Strategic & Operational HR

Pennine Acute Hospitals NHS Trust recently embarked upon widespread service reconfiguration in line with regional initiatives, which led to the merger and closure of services at various sites across the Trust. As a result this redeployment  programme was launched to place all displaced employees into alternative substantive posts. This allowed 882 employees to be redeployed within the Trust, which saved circa £56,000 per person in redundancy costs.

In 2009 a professional mental health network was set up for the Blackburn with Darwen area, which is very unique in that it is exclusively for mental health professionals from across all sectors, and has a specialism around BME. It allows different organisations to share information, combine resources and undertake joint projects to improve signposting to mental health and mainstream services and has approximately 280 members who can drop in an out as necessary. 

Lancashire Care employed  almost 3800 staff prior to April 2011 when a further 4000 community staff transferred into the Trust. With 110 sites across Lancashire storage and access to the HR files was a continual problem. The creation of electronic records in 2010 which can be accessed from any location has now solved these problems and makes significant progress towards a greener, and paperless HR office.

Network Employment was set up in 1996 and is a part of Mersey Care NHS Trust, providing  individual support to people with experience of mental ill health, to help them to gain employment. Over the past 12 months, 53 individuals have been successful in making progress towards employment with 21 obtaining paid employment in competitive jobs. By supporting these people along the journey to employment Network Employment contributes  to their recovery and wellbeing.

Individual Placement and Support (IPS) is a successful pilot scheme in Stockport run by Pure Employment funded by the Department of Health and NHS North West to address the employment need of people with severe and enduring mental health, recognised as a major contributor to mental wellbeing. 

This case study looks at how IPS in Manchester was set up, its outcomes, challenges, and key learning points. It focuses on the change of culture that was needed within community mental health teams to make employment support a key aspect of services offered to people, recognising the significant health benefits.

This case study describes the introduction and some of the issues encountered when rolling out the use of the Establishment Control functionality of ESR at the Royal Liverpool and Broadgreen University Hospitals Trust (RLBUHT) from 2009 onwards.  Workforce is the biggest single expenditure for the Trust. In order to manage this huge resource better, the Trust aimed to utilise the ESR establishment control system. This would provide the opportunity to link up to date financial information/budgets to HR information. 

East Cheshire Trust employs 120 doctors who are required to undergo a strengthened medical appraisal from the 1st April 2012 to support the GMC’s appraisal and revalidation requirements. As a result the Trust has carried out a comprehensive review of its current appraisal systems and procedures to ensure they are fit for purpose, and has have explored innovative and cost effective solutions for gathering and storing confidential appraisal information and data.

3 organisations in Central Manchester are working together on Project SEARCH - an innovative employment focused education programme designed to give young people with learning difficulties and/or disabilities opportunities to develop employability skills in a real work place, surrounded by other working people. 

Cheshire HR Service, founded in 2006, provides a blueprint for NHS HR shared services. Hosted by East Cheshire NHS Trust it provides the full range of HR services through a Service Level Agreement (SLA) Partnership Arrangement, to East Cheshire NHS Trust, Central and Eastern Cheshire PCT and NHS Western Cheshire and is currently looking to extend its coverage and build a broader customer base. With no obligation on NHS organizations to go down the shared service route there is a need to ensure value for money and the economies of scale that a shared service brings.