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Professor Malcolm Prowle

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Visiting Research Professor

You can email Professor Malcolm Prowle directly; but for media enquiries please contact a member of The Open University's Media Relations team.

Staff profile

See below for Professor Malcolm Prowle's:

Biography

Malcolm is a nationally acknowledged expert on the economics, finance and management of the public sector and public services. He has over 30 years experience of the public sector (in the UK and overseas) gained through:-

  • Senior management experience - he has held several senior financial management posts in public sector organisations.
  • Management Consultancy - for over twenty years, he held senior management positions with two major international consulting firms (KPMG and PWC).
  • Academic teaching and research - has held full time university posts and a number of visiting academic posts.

Thus he combines extensive practical experience in public sector management with academic rigour.

He has worked at the highest levels of government and has advised Ministers, Ambassadors, senior civil servants, public service managers and service professionals on a variety of public policy and policy implementation issues. He has had several periods of secondment to Whitehall departments of state. He has held a series of prestigious external positions including that of adviser to the House of Commons Select Committee and adviser to two shadow ministers. He has spoken and presented papers at a wide range of events and conferences including that of: the Prime Ministers Policy Unit, the Government Accounting Service, the CBI, the World Health Organisation and the Karolinska Institute (Sweden).

His experience of public services is very wide ranging and he has had an extensive involvement in a range of sectors including: health and social care, local government, central government, and government agencies, education (higher, further and schools), economic development and overseas governments. His range of expertise is also wide and although his core skills lie in finance and economics, he also has extensive experience in relation to:

  • policy development
  • financial and economic evaluation
  • strategic and business planning
  • organisational development
  • decision support modelling

He has specific research and consultancy interests in relation to performance improvement and performance management in service based organisations both private and public sector. Consequently, he has extensive expertise in relation to performance improvement and performance management approaches such as: benchmarking, BPR, lean systems, change management etc and his experience covers many disciplines and many types of service organisation.

While pursuing a consultancy career he has maintained an active research involvement. He has managed and/or participated in a number of funded research projects which have led to the publication of research reports. He has over forty publications to his name including: four books, research reports and papers in both academic peer refereed and professional journals.

As a consultant he has undertaken many complex and sensitive projects for Government and public services organisations. His clients have included: Department of Health, DCLG, DfES, Ministry of Defence, HM Customs and Excise, Benefits Agency and a range of other government agencies and public service organisations.

He also has substantial international experience and has worked on major consultancy projects concerning public service reform for the Governments of Brazil, India and Cyprus. He has also undertaken a number of study tours of public services in overseas countries (Sweden and USA) and has presented papers at several international events.

 

Current projects

Publications

Journal papers
Prowle, MJ  (2000)  'The development of costing systems in the public sector', Accounting and Business.
Phillips, C, Prowle, MJ  (1993)  'The economics of a reduction in smoking: A case study from Heartbeat Wales', Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health.
Prowle, MJ  (1992)  'The evolving NHS: Organising the finance function', Public Finance and Accountancy.
Books
Prowle, MJ, Morgan, ED  (2005)  'Financial Management and Control in the Higher Education Sector', Routledge Falmer.
Morgan, ED, Prowle, MJ  (2004)  'Financial management and control in Higher Education', Routledge Falmer, pp. 286. Abstract
Prowle, MJ  (2001)  'The changing public sector: a practical management guide', Gower Publishing, pp. 288. Abstract
Prowle, MJ, Jones, TW  (1997)  'Health Service Review: an introduction', Certified Accountants Educational Trust, 4th Edition.
Prowle, MJ, Hines, G  (1989)  'Local Government Competition: meeting the challenge (updated 1992)', CAET in collaboration with the Chartered Association of Certified Accountants.
Jones, TW, Prowle, MJ  (1982)  'Health Service Finance: An Introduction (4 editions between 1982 and 1997)', Certified Accountants Educucation Trust.
Book chapters
Prowle, MJ  (2008)  'Improving Performance in NHS Trusts in Wales', John Osmond (ed.) The Welsh Health Battleground: Policy Approaches for the Third Term, Institute of Welsh Affairs.
Prowle, MJ  (1994)  'Resource Allocation in the NHS: from Bevan to Thatcher', Burrows, M (ed.) Management for Hospital Doctors, Butterworth-Heineman.
Prowle, MJ  (1988)  'Budgeting in a General Management Environment', Koch, H (ed.) General Management in the Health Service, Croon Helm.
Reports
Lapsley, I, Prowle, MJ  (1978)  'Audit in the NHS: A conceptual perspective', University of Warwick Yellow Paper Series.
Lapsley, I, Prowle, MJ  (1978)  'The effectiveness and efficiency of budgetary control in the NHS: An empirical investigation', University of Warwick Yellow Paper Series.
Prowle, MJ  (1978)  'Management of Financial Resources in the NHS: Report to the Royal Commission on the NHS', HMSO.
Other
Prowle, MJ, Mako, I  (2009)  'A brief history of.... Recession', issue 08/10/10, Blog for OpenLearn.
Prowle, MJ  (2009)  'The QUANGO Question', issue 08/11/10, Open2.net article.