Unfolding National eHealth Implementation Processes: Stakeholder Engagement as a key lesson from the National Health Service in England and Wales

This research paper reports new insights in relation to national processes of ICT implementation in the healthcare sector. In the context of failing e-Health initiatives, new empirical evidence was derived from a longitudinal case study of the national implementation processes of e-Health strategies in England and Wales. The experience of two different approaches taken by the English Connecting for Health Programme and the Welsh Informing Healthcare Programme suggest the importance of stakeholder engagement in technology-led organisational change in the healthcare sector. Moreover, since stakeholder engagement as such does not necessarily lead to successful outcomes of organisational change initiatives, perspectives on stakeholder engagement strategies and levels are presented using Friedman & Miles ladder of stakeholder management and engagement.