Operating systems are critical to workforce planning

Before Covid hit, I was part of a group that NHS England had pulled together to help design what was going to be the NHS People Plan. The pandemic meant that version didn’t see the light of day (although an Interim People Plan did). The area we were looking at was operating systems, which I admit doesn’t sound the most exciting of topics but actually matters a lot. The questions we were trying to answer (in terms of NHS workforce) were – what needs to be done nationally, what needs to be done regionally, what needs to be done at system level and what do individual employers need to do?

I have been thinking about this again in terms of support workers. I have rehearsed ad nauseam the issues this group of staff, who comprise 28% of the NHS workforce, faces. In a nutshell the lack of national guidance, regulation and policy for support workers means that there is no consistency in how they are recruited, deployed, utilised, and developed. Pick a support role at a particular band. Any occupation will do. Go on NHS Jobs and search it. Done? Marvel at the different entry-requirements required. See what I mean?

For many occupations [1] the resources needed to address such issues as entry-requirements, scope of practice or training are now in place. It is no longer a matter of what needs to be done, but, rather, how things need to change and where. Any effective skill system works at multiple levels, with those levels interacting with each other. So, there is certainly a need for national bodies and direction. Indeed I would strongly argue that support workers require a dedicated national team, with specific occupational focus. There are, after all, nearly 400,000 of them!

It does, though, seem to me that ICBs will be particularly crucial in delivering real change in the workplace. It makes sense to bring employers together in a system to look at, say, their maternity support staff to ensure core roles and responsibilities are consistent, that there is collective co-delivery of apprenticeships, a joined-up approach to engaging with the local labour market and so on. This approach also allows the creation of area career pathways with staff able to move within their organisation but also across their locality in a systematic way. You never know this might even lead to individual employers recognising their colleague’s Care Certificate training, so staff do not have to repeat the training when they move (yes that still happens). This ‘systems’ ?approach will require a little extra resource to coordinate activity but will also deliver economies of scale and other gains like improved job satisfaction.

?In a month we will have a new government. Whoever they are; they will need to address the NHS workforce crisis. The good news is that they have an untapped resource already in place to help– support workers. Yes, we need specific policy interventions and leadership, but a lot is already out there but it needs mobilising, and it needs mobilising as soon as possible after July 4th. We can no longer afford this workforce’s deployment and utilisation to be so variable. Operating systems matter.

NOTE

1. Nursing is the exception.