Addressing our workforce challenges is the biggest barrier to improving the way we provide health and care in our communities. It is vital that we get it right for our workforce so we can provide the best possible care for the people of Greater Manchester.
On Tuesday 7 March, our Chief People Officer, Janet Wilkinson launched our People and Culture Strategy setting out a shared ambition for our health and care workforce.
The strategy sets out Greater Manchester’s plan to create one sustainable workforce, that has the support it needs to deliver outstanding care across our health and care our services.
There are five priority areas. These are:
- Attracting more people to work in health and care – and helping them develop
- Enabling our people to work better together to help integrate our services
- Supporting our organisations to become better employers
- Addressing the causes of staff sickness and helping to keep our workforce well
- Making sure our workforce is representative of the people we serve – and that everyone is treated fairly
The strategy was developed following extensive engagement with over 200 stakeholders, as well as through valuable discussions with our trade unions and wider workforce to listen and learn from their experience.
It provides a blueprint for why, where, and how we work together to deliver maximum impact. This is includes working together to deliver change at a system, sector, locality, and organisational level, as well as in partnership with our workforce and trade union colleagues.
This is a strategy for every member of our health and care workforce, including those working in health, care, the VCSE sector, volunteers and unwaged carers.
The strategy sets out key priority actions to be delivered once across Greater Manchester. These include helping more employers to achieve Membership of the Good Employment Charter, which will mean they pay their workforce the living wage, provide secure employment and support flexible working and more. The priority actions also include developing a social care careers academy, to support the growth and development of our social care workforce and supporting people through the cost of living crisis.
Further work will take place over the coming months to develop delivery plans in collaboration with partners across the health and care system.
You can read the full strategy here: Workforce | Greater Manchester Integrated Care Partnership (gmintegratedcare.org.uk).
Janet Wilkinson, Chief People Office for NHS Greater Manchester Integrated Care said:
“Our workforce are the beating heart of our health and care services. Everyday people go over and above to deliver care they can be proud of. We could not deliver our health and care services without those who work so tirelessly in service of our communities.
“There is no denying that these are extremely challenging times for our health and care services as we face significant financial pressures and a workforce crisis. As an integrated care system (ICS) we need to act now – to create the conditions to allow our people to provide the best possible care, within the financial envelope.
“It is important that the action taken is effective, coordinated and sustainable – so that the changes we make can support our workforce and our services in the years to come. That is the focus of this People and Culture Strategy.”
