HEALTHCARE DELIVERY Frontline teams lead the way with Productive Series
Developing the skills and leadership of frontline teams within the NHS is a vital element to help organisations achieve improvements in quality and efficiency. If organisations are to deliver better quality care and more efficient use of resources, staff need to be given the opportunity to develop and take the lead in making improvements that deliver better patient experience. The Productive Series, designed by
the NHS Institute for Innovation and Improvement, encourages frontline teams to lead the way in making such improvements. It supports and empowers all grades of staff to redesign and streamline the way they work and implement changes that improve the quality, reliability and safety of patient care. The series acknowledges the wealth of skills frontline staff possess and encourages them to use their own ideas, which are often the most relevant and successful. At University Hospitals of Leicester
NHS Trust, staff have been implementing the Productive Ward and the Productive Mental Health Ward. The programmes have not only identified staff with leadership potential, but have also provided opportunities to develop skills that will benefit the efficiency and productivity of clinical processes. “One of the great things about the programmes is how staff with leadership skills have come to the fore,” said Claire Armitage, head of improvement and innovation, Leicester Partnership NHS Trust. “We have healthcare support workers who were never identified as having leadership skills, who have shown themselves to be interested and have led the way with their teams and led modules [from the programmes]. It
Conclusion There are many challenges facing the NHS – from increasing levels of productivity and making improvements to patient safety, to delivering a critical level of savings, with fewer staff. All this requires some radical thinking. The NHS Confederation deputy director, JoWebber said: “The NHS will also need to address some of the really ‘knotty’, ingrained and complex problems. The answers lie in a radical shift in the way we think about care.We have got to address the culture on some wards, the skills of our staff, the prevention of unnecessary hospital admissions and the safe discharge of people into the community.”6 Reducing some of the burden of
paperwork and additional support to ward 20 THE CLINICAL SERVICES JOURNAL
has opened all sorts of opportunities for them such as further education and developing their careers.” “On a personal level it has given me a
massive confidence boost,” said Kristy Hughes, children’s nurse, University Hospitals of Leicester NHS Trust. “It has also helped me on a clinical level. My leadership and management skills have definitely increased. I always thought I was one of the group that was never listened to on the ward, as a band five staff nurse. Now I feel people actually listen to what I have to say.” Barnsley Hospital NHS Foundation
Trust also developed an innovative idea for helping clinical staff to use their existing skills in a new way and to develop new skills, when returning from long-term sickness absence. The Trust invites clinical staff who are in the recovery phase of long-term sickness absence, who are ready to come back to work but not able to return to their normal clinical duties, to take up the role of Productive Ward facilitators. By helping ward teams to improve the
Ward, the opportunity provides staff who have historically been clinically based, to develop skills in leadership and efficiency techniques. Many staff return to their normal clinical duties equipped with greater confidence and knowledge in leading improvements in productivity and efficiency. “Prior to working with the Productive
pace of implementation of the Productive Members of the Productive Ward team at Barnsley Hospital NHS Foundation Trust.
Series, we came across very few frontline staff who had been involved in service improvement work, or even given permission to make improvements to the way they work,” commented Lynn Callard, interim director of productivity and quality and national lead for the Productive Care QIPP work stream at the NHS Institute for Innovation and Improvement. “They had very little opportunity or guidance on making improvements and were unsure of how to do this. The Productive Series gives frontline staff the tools and step-by-step guidance to improve everyday working practices that will not only deliver better and more efficient patient care, but improved staff satisfaction too.”
leaders is to be welcomed. However, there are many other fundamental changes which need to be made in order to meet the desires and expectations of all of our patients. It is not a matter of choice, it is a requirement.
References 1 Kings College London. Improving healthcare quality at scale and pace. Lessons from the ProductiveWard programme. From
www.institute.nhs.uk/images//documents/ quality_and_value/ProductiveWard/ PWscale_and_pace_Exec_Summary.pdf
2 Ibid 3 Institute for Innovation and Improvement.
January 2011 Rapid Impact Assessment of the ProductiveWard Releasing Time to care™. Accessed at
www.institute-nhs.uk/ images//documents/quality_and_value/ productiveseries/Rapid_Impact_Assessment/ ExecSummaryFinal.pdf
4 NHS Leadership Framework. Accessed at
www.nhsleadership.org.uk/framework.asp
5 Sir David Nicholson Foreword. Accessed at
www.nhsleadership.org.uk/framework- theframework-foreword.asp
6 NHS Confederation Press Release. January 2012. Prime Minister should avoid search for silver bullet as he seeks to improve NHS. Accessed at
www.nhsconfed.org/ OurWork/Pages
MARCH 2012
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