Take the first paragraph of an article from the sports pages about Liverpool football clubs difficult start to the season and the likelihood of their manager surviving and change "club" to "Trust". Now tell me that doesn't say all you need to know about the state of the NHS.
It's a funny old game
Transition, transition, transition. It is the curse of the modern NHS. Whenever a Trust is underperforming, it is because they are in transition. To which it is tempting to reply , " Well stop the never end restructuring, don't upset key staff by changing their terms and conditions of employment , squash the talk of mergers and introduce a period of stability." It is not ,of course, as easy as that partly because the Trusts that are not in transition tend to be perceived as stagnating and partly because if your not one of the absolute elite your high flyers will be poached and the threat of takeover is very real. The majority of Trusts are trapped in an economic reality which sees them go deeper into debt as they struggle to compete/ deliver. The NHS still has chief executives willing to make interesting tactical changes who believe that a bright leader can transcend finance. A different approach may attract more sympathy but the modern way is to blame the manager, replace them and begin another cycle of restructuring, imposed changes and over ambitious targets.
See Jonathan Wilson's article in the Guardian Rodgers continues to fiddle while ambitions at Anfield burn 25/9/2015.
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