Excellence in Healthcare Partnerships

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This category recognises work undertaken in partnership/ joint working with stakeholders, either in the UK, Europe or internationally that demonstrates how co-operation has improved mutual understanding and trust, and has delivered improvements in standards of healthcare

Healthcare providers, patient associations, charities, non-governmental organisations and pharmaceutical companies share a common agenda to improve patient care outcomes through high-quality, cost-effective treatment and management.

Projects are invited that demonstrate joint development and implementation of patient-centred projects together with shared commitment to successful delivery.

Judges are looking for clarity of the specific roles of each partner, evidence of a true dialogue, joint objectives, learning and outcomes – tangible benefits to both patients and carers that ultimately save, or have a major impact on, patients’ lives. Programmes should demonstrate a real ‘win- win’ for all partners involved and clearly demonstrate how outcomes have been delivered over the time period.

Work conducted during the three-year period between January 2021 and December 2023 will be eligible. If the submission has been entered previously, the current entry must provide benchmarks to clearly demonstrate how the programme was evaluated and how it has developed over time.

Don’t forget:

  • provide a copy of any previous submission for this work
  • Consider which organisations the submission is being entered on behalf of, a true partnership ethos will ideally be reflected right the way through to outcomes.

JUDGING CRITERIA AND ENTRY FORMAT:

Entry Title

Please give a simple title for your entry of no more than ten words

Executive Summary – 200 words. 0 (zero) marks

This will be used if your entry is selected as a finalist and does not need to be anonymised.

Main entry

1. Budget Band Information, as below:

Band A under £10,000
Band B £10,001-£25,000
Band C £25,001-£50,000
Band D £50,001-£100,000
Band E £100,001-£200,000
Band F over £200,001.

If your client has declined to allow this, you must state this within your submission.

  • Failure to provide the budget band seriously impacts the judge’s ability to assess the entry against other entries and may result in the entry being disqualified
  • The budget band provides important context for judging the innovation, delivery and impact of a piece of work.
  • Impressive work is not always dependent on budget size, so there is no right or wrong budget.

2. Situation Analysis and Benchmarking– 15 marks (300 words)

  • In this section you should show the judges how well you understood the situation at the start of the project
  • Use this section/analysis to clearly lay out benchmark data that you will refer to in your measurement of effectiveness later
  • Show the judges the best information, data and insights you have about uptake of health interventions, current practice, defining/segmenting audiences, identifying educational or information needs, which channels will best reach the audience, competitive environment, creative landscape before the start of your work
  • To note, this category is focused on projects delivered via partnerships that have formed around common goals – the emphasis should not be on any one party’s drivers and needs but on those identified by the partners. Any contextual information that explains the partnership formation is important to the judging process, so make it clear in this section how the project came about – where did the idea come from, at what point in the planning did the partnership start, and who were the partner organisations involved?
Judges’ top tips
  • We work and operate in a world where there is a wealth of data and insights, so there is really no excuse for projects and programmes that are planned without this data.
  • The judges will reward the strength and robustness of this data i.e. a well conducted piece of client market research will score more highly than a two-question internal survey monkey
  • The judges will reward the variety of data that prompts useful insights and helps to shape a holistic view of the situation and audiences.

3. Objectives – 15 marks (250 words)

Describe the objectives for the project or programme including outputs (i.e., what materials/platforms are produced), out-takes (i.e., post-event evaluation, surveys showing changes in knowledge/understanding, social media/website engagement, sharing and commenting), and outcomes (i.e., changes in patient behaviour or outcomes, clinical practice or health policy versus the benchmark stated in the situation analysis) and specifically how these will be measured

4. Strategy – 15 marks (250 words)

  • Please outline what your strategy was and why
  • Refer to the data and insight in the situation analysis section
  • Explain why this was the right strategy and any points to emphasise bold or innovative strategy selection
  • Explain how you went about deciding on a partner/partners and be really clear about describing the partnership.
Judges’ top tips The judges will:
  • Reward clarity of thought around strategies and how they are communicated – bullet points may be better than long prose
  • Reward consideration of how the partnership dynamic informed the strategic thinking
  • Assess how well the chosen strategy/strategies might achieve objectives
  • Reward entries showing a clever or insightful way that you interpreted the data and insights from the situation analysis to set your strategy
  • Reward innovation in strategy
  • Recognise how different communications disciplines are blended as part of the strategic approach.

5. Implementation – 15 marks (400 words)

  • Please describe how you implemented the project or programme
  • Please briefly outline why these specific tactics were selected
  • For a programme this should include describing what tactics were deployed to implement the strategy
  • For a meeting or stand-alone event this should describe how the meeting or event was delivered
  • Be clear on roles and responsibilities within the partnership – who did what and how was it decided? How was the partnership governance managed overall?
Judges’ top tips
  • The judges need to know what you did or developed to judge this section – please keep descriptions clear and succinct
  • When awarding marks in this section the judges will reward:
    • a logical selection of tactical projects or outputs
    • creativity and innovation in the way you execute the tactics
    • clever selection and maximisation of channels
    • scientific acumen and robustness
    • the use of insights in finding creative ways to engage the defined audiences.

6a. Effectiveness Part One: Outputs and Out-takes vs Objectives – 10 marks (200 words)

  • To help the judges assess the strength of the evaluation, please describe how successful the project or programme was in terms of outputs and out-takes achieved versus the relevant measurements set in the Objectives section
  • You may include comments from third-party stakeholders in this section but ONLY if they clearly help to demonstrate the impact of the work and were a pre-planned part of your measurement approach

6b. Effectiveness Part Two: Outcomes vs Objectives – 10 marks (200 words)

  • To help the judges assess the strength of the evaluation, please describe how successful the project or programme was in terms of the outcomes achieved versus the relevant measurements set in the Objectives section
  • You may include comments from third-party stakeholders in this section but ONLY if they clearly help to demonstrate the impact of the work and were a pre-planned part of your measurement approach

Supporting Materials

Please only send information that helps the judges to see how you researched, planned, implemented and measured the programme within each specific category, e.g.:
  • Information illustrating how the strategy was brought to life is helpful, but we don’t need a copy of every item
  • Information supporting the evaluation and measurement is the most relevant
  • ESSENTIAL: a summary sheet must be supplied detailing each piece of supporting material and clearly identifying where evidence can be found to support claims in the entry
  • PLUS: An approved visual image or video that supports the entry for use in print, results pages online and in the AV.