Age concerns: innovation through care management

Age Concerns is a proprietary care management firm serving the elderly. Established in 1982, the firm has prospered by employing an integrated model of care whereby the caregivers are employees of Age Concerns. In addition, the firm's ability to keep the elderly at home, out of institutional care, has resonated with consumers. Various features of Age Concerns--organizational format, characteristics of consumers, and economic considerations-are described. In 2001, Age Concerns was acquired by the Senior Care Action Network, a social health maintenance organization. In an increasingly commercial environment in which the elderly are a burgeoning market, Age Concerns may be a prototype of future elder-care service delivery.     

Fostering innovation through innovation friendly procurement practices: a case study of Danish local government procurement

Innovation has been at the forefront of procurement policy in Denmark in recent years. The policy incentives emphasize public procurement of innovation as a way to accelerate the development and application of environmental and health technologies, but also as a way to achieve a competitive advantage, growth and job creation. This paper uses a single case study to illustrate the procurement of a chemical-free cleaning system by the local government in Denmark. It describes the public procurement of innovation project in the response to an unsolicited bid from the supplier, and highlights the importance of innovation-friendly procurement practice for supporting innovation. The study identified indirect innovation effects of public procurement and number of conditions that have supported success of public procurement of innovation project such as close and early engagement with supplier; role of supplier acting as a technology champion; competence for applying functional specification; political support; sufficient resource allocation and institutional match between involved organizations. These findings lend support to the idea that public procurement of innovation may have occurred as a result of innovation-friendly procurement practice regardless of the lack of an explicit intention to promote innovation and challenge assumptions on which emerging policy initiatives are based on. These findings also suggest that the local government procurement may have a role to play in supporting innovation that goes beyond current definition of public procurement as a mission-oriented instrument to be exploited for resolving social challenges. These understandings could contribute to further policy development that may lead to a situation where public procurement of innovation is utilized to a greater extent than it is today in Denmark.     

Transitional phenomena in adolescence: Tools for negotiating the second individuation

The purpose of this article is to heighten clinicians awareness of the integrative potential of transitional phenomena in adolescent ego development. A review of the literature and presentation of clinical examples support the author's contention that adolescents may employ transitional phenomena to assist them through developmental turbulence reminiscent of original rap-prochement crises in early separation-individuation. An understanding of how adolescent clients may use transitional phenomena provides clinicians with an expanded perspective for differential assessment and intervention.     

Being missed and missing: An interactional element of separation/individuation

The intent of this paper is to demonstrate as a therapeutic use of self the selective communication of the therapist's own feelings as enabling a patient to experiencemissing. I focus here on work with a patient who urgently and primarily presented unmourned (unintegrated) separation and loss in her history, in her self and object relations, and thus in her relationship with me. I propose that the therapist's feelings, in so far as they reflect an interactional aspect of the normal separation/individuation process may serve as a basis for expressive, interactive participation by the therapist.     

Flying through the hospital: efficiency and safety of an ergonomic solution

In hospitals many horizontal transfers (from stretcher to bed etc.) are performed from the moment a patient is admitted (f.e. with an ambulance) through examination departments all the way to the wards. These transfers can be very strenuous and solutions may be to use a special lifting device that accompanies the patient on this route: a stretcher sling This is a specially designed disposable lifting sling for horizontal transfers and repositioning, the sling can easily be connected to a ceiling or mobile lift. The ambulance service, two hospitals and a manufacturer decided to study the effects. The stretcher sling travels with the patient. Does this provide an ergonomically sound solution and is this an effective and efficient solution? The results were positive, but a behavioral change was also necessary.     

Loss of mate—A third individuation process

Summary and Conclusions The concept of a third individuation process following the loss of a mate focuses on the structural psychological dynamics which may impede or foster a successful adaptation to such a loss. When adequate individuation has been impaired during adolescence, marriage may serve as an ego support which impedes further development. With the death of the mate, there exists the possibility of a third chance at individuation. This understanding of the underlying dynamics suggests a treatment focus with an emphasis upon structural rather than behavioral change. The bereaved mate must be helped to dissolve the tie to the internalized infantile object and so gain a more advanced level of separation-individuation.While this paper has focused on the loss of a mate through death, the concepts would seem to be equally applicable for some divorcees. For some, divorce may represent a self-initiated third individuation process.This paper was presented at the Spring 1975 Educational Institute of the New York Society for Clinical Social Work.     

Handover process: how to improve quality and safety through an ergonomic solution

Patient safety practices for enhancing the quality and safety of handover are context sensitive interventions. In this article we explore the use of cultural probes as a qualitative technique with a twofold objective: eliciting implicit activity pattern and tools that may constitute resources for the design of effective handover solutions and prompting health care practitioners' participation and involvement.     

Termination of foster care for the older adolescent: Issues of emancipation and individuation

Adolescents currently constitute almost one-half of the foster care population and social work with this population now often includes helping the adolescent make the often fairly abrupt transition to independent living. The authors suggest that this process can be productively viewed as a microcosm of the first individuation process, analogous to the early individuation of self from mother with opportunities for individuation and further growth. The effect of the worker's own level of individuation and self-awareness on this process is discussed.is also in private practice.National Catholic School of Social Service, is also Principal Researcher and Program Consultant, Project Stepping Out of Foster Care Into Independent Living.     

Collective caring: creating safety through interactions between young activist groups and young adults in Sweden

Existing research explores safety among young adults as a complex phenomenon in diverse social spaces. Nonetheless, it largely approaches perceptions of unsafety and safety strategies as discrete individual action. In this paper, we show how safety is created through the social interactions between young activist groups and their main target or audience, young adults. Our study aimed to explore how young adults created meanings and actions of safety within their activism. Grounded Theory method was use to collect and analyze qualitative interviews with young adults of ten social change groups located in two medium-size cities in Sweden. To interpret our findings, we drew upon interactionist concepts of shared definitions and joint action [Blumer, Herbert. 1966. “Sociological Implications of the thought of George Herbert Mead.” American Journal of Sociology 71 (5): 535–544]. Shared definitions challenged narrow notions of unsafety by identifying uniform categories and harmful stereotypes as the source of the problem, and thereby locating constraints upon the capacity of different groups of young adults to define situations as (un)safe. Joint action combined an immediate response of moving to where young adults were with an enduring response of being there for young adults. Combined, these constituted an overarching social process of collective caring, which we linked to Isabel Lorey’s [2015. State of Insecurity. London: Verso] concept of practices of caring.     

Environment and innovation: Introducing cleaner production

The paper reviews some innovative pilot projects for promoting environmental management among small‐ and medium‐size companies. These projects leave much room for optimism insofar as they suggest that ‘cleaner production’ is both ecologically and economically efficient. Significantly they also show that much can be gained through organizational changes.     

Promoting innovation based on social sciences and technologies: the prospect of a social innovation park

Obviously Sir Francis Bacon's phrase “Knowledge is Power” refers not only to natural science and technology, aiming at understanding natural phenomena and obtaining material wealth, but also to social sciences and technologies, concerning social ideals and seeking harmonious and sustainable development in society. Innovation and entrepreneurship based on natural sciences and technologies have facilitated science and technology parks in the past; however, innovation and entrepreneurship based on social sciences and technologies are now laying the foundations for the concept of a “social innovation park”. The distinctive characteristics of social innovation parks and how social academic entrepreneurship is fostered by them through strategy and policy-making at local, national and global levels are explored in this study.     

Innovation-by-numbers: an autoethnography of innovation as violence

This article offers an account of a university exercise in ‘innovation’ to illustrate how innovation discourses and processes can be a vehicle for violence in organisations. Presented as two narratives of the same event told from different perspectives, our stories of a curriculum redesign workshop explore the ways innovation became a form of symbolic capital that prompted struggles of control and compliance among individual staff. Schemes of managerial dominance were then in turn individuated, while the assault of innovation became institutionalised and ultimately shielded from critical interrogation. In presenting these accounts, we seek to challenge the rising dominance of innovation as something vital to economic growth and social needs, highlighting instead how its romanticisation is highly problematic.     

The cultural swirl: anthropological perspectives on innovation

Abstract As the emergence of a globalized economy transforms the conditions under which economic performance and productivity growth occur, the ability to innovate has come to the fore as the key factor determining the competitive advantage of national economies, entire industries and individual firms alike. Linking the economic concern with the new products and services to more general questions of the social organization of culture, this essay sets out to explore the contribution of anthropology to an understanding of how innovation occurs. Against the backdrop of theories of cultural change and the identification of parameters that define innovative environments, anthropology enquires into how historical contingency and social agency make innovation possible. In‐depth ethnographic studies emphasize that innovation is much less dependent on the creative individual than on the interaction within social milieux that create what anthropologist Ulf Hannerz calls a ‘cultural swirl’. Such milieux appear to function best when they incorporate heterogeneous actors and are not closed systems but exposed to serendipitous encounters and exchanges with others actors and milieux.     

Public procurement of innovation: empirical evidence from EU public authorities on barriers for the promotion of innovation

Public procurement is seen as a powerful instrument for innovation policy, but meaningful barriers seem to hinder its deployment. This study reviews literature on complexity, time consumption, and risk representing important hindrances for the procurement of innovation from public buyers' perspective. Findings provide evidence on the existence of hindrances for public procurement of innovation across European Union member states through the analysis of data from a large-scale survey. Further, differences in terms of the perception of barriers become evident depending on the availability of monitoring systems for innovation performance.     

Achieve Boston: a citywide innovation in professional development

Achieve Boston is a broad-based collaborative effort to improve the overall quality of programs for children and youth by establishing a professional development infrastructure that supports those who work with young people during the out-of-school-time hours.     

Greenland: Education and society between tradition and innovation

In this article I discuss the history, the demographics, and the educational landscape of Greenland. During the past hundred years the Greenlandic educational system has gone through multiple changes. The most significant are discussed here. The main developments have always dealt with the schism that exists between European (Danish) culture and the indigenous (Inuit) culture. More and more a balance is being reached between the two, as it is in the educational realm, but with an emphasis on the indigenous culture and traditions.     

State and local retirement plans: innovation and renovation

This Special Report/Issue Brief examines the universe of state and local retirement plans. It describes how these plans have developed and continue to evolve in a number of areas, including plan features, regulatory framework, governance, and asset management. While these retirement programs differ in many respects from private-sector plans, the disparity in some areas has narrowed. This report also includes a discussion of trends and the underlying forces for change. Public-sector retirement programs provide an important source of pension coverage in the United States, and are a significant part of the total retirement market: Combined public-sector retirement assets (state, local, and federal governments) comprised 29 percent of the $11.2 trillion U.S. retirement market in 1998. State and local plans are dominant in the public-sector retirement market, holding $2.7 trillion in assets, compared with $696 billion held by federal plans (both military and civilian). More than 16 million individuals are employed by state and local jurisdictions in the United States. State and local retirement plans share certain common features because of the environment in which they operate. Legal statutes, governance, and tradition all play a role in defining what is sometimes referred to as a "public-sector culture." Despite common features, there is considerable diversity among public-sector retirement plans. To attract and retain a skilled work force, public-sector employers have increased their use of defined contribution (DC) plans to supplement defined benefit (DB) plans (or, to a lesser extent, replace or serve as an alternative to them) and improve cost-of-living adjustments. At the same time, a combined federal-state regulatory framework has encouraged certain plan design features, unavailable in the private sector, which include multiple tiers for successive generations of employees in a single plan and different strategies to increase portability. State and local retirement plans reflect an increasing role by the federal government in pension system design and operation, which has led to greater complexity in such areas as Social Security participation and deferred compensation arrangements. Complexity can be expected to increase with the recent passage of P.L. 107-16, the Economic Growth and Tax Relief Reconciliation Act of 2001. The latest full-year data included in this report are for 1999 and in some cases 2000. After this report went to press, the Federal Reserve issued significantly revised quarterly data for state, local, and federal retirement plan assets, which were not incorporated in this Issue Brief.     

Social innovation: Buzz word or enduring term?

The term ‘social innovation’ has come into common parlance in recent years. Some analysts consider social innovation no more than a buzz word or passing fad that is too vague to be usefully applied to academic scholarship. Some social scientists, however, see significant value in the concept of social innovation because it identifies a critical type of innovation. In this paper, we suggest one possible definition of social innovation and show that when its empirical meaning is distilled, the term is of great importance. We distinguish social innovation from business innovation, and identify a subset of social innovations that requires government support.     

Social-ecological innovation: adaptive responses to urban environmental conditions

Novel approaches to natural resource management, particularly those which promote stakeholder participation, have been put forward as fundamental ingredients for establishing resilient, polycentric forms of environmental governance. This is nowhere more pertinent than in the case of the complex adaptive systems associated with urban areas. Decentralisation of urban green space management has been posited as an element thereof which, according to resilience thinking, should contribute to the adaptive capacity of cities and the ecosystem services upon which they rely. Implicit in this move towards increased adaptive capacity is the ability to manage through innovation. Although the importance of innovation towards system adaptability has been acknowledged, little work has thus far been carried out which demonstrates that innovative use of urban green space represents a form of adaptive response to environmental conditions. The current paper reports on research which maps examples of organised social-ecological innovation (OSEI) in an urban study area and evaluates them as adaptive responses to local environmental conditions which may contribute to system resilience. The results present OSEI as a coherent body of responses to local social and environmental deprivation, exhibiting diversity and adaptability according to individual contexts. The study therefore provides evidence for the importance of local stakeholder-led innovation as in the building of adaptive capacity in urban social-ecological systems.