Evaluating Innovation in Motion: Designing a Qualitative Study Protocol for the HSE Spark Innovation Programme

Introduction:

Evaluating the impact of a public sector innovation programme with multiple routes for engagement poses a unique methodological challenge. Each route requires a bespoke approach to understand participant’s engagement with the programme, and its impact on their development as frontline innovators. This paper presents Phase 1 of a study addressing this challenge in the Irish Health Service Executive’s Spark Innovation Programme (‘Spark’). The paper provides an overview of the flexible approach to qualitative interviews, developed to capture and analyse the different engagement routes for the programme focusing on agile interviewing approaches.

Goals and Methods: This study has four objectives: (1) To capture and evaluate the Spark engagement routes; (2) To capture and evaluate direct and indirect Spark innovation supports; (3) To analyse the direct and indirect impact of these supports; and (4) To identify any current or emerging support gaps. Using a phenomenological framework, Phase 1 of the study uses retrospective and prospective approaches to understand Spark’s multiple engagement routes. The goal is to ensure agility, and to allow for the needs of the frontline innovators to guide the direction of the study to the relevant route. The paper delves into these methods, detailing how participants were given autonomy to select a route, and how each route required a different interviewing approach.

Conclusions: This paper demonstrates how qualitative methods can be adapted to respond to the demands of health-focused innovation programmes with multiple engagement routes. We reflect on the methodological challenges of integrating human-centred design into a phenomenological framework and discuss how these approaches can advance qualitative study design in public sector healthcare innovation.

Results: This research approach requires agility, flexibility and close collaboration with the public sector programme team.  This ensures alignment with the programme’s original priorities, while remaining responsive to the emerging needs of frontline innovators.