Public Health Doctors often work uneasily between Clinicians and Managers. It is a difficult interface and the task is to try to explain the one to the other, to provide good quality information- on which better management decisions can be made and to interpret the clinical implications of a particular course of action.
On occasion the Public Health Doctor may manage services-usually the least glamorous and least well funded
   Community
   Mental illness
   Learning disability
Management is experiential and much of Management appears intuitive. The literature is considerable but most writing is in terms of a manual rather than a philosophy founded on sound theory and supported by rigorous experimentation. Management remains an Art more than a Science.
All Doctors inevitably are involved with Managing Services and this involvement increases over time. It is possible to improve performance. There are some helpful ideas and key understandings which it is worthwhile to achieve.It is not “just good housekeeping and commonsense”.