Values-Driven Innovation: The potential for Social Enterprise to drive growth and sustainability

Our values are what makes me proud to be British. The National Health Service is a prime example of an institution that has long been guided by values, with the goal of delivering high-quality healthcare to all, regardless of their ability to pay. The Darzi review was clear on the need to protect universal healthcare as a model and stated that “innovation is the only way out” from the problems outlined today. So where do we go from here?

I had the pleasure of attending and speaking at Professor Durka Dougall’s Inaugural Centre for Population Health Conference in Bradford a few weeks ago. The first thing that struck me about the event was the venue. No swanky hotel, or conference centre – we were in the heart of a community centre, filled with energy and passion, not pretence. The speakers and attendees at the conference all had one thing in common – a values-driven approach to their work. Speakers like Christiana Melam MBE particularly caught my attention, the founder and CEO of the National Association of Link Workers, who spoke eloquently about the potential for social enterprises to deliver innovative solutions to the most complex health and social care challenges. I have seen first-hand as a GP the power of social prescribing and the role link workers play in connecting patients to non-medical sources of support in the community. Where Christiana advocated for social justice and bottom-up approaches to the challenges we face today, I couldn’t help but mime “hear hear”.

I then take my mind across the Atlantic to our ally and global superpower United States of America, where I’m fortunate to often be invited to speak and share the work we do in the NHS in Innovation and Artificial Intelligence. I look at their ability to leverage the non-profit and social enterprise sectors to deliver solutions that many governments around the world, including our own, have struggled mightily with. I look at the role of their non-profit approaches at bodies like Kaiser Permanente, Mayo Clinic and Intermountain Healthcare in driving innovation and improving health outcomes, through securing grants for research, education and supporting entrepreneurial clinicians and patients. Whilst the US healthcare system has many of its own challenges, I don’t think we can ignore the examples of what can be achieved through these values-driven models where best practice exists.

The NHS is a brand known globally for quality and universal healthcare, and we must protect and nourish this. However, I cannot help but wonder whether a more evident support and integration of a social enterprise model, where staff, patients and the wider community have more of a direct say and stake in the design and delivery of services, novel use of technology and medicines, could help to drive the innovation the system so desperately needs. I feel so proud to lead a Social Enterprise of this kind, which focuses on innovation across a region, bringing together health, care, education, industry and the third sector to collaborate and solve problems together. I believe if we hold on to our values and become more adept and agile at deploying values-driven business models and partnerships, we can start to leverage the inward investment and growth we so desperately need, to protect and sustain the NHS for generations to come.