Elizabeth Lank

Communities of Influence tells the story of how a prominent UK non-profit organisation (Macmillan Cancer Support) has engaged both professionals and patients over the past two decades to improve cancer care. Dedicated staff at all levels of large healthcare organisations can be frustrated by a perceived inability to influence healthcare priorities...

Many organizations grapple with the challenge of connecting their organizational silos. Both organizational and geographical boundaries often slow down or block the flows of knowledge and experience that are needed to make full use of the organization's capabilities. There is a high cost to the duplication of effort, inconsistencies and inefficienc...

When the Cancer Genetics Pilots Programme was established in 2004, Macmillan Cancer Support undertook to create and facilitate the work of a "National User Reference Group". The purpose of this group was to give service user representatives (patients and carers) from each of the seven pilot projects regular opportunities to meet and share experienc...

Now we have explored the different facets of collaborative working, there is one overarching challenge that remains to be addressed. How can an organization develop its capability to collaborate effectively with others? Knowing what needs to be done is one thing; having the individual and organizational capability to do it well is another.

It should be clear by now that collaborative working is much more of an art than a science. Moving between tasks and relationship building, balancing individual motivation with organizational agendas, building consensus, handling conflict, considering strategic issues and then nittygritty detail—all of this requires the skills of a consummate diplo...

In an ideal world, learning from experience would be considered a natural and essential part of organizational life. In practice, the time needed for review and reflection is often traded out for what are felt to be more pressing priorities. In collaborative work, because of its evolutionary nature and the range of stakeholders involved, it is esse...

Many organizations find it a challenge to measure and evaluate the impact of complex organizational interventions. In this second of a two-part article (part one, ‘Connecting through Communities: How a Voluntary Organization Is Influencing Healthcare Policy and Practice’, appeared in the last issue of this journal), the authors relate how UK-based...

In recent years, the UK charity Macmillan Cancer Relief has been developing innovative ways of stimulating learning—among health professionals, patients and carers—to improve the experience of people living with cancer. In essence what it is doing is to create and support a number of groups and communities that ‘float’ around its organizational str...

Though invisible and therefore difficult to measure, knowledge and human expertise are the principal creators of value for every organization. What new approaches might business leaders adopt to ensure that this intangible source of value is managed and enhanced? The success of a knowledge-based organization will always depend on the willingness of...

Many companies are recognizing the importance of knowledge as a vital business asset. ICL, a leading European information technology company, is one of them. As ICL has shifted away from being a product company to being a systems and services company, knowledge management has been recognized as a crucial business process. A full-time role was creat...

No less than twenty years ago, the international operations of most companies were largely export activities of ethnocentric organizations. Expatriate assignments spelt career doom, distancing the exile from the headquarter politics of a successful career. Surveys in the mid-70s of Fortune 100 companies revealed that 90% of top executives had no fo...

In this article we argue that leadership development is more important than ever. We argue that it should be an ongoing process, integrated as closely as possible with day-to-day business activities. We suggest that leadership development has evolved over time, moving from Leadership Development 1.0, which focused primarily on developing a small nu...

Traducción de: The Power of Learning. A Guide to Gaining Competitive Advantage Contenido: 1. El poder de aprender como esencia del éxito. 2. El poder del liderazgo. 3. El poder del lenguaje y la cultura. 4. El poder de los procesos de apoyo para la dirección de personal. 5. El poder de la tecnología de información. 6. El poder del aprendizaje perso...

Sumario: El poder de aprender como esencia del exito -- El poder del liderazgo -- El poder del lenguaje y la cultura -- El poder de los procesos de apoyo para la dirección de personal -- El poder de la tecnología de la información -- El poder del aprendizaje personal -- El poder de los equipos, las redes y las comunidades -- El poder del aprendizaj...