As part of my MBA journey, the Understanding the Economy module stood out for its relevance, challenge, and direct applicability to my real-world leadership role within the NHS. Coming from a clinical and operational background, I approached this subject with curiosity but also a sense of uncertainty. Concepts like market structures, externalities, and elasticity weren’t part of my medical training — but through the module, I found these ideas both accessible and surprisingly transferable to healthcare leadership.
From Patients to Prices: A Mindset Shift
One of the first things I noticed was how economics forced a shift in thinking. As a clinician, I’m used to diagnosing symptoms and planning treatment. In contrast, economic reasoning is more abstract — it looks at systems, incentives, and behaviour. Over time, I started seeing how these frameworks could help explain things I deal with every day: the rising demand for services, funding bottlenecks, labour market shortages, and even patient behaviour in elective care.
Through both group work and individual assessments, I gained a deeper appreciation for the balancing act that defines modern policy — whether in healthcare, agriculture, or energy. Resources are finite. Trade-offs are inevitable. Understanding how to frame those trade-offs using the language of costs, benefits, and incentives is a critical leadership skill — and one that I now feel much more equipped to apply.
Group Work: Collaboration, Complexity, and Externalities
Our group assignment focused on environmental externalities — a classic economic concept that explains how market transactions can create costs or benefits for people not directly involved. We applied this to sectors like transport and energy, analysing how subsidies, taxes, and regulation could be used to internalise these externalities and drive more sustainable outcomes.
Key takeaways:
- I strengthened my understanding of demand and supply theory, substitute goods, and price elasticity.
- The assignment highlighted the challenges of real-world policy — especially in balancing economic growth with sustainability.
- Working in a team exposed me to different viewpoints, which helped sharpen my argumentation and ability to structure ideas logically.
We scored reasonably well on this piece — a fair result, though feedback pointed out areas for deeper analysis and clearer application of theory. Specifically, I could have developed the policy section further by examining the effectiveness of existing interventions.
Individual Assignment: Market Dynamics and the Manuka Honey Boom
For my individual assessment, I focused on the New Zealand mānuka honey market. The assignment asked us to analyse how producers respond to projected demand in the presence of supply lags, volatility, and elasticity. I used classical economic models (including supply-demand diagrams) to explore how a boom in prices led to overproduction, followed by a market correction.
I was pleased to score well on this piece. The feedback recognised the clarity of my argument and the structured use of theory — though it highlighted the need for even clearer diagram labelling and more rigorous discussion of elasticity concepts.
Most importantly, this assignment cemented my confidence in applying economic models to real-world issues — something I’ll be taking into my NHS leadership role.
What I Learned – and What I’ll Carry Forward
This module wasn’t just about passing an exam. It was about developing a new lens for decision-making. Some key reflections:
- Economic literacy matters: In an NHS under immense financial and operational strain, being able to speak the language of economics — cost-benefit, marginal utility, externality — is increasingly valuable.
- Diagrams are tools for thinking: While often associated with academia, models like supply and demand curves helped me visualise system dynamics in a more objective way.
- There’s no such thing as a free intervention: Every policy has a cost — whether to taxpayers, patients, providers, or future generations. Understanding who pays, who benefits, and how incentives work is vital to good leadership.
Final Thoughts
Scoring well across both assignments was a solid result — but more importantly, I now approach strategic decisions with a better understanding of the economic environment we operate in. Whether I’m leading service redesigns, assessing business cases, or contributing to national policy work, I feel far more grounded in the analytical tools that underpin sound decision-making.
This module challenged me to think differently — and that’s exactly what I hoped for when starting this MBA.