Enabling Staff Movements within the NHS
The East of England Streamlining Conference
Background
The East of England Regional Streamlining programme first launched in 2016, with a focus on 4 main workstreams; Recruitment, Transfer of Training, Medical Staff - Doctors in Training (DiT) and Occupational Health. Excellent progress was made within the region, with regular workstream meetings held, objectives agreed and a central support structure in place.
The formal project support came to an end in 2017; so this was an opportunity to relaunch Streamlining within the region, review the great work already completed by organisations, understand what needed to be worked on and take that forward into the future to ensure all benefits are realised.
Within the Streamlining Programme there is a focus on staff movement between organisations, making it a simpler and more positive experience for new starters. The activities involved can be applied to both general recruitment and Doctors in Training, and supports the NHS Long Term Plan to ensure “staff move more easily from one NHS Employer to the other”. A similar sentiment is emphasised in the Interim People Plan and with the release of the Enabling Staff Movement Toolkit.
It is recognised nationally and locally that ESR functionality is critical for enabling the transfer of staff information around the NHS - and so plays an important role in achieving the goals of the Streamlining / Enabling Staff Movement Programme.
The East of England Approach
A conference was held on the 31st October in Cambridge, with over 80 regional leads focussing on how the region can improve both efficiency and staff experience.
Monty Keuneman EoE Streamlining Project Manager stated:
The workshop was a great success with delegates from across the whole region coming together to hear about developments from the national and regional perspective. The vast majority fed back to rate the day as “good” and several rating it as “excellent”. The room was full of energy throughout the day and delegates were pleased the staff experience workstream was returning to the agenda.
The conference was organised by the Regional Streamlining Champion, Anita Pisana - Deputy Chief Executive, Cambridgeshire Community Services and fully supported by NHS Employers and NHS England / Improvement who jointly lead on the National Doctors in Postgraduate Training programme - which aims to improve the rotational experience of Doctors in Training, valuing their time and releasing time to care. In so doing, efficiencies will be realised that directly support the 2016 contractual commitment to improve the on-boarding and induction processes for doctors in postgraduate training.
View the NHS Employers/ NHS Improvement latest video for improving the pre-employment process and induction for doctors in training here.
‘Enabling Staff Movement’ includes an ambition to support a workforce to move seamlessly between providers. This means:
- Enabling a more robust new starter process with reduced repeated administration,
- Being able to update employment records online instead of using paper forms,
- Having an on-boarding process that is efficient and professionally managed,
- Having previous training and skills records transferred and recognised,
- Experiencing a relevant and value-adding induction.
Whilst there is a particular emphasis on improving the rotational experience of Doctors in Post Graduate Training, the same principles can be applied to all staff groups and recruitment within an organisation.
A common theme across all of the guest speakers highlighted the importance of a number of tasks where ESR plays a fundamental part of the process, such as initiating the Inter Authority Transfer (IAT) at the Pre Hire stage - which remains an integral part to enabling the transfer of employee information between trusts. ESR IAT functionality underpins the Streamlining objectives and its timing in the recruitment process is critical as it is the enabler for all of the workstreams.
Transferring Mandatory and Statutory Training remains a key objective to enable previously completed training to move with an employee, removing the need for them to repeat the same Statutory and Mandatory training if already compliant.
To support this ambition, NHS Improvement and NHS Employers are encouraging alignment to the Core Skills Training Framework (CSTF) - enabling consistency with the learning outcomes across different subject areas. In turn, this will provide assurance to organisations as to the standards of the training, enabling it to be accepted via the ESR IAT process when an employee moves between organisations.
How organisations approach the work will have an impact on how successful they are, with a recurring discussion point during the day being how important it is for different functions within an organisation to work together - not in isolated silos.
James Clayden, Senior HR Business Partner/ Medical Workforce Lead for Cambridgeshire and Peterborough NHS Foundation trust and the DiT Workstream Lead noted;
One of the key things for me that came out of the group sessions was how the roles relevant to improving staff experience processes are often split across different teams – for example, just in relation to DiPT one Trust has separate Medical HR, Medical Recruitment and Medical Education teams. I think we need to maintain the strategic drive behind Improving Our Staff Experience while at the same time making sure that the message is getting right down to the people who are actually doing the functions.
Benefits Realisation
A more streamlined recruitment process will lead to a reduction in the ‘time to hire’, which in turn will lead to less spend on agency staff, bank staff or overtime - as vacancies are vacant for less time.
65% of IATs completed within the East of England occurred for employees moving between trusts in the region.
Christine Cornwall, Associate Director of HR Transformation at Herts Valley’s CCG presented a case study that demonstrated some key benefits expected within the Herts and West Essex STP. The ESR Business Intelligence IAT Benefits report showed that within the STP there was the potential to achieve savings close to £200,000 in Q1 and Q2 of 2019 - if the training that had been transferred via IAT was taken into account pre-hire and not repeated by new starters on induction. This demonstrates the importance of having a flexible induction programme to deal with the different scenarios for staff.
ESR Tip: Run your IAT Benefits Dashboard to see your saving potential.
ESR Recommended Next Steps
By embracing and committing to the Streamlining / Enabling Staff Movement programme, organisations can improve the applicant process and associated experience for new starters.
Organisations are encouraged to review the Streamlining / Enabling Staff Movement objectives set out on the NHS Employers website here, and consider what opportunities they may present.
The ESR Annual Statement
Every organisation is encouraged to complete their Annual ESR Assessment with the support of their Functional Account Manager. This provides an organisation with information on their use of core ESR Functionality and how this supports key streamlining objectives. In turn, this will support the organisation to plan for the realisation of all ESR benefits, including streamlining and how this will improve the experience for new starters – contributing to making the NHS the best place to work.
You can read about how NHS Dorset CCG has used their Annual Assessment process to drive their Workforce agenda forward in this edition of ESR News, where you can also watch our latest ESR Annual Statement video.
In addition to the Annual ESR Assessment, there is also an opportunity to run your own New Starter Journey process workshop - to look at best practice and improve local processes. Your Functional Account Manager will work with you to review key functions such as, Recruitment, Learning & Development and Workforce management. The Streamlining Checklist can be utilised to work through the on-boarding journey, make improvements and efficiencies in current processes, and maximise use of the functionality available to you.
ESR Tip: Contact your ESR Functional Account Manager to arrange your Annual Assessment
A Key Message
A key overall message at the conference from the Regional Team was for organisations to embrace what you can; it is not a case of all or nothing.
Anita Pisani – Regional Streamlining Champion and Deputy Chief Executive Cambridgeshire Community Services commented afterwards:
We had a really successful workshop across East of England on 31st October to re-energise our streamlining work. We focused on improving our staff experience and enabling excellent People practices. I would encourage all Trusts to engage in this agenda as it reduces wastage and duplication as well as saving money and getting people into post quicker. You do not have to implement every aspect but please do implement what you can as soon as you can as it really does make a difference to the experiences of our staff who move between our organisations.
Further Information and Support
Contact your NHS ESR Functional Account Manager for more help and support in achieving a streamlined staff movement experience for all new starters.
Further information including case studies on the national streamlining programme can be found via the NHSE Streamlining Resources Hub.
For information on how ESR supports streamlining take a look at our on line toolkit.