Value Hidden in Plain Sight – an Allied Health Professional Case Study

Abstract

This chapter discusses the meaning of value with regard to a business: how does a business view its own value – value in terms of monetary profit, value in terms of its employees, and value in terms of the business as a whole. This chapter offers an alternative to the traditional view of measuring value and whether a business is successful or not only by profit. We do not suggest for one minute that this metric is not valid, but we do offer a way of measuring value from a different perspective looking at value in entrepreneurial behaviours. Following Tett (2021) we call that perspective a ‘lens’; we discuss viewing value from the lens of the funder (most likely a bank or venture capitalist); the lens of the business owner; and the lens of the employee and the customer. To do this, we take an ethnographic approach of participant observation and review a case study; Saunders notes that ethnography is used to study a culture or social group (Saunders et al.,et al., 2019), and the case study chosen for this chapter is of an allied health professional (AHP). This approach allows us to take a step back from the traditionally understood definition of value, and research the culture and social dynamics within the AHP group in a qualitative way and view value in context – that context being value from each lens, or each point of view. We move beyond the current lens of viewing the value of a business in terms of its profit, and look at the value in terms of human capital (Bourdieu, 1986). To do that we take the established definitions of enterprise and entrepreneurship and look again at what value means in this context and suggest a qualitative view to stand alongside the current quantitative view. We did this by taking an ethnographic stance and developing taught content from learnt experiences. By using the case study, we are able to highlight where traditional entrepreneurial attributes are applied without recognition. We link those entrepreneurial attributes to human capital, thereby offering a means by which their value can be recognised and encouraged, leading to an enhanced company performance.