There are some great things emerging from Q’s member-led Special Interest Groups. Read on for an update on the latest happenings, upcoming events and groups in the pipeline. Get involved or contact us for more information on anything detailed below!

Updates and upcoming events

14 September: Co-production

Q member Michelle Beattie, part of the team leading the Co-designing the use of NHS near me at home shortlisted Q Exchange project, recently got in touch with me to point out that over 10 of the shortlisted projects involve co-production (sharing power with patients and others to deliver services).

Michelle wanted to know if there was a smarter way to connect, share and learn from each other. As if by magic, the Co-production SIG’s core team rapidly organised a video call, which will look at what is co-production – and how to make it work in your improvement project. Do join us!

This SIG is also planning a call on Always Events – a co-produced QI methodology for improving care, which is spreading fast – following the publication of a major evaluation by the Picker Institute. The speaker will be Q’s Helen Lee, who starts a secondment to lead Always Events imminently.

26 September: Closing the gap – developing improvers for a complex world

This SIG is hosting a video call entitled how to support innovation in the NHS and other organisations – with a little help from complexity science, with an influential and respected figure, Prof Mary Uhl-Bien.

There’s been a high level of interest in it, with 79 people already signed up, including complexity in healthcare fans like Prof Trish Greenhalgh. (More info/to register, go here).

28 September: Lean Healthcare

This SIG has been organising a series of video calls showcasing pioneering Lean implementations around the UK. The next one will looking at using the lean tool of 3P to design facilities in healthcare, with the SIG’s join organiser, Dr Iain Smith.

4 October: Q Connectors’ video call on evaluating the impact of Q

There is an upcoming Q Connectors call on evaluation and the impact of Q nationally and regionally (for more details/to register go here). We’ll hear from Sophie Bland about a first annual review of Q she produced for the West of England region, as well as the new upcoming Q learning report, produced by Q’s core team, in response to RAND Europe’s latest evaluation of Q.

18 October: Evaluation

The evaluation SIG is involved in a proposed training day to take place at the Health Foundation on Developmental Evaluation. This is the novel approach used by Q’s evaluators, RAND Europe, and focuses on real-time feedback and insights to support a project’s development. Watch this space!

30 November: Primary Care SIG

Register for a video call on quality improvement in patient safety with Don Berwick, Simon Denegri, Martin Diaper, Nav Chana and others.

Q Exchange –crowd-funding options for improvement projects

It’s fabulous to see the inspiring shortlist of Q Exchange projects, that will go to crowd-voting next month – an idea that had once been mooted to specifically support SIG projects. It was interesting the see the path one project took to reach the shortlist: emerging from an Open Space session at last year’s Q community-wide event in Liverpool and also in a Future Q session I helped to run there.

As well as the co-production video call, I’ve also organised an expert call on how to successfully crowd-fund for health projects on 2nd October (more info/to register, go here). This may be particularly relevant for Q Exchange projects that aren’t successful in getting funding, but are still keen to access the funding needed so that they can go ahead.

For example, the Ambulance Services and QI SIG has regular conference calls – on topics like Ambulance Trigger Tools, PROMs and clinical improvements. But it’s become clear that they need longer and face-to-face time to build the infrastructure that is missing nationally for Ambulance QI. The SIG’s Q Exchange proposal around this didn’t reach the shortlist, but maybe the upcoming call can help.

Developments

SIGS in the pipeline:

• Child and Adolescent Health
• Culture and QI
• Big Data

We’re looking at the possibility of authors of the many interesting upcoming Health Foundation publications making themselves available for calls to share key findings and engage in discussion with SIG members.

If you want to help a Q SIG do great things, get involved – join the core organisers’ group, for example. And engage in the online spaces – make sure every post gets a response. More advice on how to launch and support SIGs (and Communities of Practice) can be found in this Q SIGs/CoPs toolkit.

A thank-you

A big thank you to SIG leads Mandy Rudczenko (Co-production) and Ann Abbassi (Communities of Practice) who led their respective SIGs and did great things including rewarding video calls and a tweet chat to co-produce new guidance with NIHR, with over 250 participants. They’ve handed over the baton to others to lead their SIGs, but will remain involved.

Getting Things Done (GTD)!

With 2,500+ Q members, almost 9,000 Twitter followers, and around 60 Q groups, it’s not always easy to keep all the balls in the air. I’m having a go at setting up a watertight personal productivity system, inspired by the by Getting Things Done approach described in David Allen’s two million-selling book of the same name. Once I’ve done this, expect to see a truly unprecedented level of unflappable calmness, combined with efficiency.

I’d love to compare notes with any other GTD geeks out there – get in touch. I’ll share an outline of the approach in a future blog – you might find it helpful even if it’s largely common sense!

If you have any suggestions that could improve the Q community or for any more information on the special interest groups, please get in touch.