Whole of Government MOVEment
Healthy Ireland – Let’s MOVE!
Future Health Summit
27 May 2016
Kate O’Flaherty
Health and Wellbeing Programme Director
Department of Health
Whole of Government MOVEment:
What is it? And why do it?
• Whole of Government or Whole System approaches
a.k.a Joined-up Working
• Government Departments (and other partners) work
together on critical societal issues or ‘wicked’ problems
that one sector alone cannot address
• Healthy Ireland as example – improving health and
wellbeing outcomes through tackling social and
environmental determinants (not just health factors)
Whole of Government MOVEment:
How do we it? What does it take?
• Structures? Helpful but not sufficient alone … whole of
government MOVEment about ‘way of working’ …
therefore needs:
• Mandate
• Leadership
• Supportive culture … for collaborative working
Whole of Government MOVEment:
All About Collaboration
Whole of Government MOVEment:
All About Collaboration
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Communication and relationships
Shared vision on goals and outcomes
Trust
Focussed on solutions
Flexibility and openness
Understanding different perspectives
• Skillset … networking …
need to be a (boundary) spanner
Whole of Government MOVEment:
The challenges
• Working … horizontally in a vertical system
• Balancing …. short-term pressures v long-term goals
• Changing …. culture, behaviour, ways of working
• Avoiding … (health) ‘imperialism’ / language important
• Linking … policy and implementation (and top-down
with bottom-up)
Whole of Government MOVEment:
Healthy Ireland
• Joint projects underway with range of Departments
including …
• D/ Education and Skills (Wellbeing in schools)
• D/ Children and Youth Affairs (Giving children best start
in life – focus on prevention and early intervention)
• D/Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation (Healthy Workplaces)
• D/ ..Local Government (Healthy Cities & Counties)
Whole of Government MOVEment:
Now is good
• Climate of public sector reform
• Wider recognition of need for greater integration to
achieve broader societal aims
• Increasing emphasis on ‘prevention and early
intervention’ and ‘health and wellbeing’
• Citizens expect it (and want to be part of it)
Whole of Government MOVEment:
Some final thoughts
• Our challenges are not unique to Ireland … however
unique opportunity to develop solutions
• Same principles apply for ‘cross-sectoral’ working
• Biggest job = joining the dots
• Priority focus = building (and maintaining) relationships
… and keeping things moving
Thanks for listening
[email protected]
www.healthyireland.ie
@HealthyIreland