HSJ Awards 2010: Workforce Development

2009 Winner - NHS west midlands

There were three particular features of the NHS West Midlands Workforce Transformation project that prompted the team behind the HSJ Awards entry to seek to share it with a wider audience.

Jon Crockett, chief executive of Wolverhampton City primary care trust, explains: “What we have been doing, and continue to within a long-term programme, breaks new ground and doesn’t exist anywhere else in the NHS. What we have is an integrated system across all the organisations in the region that enables us to effectively plan for future needs with the right skills to deliver the right services.”

“There is also the partnership approach,” he continues. “It is vital to a project that can only be delivered by the strategic authority, primary and acute sectors all working together.”

“Finally,” he concludes, “it raises the profile of the West Midlands and shows that despite some of the region’s recent setbacks we are a vibrant health community with many innovative and cutting edge developments.”

Workforce Transformation is now in its third year and this was not the first time that the project had been entered for this HSJ Awards category.

“We were shortlisted in Workforce Development in 2008,” says Mr Crockett, “and were able to demonstrate an exciting, interesting concept. We were not, however, at a point where we could show any benefits realisation and it was this that made all the difference in 2009.”

Clear project links between workforce planning, the delivery of education and service improvement within a whole-system approach made a strong impression with the judges.

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