A message from the National Programme Director

As I reflected on 2024 - and considered the scale of change activity delivered in an NHS environment with so many competing priorities, I continue to be proud of the achievements that we have collectively delivered in supporting our NHS colleagues.

Indeed, what I would consider to be one of the best sources of illustration - within this edition of ESR News are great local case studies covering a breadth of ESR enabled capability, ranging use of the application technology – including using the Portlet capability to support local Flu Vaccination programmes and leveraging technical data integrations to streamline the National Consultant Information Programme (NCIP) processes, to specific functional usage – including using ESR to support establishment control, flexible working requests and onboarding using the Applicant Dashboard. All of this is packaged alongside other updates about national ESR services and local engagement - including feedback from the newly reformed London Big Special Interest Group (SIG).

As in previous years, I never fail to appreciate that colleagues are working incredibly hard to deliver high quality care – often alongside many operational challenges and priorities. I am once again delighted with the levels of engagement, continued support to the ESR Service team and local ambition to optimise use of ESR – all with the aim of supporting your People.

Working in partnership with NHS organisations and collaboratively with our sponsors - DHSC, and delivery partners in NHS England and NHS Wales, 2024 has been another successful year in terms of service growth.

I would once again like to thank IBM, our technology and service partner, and colleagues within the NHSBSA ESR service team, who together have worked tirelessly to maintain a high-quality service. Ensuring service stability and security remains, and will continue to be, our highest priority.

ESR System Usage and Developments

Optimisation of ESR has continued to grow during 2024. Driven by our Standards and Level of Attainment framework, there has been a renewed focus on Manager Self-Service in particular. Throughout the year, NHS organisations have continued to strive to optimise their use of functionality within ESR and realise many of the associated efficiency and productivity benefits. Having reflected on feedback, we have subsequently reviewed and updated the Standards and Levels of Attainment – please see an update about the Assessment in this edition of ESR News.

Our collaboration with key strategic stakeholders and delivery partners has continued - particularly in relation to supporting workforce policy in England and Wales - including successfully delivering the various pay awards in a timely manner, impacting every NHS employee.

Ensuring that ESR can meet the needs of the NHS remains a priority for the service team. During 2024, as with previous years, there has been a busy development calendar looking at existing capabilities of ESR and enhancing the user experience for NHS employees, managers and professional users. Some key highlights include:

• In May, ESR moved to using the most recent version of the Oracle Learner Homepage. This ensured that ESR is on the correct technical path to take advantage of improvements developed by Oracle - I am also pleased to advise that this includes developments proposed directly by the NHS that we had been unable to incorporate into the previous version.
• In June we launched the new Leavers Dashboard, designed to ensure that ex-employees are still able to access their pay information up to 90-days after they have left their employment. The Leavers Dashboard is a significant enhancement to ESR and not only supports national policy in relation to increased efficiency - by removing the need for local administration of queries after leaving (such as earnings information), but also supported another ESR strategy to remove printing services (payslips etc). You can read more about this in this edition of ESR News.
• In August we withdrew all national printing for payslips and other pay related information. Although over 90% of employees had already opted out of paper payslips, this change was strategically important and again, like the Leavers Dashboard, fully supports the ambitions of delivering operational efficiencies, removes risks associated with sensitive data and supports an environmental ambition to reduce our carbon footprint during the delivery of Services.

Alongside ESR solution developments, our engagement and collaboration in relation to wider workforce transformation has continued to be a priority. Our role in supporting parts of the Future of HR & OD report has continued this year, and the work of our regional teams to encourage the optimisation of ESR Self-Service functionality is a key enabler in support of this vision. Whilst there is a lot of focus on digital transformation, the NHS must complement such tools by maintaining a focus on redesigning processes using the technology and tools that we have available to us – both today and in preparation for the future. As we move into 2025 our regional teams will continue to provide valuable support, guidance and practical assistance to support organisations on a journey to reshape business processes, optimise efficiency and release transactional activity from corporate teams. Whilst such optimisation will benefit NHS organisations and your employee experience today, it will also support your preparation for implementing the Future NHS Workforce solution.

The Future NHS Workforce Solution

During 2024, the Future NHS Workforce Solution Transformation Programme has continued at pace, with the procurement exercise progressing to source a supplier for the future solution and service. As you may know, the supplier of the new agreement will also take on the running of the existing ESR solution and service, that will be succeeded by the future solution.

The programme has very recently completed the third stage of the procurement process - Negotiation and Proof of Concept (PoC). This involved the suppliers demonstrating how their proposed solution(s) could deliver some specific scenarios and functionality, including: new hires, staff transfers, leavers and working across multiple organisations. Several volunteer colleagues from across NHS England and NHS Wales helped the programme during this PoC stage.

Earlier this month, the programme moved into the next stage of the procurement process, Invitation to Submit Final Tender. This stage is where the bidders will refine their tender submissions and proposals based on feedback from the previous negotiation stage, and feedback from the proof-of-concept exercise. It will take several months for this stage to complete, ahead of evaluation, preferred bidder selection and contract award planned during Summer/Autumn 2025.

In parallel to the procurement, the Programme also ran a series of webinars, ‘Potential Unlocked’, aimed at senior and strategic leaders.  These webinars were attended by over 1000 colleagues from across England and Wales.  Based around the programme’s strategic messaging that was launched in May (Wales) and July (England), the webinars focused on key things that NHS organisations need to be doing now in preparation for the Future NHS Workforce Solution, covering four themes: Transforming; Optimising use of ESR; Data Quality; and Keeping Engaged. You can join the Programme’s FutureNHS workspace to access the webinar recordings.

Chris Price, Transformation Programme Director comments;

I would like to thank everyone who has supported the programme throughout 2024, enabling us to progress to the next stage of the procurement, to plan. Whilst there remains a lot of work to finalise the procurement, I remain confident as we move into 2025.

Coming Soon in 2025

Future NHS Workforce Solution: Organisational Readiness Survey

To understand more about your organisation, nationally, the NHSBSA is asking all Chief People Officers (CPO) and Human Resource Directors (HRD) across England and Wales to complete an ‘Organisational Readiness Survey’.   The survey will launch in early 2025, and initial communications are currently being sent to CPOs/HRDs in preparation.

The Future NHS Workforce Solution Transformation Programme is delivering the survey, and all results will inform the national implementation plan of the future solution.

CPOs and HRDs will be asked to collaborate on gathering the information with Chief Information Officers, ESR leads and IT leads.

This is your chance as an organisation to be further involved in the preparations of the future solution, and your contribution will help the Programme team to provide the smoothest implementation and transition possible, for all organisations.

If you’re an ESR Lead you will receive your survey link from your Chief People Officer () or HR Director (HRD). If you’re a CPO/HRD and you’ve not received any initial email, please contact the programme directly.

Thanks, and Best Wishes…

Finally, I hope that you find this December edition of ESR News both interesting and useful. As referenced above, there are great case studies included that really do illustrate how the NHS is maximising their use of the solution to meet local and national objectives.

On behalf of the NHS Business Services Authority and the ESR Service team, may I express our thanks for all of your support throughout 2024, and wish you a Merry Christmas and offer Best Wishes for a healthy and happy 2025.