Turning the vision into action

This chapter sets out the actions planned to achieve the 2030 vision for the NHS people profession. These actions were co-designed by working groups made up of national leaders, subject-matter experts and directors of human resources. They were refined further through crowdsourced discussion with the people profession and their customers.

The chapter addresses each of the themes of the vision in turn. Many actions are best carried out locally, in organisations and systems, while others will be better carried out nationally or regionally – but always in collaboration and partnership. The actions also reflect growing opportunities to work at scale across health and care, helping standardise approaches, reduce duplication and increase impact.

The delivery of the priorities in this report and the People Plan require senior people professional leadership. The majority of NHS organisations have a director of human resources or chief people officer (CPO) as a member of their board. The minority of trusts that have not established this role yet are strongly encouraged to do so as soon as possible.

This journey will take time, and different organisations and systems will be at different starting points. Each section outlines actions for the national team, organisation and integrated care system (ICS) chief people officers, or boards.

Where actions are for the national team, timescales are set out. Where they are for organisations and systems, timescales are not provided: it will be for them to develop their plans to respond to this report, based on their local priorities and current position.

More detail on this process, and how we can work together to make it happen, is set out in the Working together to make it happen section of this report.

Supporting and developing the people profession

This infographic is part of the future of human resources and organisational development 2030 vision. The graphic includes three blue professionals and this text: ‘supporting and developing the people profession’.

We support everyone working in the people profession to be their very best and reach their full potential. Together we provide outstanding people practices.

There will be an essential change in the way people professionals develop through their careers, with a strong emphasis on building the capabilities and expertise that support service transformation and cultural change within organisations.

Action 1

The national team will work alongside the profession, the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD), the Healthcare People Management Association (HPMA) and other experts to develop dynamic professional standards for the people profession that meet the needs of our NHS people and support the delivery of high-quality patient care. The national team will:

  • introduce NHS people profession standards, to create a curriculum of development tailored to the needs of the health and care sector (by 2023)
  • develop the infrastructure to support implementation, including a national people profession development board and strong links to the regional people boards (by 2023)
  • deliver development programmes and tools to increase organisational development (OD) skills, capability and capacity – building on the ‘Do OD’ community resources (by 2023)
  • ensure that systems, with support from the national team, adopt standard benchmarking tools, to help teams and organisations understand capability, and ensure tailored development (by 2025)
  • ensure that employing organisations demonstrate they are meeting the professional standards set nationally.

Action 2

CPOs, or equivalent, need to ensure all people professionals have professional development plans aligned to the delivery priorities. Organisation and ICS CPOs should enable all people professionals to:

  • undertake continuous professional development and appraisal processes that align to professional standards and incorporate customer feedback, to support development and continuous improvement
  • have opportunities to enhance their skills, knowledge and experience through experiential and formal learning, to reach their full potential throughout their career journey
  • access a high-quality development support that covers the emerging skills and capabilities needed, such as workforce planning organisation development, digital, equality, diversity and inclusion, transformational change, culture change and design and system thinking
  • access apprenticeship programmes to enable CIPD accreditation at all stages of the career journey
  • access professional support, such as coaching, mentoring, role modelling and senior sponsorship.

Action 3

The people profession must be representative of the communities they serve and need to lead by example. Organisations and systems need to develop a representative talent pipeline, using their position in anchor networks. Organisation and ICS CPOs should:

  • provide clear and inspiring pathways to address the under-representation of our NHS people with protected characteristics, through improving development support, talent management, recruitment and promotion
  • assess proactively the equality, diversity and inclusion (EDI) development gaps in knowledge and upskill people professionals to be the catalysts for change and to positively disrupt the norms
  • collaborate with local communities – through multiple agencies, non-profit organisations and academic establishments – to improve the talent supply pipeline for the people profession
  • advance the NHS people profession to be representative of the communities that our NHS people serve. Introduce new and comprehensive routes into and within the profession, including through apprenticeships
  • create a vibrant and active succession planning framework within the people profession to ensure inclusive talent acquisition and management across systems and organisations
  • recognise and sponsor all high-potential individuals from under-represented backgrounds to enable them to fulfil potential and ambition. Use data and robust monitoring to understand the experience and outcomes of people professionals from under-represented backgrounds, and take action where needed
  • commit to professional accreditation, including apprenticeships, experience assessments and professional developmental pathways for all people professionals.

Leading improvement, change and innovation

This graphic is part of the future of human resources and organisational development 2030 vision. The graphic includes a purple ‘idea’ light bulb with a cog inside and this text: ‘leading improvement change and innovation’.

The people profession is productive, efficient and responsive. Our operating model delivers transformation and embeds innovation across organisations and systems.

As the NHS innovates and changes, the people profession should innovate and change too, to ensure that it continues to provide high quality support that enables the delivery of high-quality care to our patients, both now and in the future.

Action 4

National bodies and organisations will work together to develop leading-edge practice for people services, based on robust research and evidence. The national team will:

  • develop frameworks to enable people services to assess alignment of resources with the delivery of the NHS Long Term Plan, People Plan, People Promise and local priorities (by 2023)
  • develop a range of new people function service models to support our vision for 2030 (by 2023)
  • establish a central repository of best practice to support profession-wide collaboration, knowledge sharing, horizon scanning, collaboration and celebration of successes (by 2023)
  • create a clear view on the expectations of line managers in the service in relation to people practice and the implications for provision of people services (by 2023)
  • conduct research with academic partners to build the evidence base on core topics, such as health and wellbeing interventions (by 2025).
  • ensure the NHS is part of CIPD policy and strategy discussion (by 2025)
  • embed research and evidence-based practice in the work and learning activities of the people profession (by 2025).

Action 5

The national team, working with trade unions, systems and organisations, will simplify and standardise core NHS people policies and processes, to drive innovation, bring more consistency, support quality improvements, and ensure alignment to the People Plan and Promise. The national team will:

  • develop national standards and key performance indicators for people services to support improvement (from 2022)
  • develop national toolkits and training that support the people profession to embed these standards for local adaptation (from 2022)
  • develop and implement a national framework for collecting customer feedback (by 2025)
  • develop in partnership a standard set of simplified national people policies (by 2025)
  • create a national guide for scaling transactional services, to enable successful implementation (by 2023).

Action 6

People professionals should deliver services at the level where they benefit most from scale and where they can have the most impact. The people profession needs to take the opportunity of working at scale across systems – particularly on core transactional services – to create a more streamlined, standardised offer. Organisational and ICS CPOs should:

  • create system-level consolidated and simplified transactional people services, with a focus on customer service, reducing duplication and the increasing the benefits of digital systems (see ‘Embedding digitally enabled solutions’, below)
  • review the allocation and distribution of people function resources to ensure alignment with the People Plan, NHS Long Term Plan and local system priorities
  • build strong organisational development capability across people services, to support cultural change in our organisations and systems
  • agree the provision of people services across the full scope of the ICS ‘one workforce’– including, in the future, primary care and social care.
  • use regular customer feedback to help shape the development and improvement of services.

Embedding digitally enabled solutions

This graphic is part of the future of human resources and organisational development 2030 vision. The graphic includes an indigo computer and smart phone overlapping each other and this text: ‘embedding digitally enabled solutions’.

We make best use of technology and digital solutions to deliver great people services. We develop our digital capability to equip ourselves for the future.

The people profession will transform the way people access people services – using digital tools and platforms to create a more timely, standardised and intuitive service. This approach will also release more time for people professionals to focus on priorities that improve the working lives of our NHS people, which in turn supports delivery of high-quality care for patients. In making these changes it is essential that they deliver improvements for all and address digital exclusion risks.

Action 7

Improve accountability and clarity on roles, responsibilities and decision making for digital workforce and people programmes at a national level. National organisations will:

  • establish a strategic board that effectively prioritises, co-ordinates and agrees the digital people strategic initiatives, aligning them to the NHS Long Term Plan, People Plan and People Promise (by 2022)
  • prioritise and actively manage interdependencies between digital workforce programmes and the People Plan (by 2023)
  • build digital workforce and business intelligence capability at national, ICS and provider level to support delivery of the People Plan and People Digital Strategy towards enabling improved efficiency and workforce planning (by 2025)
  • provide support and tools for providers to undertake reviews of systems and processes, to establish effective routes for automation (by 2025)
  • co-design and support the implementation of the new national People Digital Solution (successor to current electronic staff record [ESR]) (from 2024).

Action 8

Organisations and systems should create a local plan for optimising use of existing digital solutions. Organisation and ICS CPOs should:

  • create a local plan which is aligned to ICS digital architecture, to optimise adoption of current digital solutions (eg ESR, e-rostering) to improve our NHS people, leader and line-management experience, normalising self-service across the NHS
  • align and harmonise digital strategies and solutions, across providers wherever possible, to enable more joined-up working (eg harmonised e-rostering systems improve the ability to plan and deploy staff across systems)
  • refine and improve digitally-enabled services based on real-time customer feedback
  • co-design new people digital systems that optimise how our NHS people interact with people services (such as ‘digital in your hand’, push notifications, removal of duplicated data entry, and mobility across systems)
  • design digital systems to be predictive, intelligent and interoperable to support strategic and operational decision making – for example, enabling data sets to be triangulated to provide new insights; supporting real-time pulse surveys; and analysing equality, diversity and inclusion (EDI) trends.

Action 9

Collaborate at national, ICS and organisation level to optimise the procurement and the introduction of digital services, creating more efficient and aligned digital services through using economies of scale to provide richer, more timely insights to support decision-making. Organisation and ICS CPOs, within a national framework, should:

  • ensure that digital services are procured in compliance with national technology standards and commercial digital frameworks (by 2023)
  • leverage the use of procurement frameworks to adopt digitally enabled and intuitive transactional processes at all levels, including the opportunities for efficiency through robotics, which will provide high-quality and responsive services that minimise time spent on administration in areas such as pay and recruitment.

Action 10

Organisations and systems should have high quality reporting of people data and insights, enabled through the use of digital services to support effective, informed decision making. To support this the national team will:

  • establish data standards across multiple people digital systems to enable interoperability and informed decision making (by 2023)
  • define a benchmarked set of key performance indicators for people services, with a consistent reporting framework (by 2023)
  • create opportunities for organisations to share best practice and support learning and development (by 2025)

Action 11

Organisations, supported by the national team and arms-length bodies (for example, Health Education England [HEE]), need to build digital capability, skills and leadership at all levels of the people profession to enable and support the shift from transactional to transformational people services. Organisation and ICS CPOs should:

  • use competencies, training and agreed standards to help build digital capability within the people profession, creating a supportive environment so that staff feel supported and skilled to embed the change to digitally-led services

Prioritising the health and wellbeing of all our people

This graphic is part of the future of human resources and organisational development 2030 vision. The graphic includes an orange apple and this text: ‘prioritising the health and wellbeing of all our people’

We take a positive and proactive approach in supporting the health, safety and wellbeing of our NHS people, ensuring that work has a positive impact. We address health inequalities at work and in our communities.

For the NHS to deliver great patient care, our people need to be safe and healthy. The people profession should lead the development of an organisational culture that prioritises the health and wellbeing of our people.

The people profession should ensure that leaders and managers have the support they need to prioritise their own health and wellbeing so that they, in turn, can prioritise the health and wellbeing of their people.

People professionals need to ensure they understand where there are inequalities in staff health and wellbeing in their systems and organisations and take action to address them.

Action 12

The national team will develop a standard set of skills, competencies and behaviours for leaders on health and wellbeing, creating a core curriculum to be embedded locally. It will:

  • continue to set out national direction on health and wellbeing, such as through operational planning guidance (by 2023)
  • work with the profession to define metrics to be used locally and nationally, to measure and track the health and wellbeing of our people (by 2023)
  • define minimum standards for the physical work environment that supports good health and wellbeing, such as access to rest spaces (by 2023)
  • formalise an approach to ensure rapid access to core health and care services when our people need it, to enable people to feel well and supported to get back to work quickly, wherever possible (by 2025).

Action 13

Systems and organisations must formalise governance arrangements for overseeing the health and wellbeing of its people, which is a core responsibility. Organisation and ICS boards should:

  • appoint the CPO, or equivalent, as the accountable lead – working with the board-level guardian for staff health and wellbeing
  • consider staff health and wellbeing metrics with the same scrutiny as operational and financial performance
  • support the development and sharing of evidence and best practice, alongside ICS and regional people boards.

Action 14

Organisations and systems health and wellbeing plans reflect national plans and local priorities. Organisation and ICS CPOs should:

  • embed best practice from the NHS health and wellbeing framework for the whole NHS workforce
  • embed a standard set of skills, competencies and behaviours for leaders on health and wellbeing – with shared responsibility between line managers and their people professional team
  • ensure that estates and facilities teams are key partners in how the physical work environment is improved for our people, to support their health and wellbeing.

Action 15

Prevention is always better than cure. The people profession needs to help design job roles, to provide our people with good work.

  • review and baseline their current offer, including identifying which areas to enhance or evolve
  • personalise the health and wellbeing offer to reflect the diverse needs of our NHS people, taking into account population health information
  • make sure the people profession and line managers have the capability and support to provide the health and wellbeing offer – through regular one-to-one health and wellbeing conversations
  • make sure occupational health professionals are engaged as a strategic partner in developing and delivering prevention-focused health and wellbeing services.

Ensuring inclusion and belonging for all

This graphic is part of the future of human resources and organisational development 2030 vision. The graphic includes a green heart and this text: ‘ensuring inclusion and belonging for all’.

We use our expertise and influence to create an inclusive culture, which values and celebrates our diversity. We listen to our people and take action to ensure there is equity for everyone.

Our NHS people do their best work in strong teams where they feel that they are valued and that they can make a difference to others. Our People Promise is that all NHS teams, organisations and systems must have a compassionate, inclusive and equitable culture – where everyone feels that they belong. The people profession will develop leaders and teams to have the capability, skills and understanding to create working environments where all our NHS people prosper, thrive and fulfil their potential – without discrimination – and where there is equity of outcomes for all staff.

Action 16

National bodies will align the approach to national equality, diversity and inclusion policy and set clear standards and competencies. The national team will:

  • engage with regulators (such as the Care Quality Commission [CQC] and the Health and Safety Executive) to provide influence and ensure greater emphasis is placed on EDI and employee experience measures when assessing organisational performance (by 2023)
  • Identify EDI standards and expertise as core competencies within the people profession, to be tested during recruitment, promotion and appraisal with support provided for development (by 2023)
  • work in partnership with the CIPD to develop and accredit standards, competencies and skills in EDI (by 2023)
  • support the implementation of the NHS director leadership competency framework in relation to EDI (by 2023)
  • develop resources for leaders and line managers, through co-creation, to help them deliver compassionate and inclusive people practices (by 2023).

Action 17

All organisations must have a talent management strategy and recruitment and careers pathways that address under-representation and lack of diversity. Organisation and ICS CPOs should:

  • overhaul recruitment processes to take account of EDI considerations and be responsive to personal circumstances
  • provide appropriate developmental support and pathways, including coaching, mentoring and role modelling for staff in under-represented groups
  • ensure that all job appointment processes, including promotions, include evidence of the candidate’s personal positive impact on equality, diversity and inclusion in the workplace
  • ensure that high-potential individuals from under-represented backgrounds have a clear development plan, to help them reach their potential.

Action 18

Every team, organisation and ICS must champion policies and practices that achieve tangible, measurable improvements to the culture within the NHS – particularly on equality, diversity and inclusion. Organisation and ICS boards should:

  • ensure that all individuals, teams and organisations have measurable objectives on EDI, including all board members
  • ensure equality impact assessment tools are used to inform decision-making at all levels and periodically reviewed to assess progress
  • take account of and explicitly address issues of equality, diversity and inclusion in culture change programmes
  • monitor key indicators of impact – to include as a minimum the Workforce Race Equality Standard, Workforce Disability Equality Standard, gender pay gap assessment, and NHS staff survey data to pick up other protected characteristics.

Action 19

Every team, organisation and ICS must have a systematic way of capturing and understanding our people’s lived experience of, and concerns in relation to, equality, diversity and inclusion – and take responsibility for addressing them. Organisation and ICS CPOs should:

  • build on existing interventions and develop new mechanisms to support our NHS people to speak up and feel heard, without fear of reprisal – including staff networks, freedom to speak up channels and trade unions
  • create an open, productive and learning environment that educates and addresses privilege and everyday bias
  • create a continuous improvement process, through seeking regular feedback
  • develop skills and capability across the people profession to equip them to connect with staff and communities affected by discrimination and bias, so that they can better effect change.

Action 20

The people profession must help develop and embed a ‘restorative just culture’ across organisations and systems that helps to eliminate cultures that propagate blame or fear. Organisation and ICS CPOs should:

  • embed the principles of a restorative just culture into all people practices, for example employee relations, leadership and talent frameworks
  • implement healing, compassionate interventions and programmes for staff who have experienced hurt due to people practices, incivility, bullying/harassment and/or discrimination
  • develop leaders and line managers at all levels to create psychological safety within teams to enact and sustain consistency of restorative just cultures.

Creating a great employee experience

This graphic is part of the future of human resources and organisational development 2030 vision. The graphic includes a teal person in a circle, with five stars around the top of the circle and this text: ‘creating a great employee experience’.

We understand the diverse needs, expectations and experiences of our NHS people, and use that insight to tailor our people services. We attract and retain people in health and care, creating a positive impact on our communities.

The people profession will focus on creating a great employee experience, making sure jobs are designed to provide good work, so that people can thrive at work – delivering and supporting high quality patient care and services.

Action 21

The national team will provide support and guidance for systems and organisations to enable them to improve the experience of current and future staff. It will:

  • establish a range of ways to measure employee experience that complement the staff survey, to be included in performance dashboards across NHS organisations and systems and to be used to benchmark, learn and improve (by 2023)
  • provide advice, guidance and support on how to promote the full range of careers in the NHS, including sharing good practice (by 2023).

Action 22

Organisations and systems need to understand the experience of their people to enable them to create great places to work, to enable individuals and teams to thrive, and to deliver great patient care. Organisations and systems need to establish their approach to board-level accountability for staff experience, including the People Promise. Organisation and ICS boards should:

  • formalise governance and reporting arrangements for overseeing employee experience, by appointing the CPO (or equivalent) as the accountable board-level lead
  • build employee experience metrics into performance dashboards so they have the same weight as other forms of performance data.

Action 23

Organisations and systems must embed the People Promise – by building on the strong NHS brand, values and proposition to attract and retain our NHS people. Organisation and ICS CPOs should:

  • review regularly what staff in all parts of the organisation, at all stages of their careers, are saying about ‘what it is like to work here’
  • develop clear plans to improve employee experience, based on evidence and staff suggestions
  • understand why people leave the NHS and take systemic action to address the causes, working with leaders and line managers to create a vibrant employment value proposition
  • design job roles proactively to ensure they are fulfilling and meaningful and support good staff health and wellbeing.

Action 24

Organisations and systems need to develop strategies to make health and care the first choice for local employment using our position in anchor networks. Organisation and ICS CPOs should:

  • develop plans to capitalise on the strong NHS brand, values and proposition to attract people to a career in health and care
  • communicate the core NHS employment offer with creativity and pride, reaching a wide range of audiences
  • develop greater insight, supported by data, into what is attracting people to health and care careers, to enable more tailoring and targeting
  • use innovative ways to bring to life the breadth of roles and career opportunities in health and care and diverse routes into employment, including through volunteering, work experience and apprenticeships.

Action 25

Organisations and systems should use fair, inclusive and modern recruitment methods and simple processes to provide a high-quality candidate experience. Organisation and ICS CPOs should:

  • design recruitment processes to focus on skills and competencies, enabling potential candidates to demonstrate how their skills could best fit with roles
  • use technology to create a ‘frictionless’ recruitment pathway that improves the candidate experience
  • use the opportunity to recruit at scale across a system, to create a more open and efficient process.

Action 26

Organisations and systems should create strong onboarding processes that reflect the People Plan and People Promise. Organisation and ICS CPOs should:

  • ensure that welcoming and onboarding new joiners is recognised as a crucial driver of retention and that it is a personal priority for leaders
  • remove unnecessary bureaucracy and duplication, such as repeated statutory and mandatory training.

Harnessing the talents of all our people

This graphic is part of the future of human resources and organisational development 2030 vision. The graphic includes two yellow hands cupping a star and this text: ‘harnessing the talents of all our people’.

We help all our people to fulfil their ambition and potential. We build strong leadership and management capability at all levels.

Everyone should be able to have a fulfilling career and be able to access the right development opportunities for them. The people profession should lead action to make sure this happens across organisations and systems, supporting line managers and leaders to build their skills at talent management and development. Attracting, developing and retaining talented people from all backgrounds is a key commitment in our People Promise.

Action 27

The national team will develop a framework for talent management, to set out core elements that should be adopted across all systems, with flexibility for local adaption. The national team will:

  • develop clear standards and responsibilities, and practical support for organisations and systems for talent management (by 2023)
  • use digital talent-management tools and platforms to enable a single view of talent across the NHS, including skills, experience, progression readiness, talent assessment and mobility preferences (by 2025).

Action 28

Organisations and systems must have formal governance in place to enable senior involvement and oversight in talent management, succession planning and development. Organisation and ICS boards should:

  • enable CPOs, or equivalent, to chair people boards that adopt and adapt the national framework locally and oversee the approach to apprenticeships, talent development and mobility
  • ensure the CPO, or equivalent, is involved in all senior appointments and performance management discussions about senior staff
  • engage all professions within talent and leadership strategic planning in designing a common framework and driving the agenda
  • ensure that chairs, chairs of the remuneration committee, chief executives and CPOs or equivalent collaborate on talent development
  • build non-executive director capability and ensure that a defined board subcommittee owns the talent and leadership agenda.

Action 29

Organisations and systems need to proactively set the direction for talent management, working collaboratively with all partners across systems to a common framework. Organisation and ICS CPOs should:

  • lead the long-term talent strategy – building capabilities for all people leaders with an explicit focus on addressing issues of equality, diversity and inclusion
  • set expectations that normalise talent mobility, alongside support programmes that encourage movement
  • prepare aspiring leaders through proactive development and stretch opportunities well in advance of being appointed into a leadership or line-management role
  • design the approach for consistent succession-planning processes, tools and approaches for key leadership roles across the system
  • use data and insights to provide a holistic view of local talent pipeline for talent managers and leaders
  • develop a system-level skills recognition and certification programme that facilitates talent mobility
  • make sure line managers are developed and supported to achieve their talent management responsibilities
  • develop an alumni programme to create an additional, flexible talent supply.

Action 30

Organisations need to support leaders and line managers to understand the needs, expectations and aspirations of their teams. People professionals will play a leading role in intentionally building capability and space for leaders and line managers to prioritise and effectively lead for talent, enabling them to spot, develop and nurture talent at all levels. Organisation and ICS CPOs should:

  • ensure that all professions and staff groups in the NHS are developing talent
  • provide support for development that focuses on sideways moves and broad development – not just ‘upwards’ progression
  • create a careers-advice approach within the NHS, using interactive tools and support mechanisms to help our NHS people and potential new joiners understand how to navigate careers in the NHS and what opportunities could be available to them.

Enabling new ways of working and planning for the future

This graphic is part of the future of human resources and organisational development 2030 vision. The graphic includes a pink clock and this text: ‘enabling new ways of working and planning for the future’.

We enable our people to work differently, to support new models of care. We anticipate the needs of the health and care system, and play our part in creating a sustainable supply of workforce which meets the needs of our patients now and for the future.

Workforce planning needs to be rooted in understanding of the future health and care needs of the population at local, system and national level. This understanding can be used to drive workforce, service and financial planning. The people profession has a leading role to play in workforce planning, both in the short and longer term, including in designing roles that provide good work and supporting its implementation.

Action 31

Systems need to lead comprehensive ‘planning for the future’: developing workforce plans, based on service planning, to meet population health needs – with clear actions for meeting the plans through new ways of working and growing the workforce. System and organisation CPOs should:

  • develop governance and infrastructure that enables workforce plans to align with local service and financial planning, HEE plans and the responsibilities set out in guidance on the ICS people function
  • take account of the needs of the whole health and care sector and its workforce in planning for the future, taking a ‘one workforce’ approach across the NHS (primary and secondary care), social care and the independent and charity sectors
  • use workforce plans to help shape the local and national education and training needs, recruitment and retention and workforce transformation
  • continue to evolve the approach to workforce planning, to take account of new ways of working and workforce transformation
  • support the embedding of new roles into multidisciplinary teams, to make the most of the available skill mix.

Action 32

The Department of Health and Social Care, HEE and NHS England and NHS Improvement national and regional teams will work together to support further development of workforce planning capacity and capability. The people profession should be supported and developed to carry out planning directly, and through convening and facilitating other key partners (including clinical leaders, finance and service planners). National and regional teams will work together to:

  • help develop and promote tools that support clinical, people professionals and other specialist leaders, to plan for workforce needs (by 2023)
  • consolidate training materials and a programme of development to support the people profession grow and evolve its skills and capacity in workforce planning (by 2023).

Action 33

Organisations and systems need to ensure that planning for the future, including workforce planning, is digitally enabled and draws on more robust and timely data. Organisation and ICS CPOs should:

  • ensure that digital planning tools (such as e-rostering and e-job planning) are fully implemented, to support the day-to-day deployment of staff across the ICS
  • ensure better use of digital planning tools, to improve data quality – making it more accurate and timely, supporting more accurate medium-term and long-term planning
  • work with systems to understand their planning needs, then develop common data standards to allow data to be shared. This will enable them to build workforce planning platforms that use improved existing data and integrate across existing tools.

Action 34

Organisations and systems need to support our people to work differently and more flexibly to support action to deliver care to patients in new and different ways. This will mean actively designing teams around the full range of experience and capabilities of their clinical and non-clinical staff, including those in partner organisations and volunteers. Organisation and ICS CPOs should:

  • lead planning on the opportunities of new ways of working and new roles to transform service delivery and achieve sustainable workforce supply
  • enable our people to access wider opportunities across the system, supporting their development and helping them gain wider experience
  • consider different employment models, to enable more flexibility in the movement of staff across the system to work in different teams
  • implement digital staff passports, to enable seamless moves between teams and organisations
  • use the benefit of scale to develop shared bank and temporary staffing arrangements
  • ensure the benefits from remote and virtual working are carefully considered and benefits realised for the long term.

Action 35

Organisations and systems should continue to lead action to address local supply issues, using the benefit of scale wherever possible and innovative approaches that broaden access to roles for the local community. Organisation and ICS CPOs should:

  • support the introduction and embedding of new roles and new ways of working into the service – such as advanced clinical practitioners
  • build strong relationships with local communities to share the opportunities working in the NHS and wider health and care service can bring, encouraging social mobility
  • implement approaches that use the benefit of scale, such as running larger-scale recruitment rounds that cover multiple providers
  • adopt a wide range of supply approaches, including those that may only provide benefit in the longer term, including traineeships, work experience and volunteers
  • embed the use of apprenticeships across different settings (clinical and non-clinical), such as locally commissioned apprenticeships
  • establish, or become part of, volunteer services that make sure volunteers receive appropriate support and training and are made to feel a true part of the team
  • support schemes such as the NHS cadets and NHS reservists, to support people from under-represented groups to embark on health and care careers.

View the next sections in this guide: