Breaking the barrier between academic theory and industry practice

Until you do, you’re not really creating change.

“I come from a corporate background, and because of that, I know there’s a barrier between academics and practitioners, where they think they live in two different worlds,” says Dr Nazlee Siddiqui, an academic in health service management at the Tasmanian School of Business and Economics.

“I believe it’s an artificial barrier, because there’s no good theory without good practice, and there’s no good practice without good theory,”

In her teaching and research, Dr Siddiqui is seeking to break this barrier down. And her research on hospital length of stay for patients with chronic physical illness and mental illness could see a change in industry practice. She is leading this research with a cross-disciplinary team at University of Tasmania.

Through her study of patients with chronic disease, both with and without mental illness, Dr Siddiqui found that patients with both chronic physical illness and mental health issues are relatively younger, and experienced longer hospital stays than those without mental illness.

She found that this could be improved by ensuring clinicians have the flexibility and training to treat mental and physical health together, rather than focussing on the physical illness first, and calling in a psychiatric team to deal with the mental illness later.

But uncovering these findings was not enough for Dr Siddiqui, because good theory must also inform and improve industry practice.

Her findings are now being channelled straight back into industry practice by being incorporated into the Master of Health Service Management at the University of Tasmania.

A more engaging learning experience

Dr Siddiqui is ensuring that health service managers can apply new theory straight back into their practice through collaborative learning, which also helps them to manage their studies and work concurrently.

“Most of our students, as a condition of sponsorship from their employer, have to study three units a semester, which is quite a heavy load, while also working a full-time job,” she explains.

“When you have that kind of study and workload, there’s a danger that your engagement and learning experience can be compromised.”

Dr Siddiqui and her colleagues looked at making the course more engaging for these students without increasing their workload.

“We brought together small groups of two or three students in an online environment where they could talk to, argue with, and help each other, to work out how the theory they were learning could be applied to their current and future workplaces,” she explains.

“When we did a survey on this intervention, we found that at least 50% agreed that they had learned much more and at faster rate because they were working as a team.”

“Some of them also said that because it was a discussion around how, in reality, the concepts are practised in their organisations, they could see the impact, and that really made them think about how they applied their classroom learning to the workplace.”

After the success of this experiment, Dr Siddiqui is looking at rolling out this type of study to other units at the University.

“Because of my work experience in the industry, and then coming into academia, I see a benefit to the blending of theory and practice, because until you do, you’re not really creating a change,” she says.

“That’s where I come to teaching – I’m hoping I can motivate students to see the benefits of engaging with theory, and taking it back to their workplace to make their whole career more motivating.”

Research that makes a difference