be best overcome by top level support for innovation combined with the use of development officers to bridge the gap between very different producer groups.