You are here:Home› Government › Consulting services

Government

Consulting services

The knowledge AHP has gained after years of involvement in the HRH is highly valued by government departments looking to streamline processes and implement managerial best practice. To this end, we offer the following services:

Best practice HR management 

AHP provides best practice HR management to organisations looking to improve internal HR practices around recruitment, retention, career path progression, and resource optimisation. Our experience includes:

  • Working with governments, professional bodies and other healthcare providers to recruit health workers based on identified human resources in health needs. AHP has sourced and placed thousands of foreign and locally qualified health workers in government hospitals (almost entirely rural) and NGO facilities in the region. 
  • Designing and providing orientation programmes and ongoing support services to foreign-qualified health workers. These programmes have been designed in conjunction with healthcare facility managers with the objectives of improving health worker retention and impact.
  • Implementing and managing a project to provide clinical and management support for rural doctors in the Eastern Cape. This programme, funded by the Clinton Health Access Initiative, was designed and implemented in partnership with the provincial and local government.
HR process engineering and HR in health planning

AHP has a unique perspective on HR process engineering within healthcare facilities, government and regulatory bodies. Re-engineering around human resources practices, orientation programmes, HR expenditure, and retention programmes all contribute towards attracting and retaining valuable health workers. AHP provides strategic bursary programmes advice to assist governments and donors in retaining healthcare workers within their home country. Our experience includes:

  • Providing a consulting service to the Lesotho and Swaziland health ministries. AHP identified the bottlenecks in their recruitment processes and is working with these governments to streamline these processes.
  • Providing capacity to the South African National Department of Health and Health Professions Council of South Africa. This assistance is focused on relieving critical bottlenecks and has had a significant impact to date.
  • Working with the South African private sector on public private partnerships (PPPs) to improve capacity in the public sector. AHP has provided strategic advice and developed business plans for a number of corporations around proposed human resources in health initiatives.
HR in health research and strategic information

AHP conducts research into various areas of human resources in healthcare, providing strategic information for HR decision-making. Our team has experience in conducting research reports in and comparative analyses between countries, professions, specialties, public and private healthcare, provinces, and many other areas. Monitoring and evaluation (M&E) of HR programmes are also critical to establishing progress and success. AHP provides the development and execution of M&E frameworks designed to answer key strategic questions. Our experience includes:

  • Successfully completing research on numerous issues, including research around the career objectives of final year medical students, community service for health workers, case studies on various HR in health issues, case studies on HIV/Aids patients in rural areas, and orientation and induction of foreign-qualified doctors.
  • Building a tender for the provision of an M&E framework for the South African Department of Health to monitor the impact of their occupational-specific dispensation (OSD) programme.
  • Building a database that sources, analyses, and interprets strategic information on human resources for health in South Africa. This database will provide information on the health workforce for strategic decision-making and to evaluate the healthcare system in South Africa. This is still in progress.  
HR in health policy development

AHP has worked extensively with human resource management issues within the South African public healthcare system. We have subsequently become highly conversant with the particular challenges that have to be addressed in order to make the system work. These include:

  • Translating policy into practice in a way that is appropriate and practical – working within the constraints and making it work. 
  • Understanding the factors that drive public health service as a career choice and helping to make them happen (career path, remuneration, mentoring and support, lifestyle). 
  • Understanding the factors that drive people away from a career in public health, as well as those factors that are simply frustrating. This knowledge is valuable to any government department or facility manager that is tasked with improving the success rates of attracting and retaining relevant health professionals.

Our experience includes:

  • Performing extensive monitoring and evaluation on human resource in health issues and interventions. This has been used to provide feedback to government, private sector and civil society partners on their success and impact, as well as to suggest potential improvements.
  • Developing ethical recruitment guidelines. These are in accordance with WHO guidelines and accepted international standards for the recruitment of foreign and local health workers.
Crisis management

AHP provides crisis management assistance during periods of health worker resource shortages. We have considerable experience in providing emergency capacity to healthcare facilities, government ministries and regulatory bodies. Our experience includes:

  • Provided over 20 000 locum health worker hours that provided critical capacity to hospitals. We also Work with a host of healthcare facilities to source immediate health worker resources.
Internal marketing and communication

AHP provides assistance to healthcare organisations and governments around sourcing experienced and qualified health workers. We have extensive experience in designing and implementing marketing and communication strategies to attract target audiences of health workers. Our experience includes:

  • Developing successful marketing campaigns, both locally and overseas for South Africa, Swaziland and Lesotho. 
  • Successful developing and implementing online marketing tools. These include websites, as well as a wealth of experience in using social networking tools.