Leadership Q&A: Pennine Care Foundation Trust

1. Why this job?

The challenges facing health and social care across the country are unprecedented and no more so than in Greater Manchester. In April 2016, Greater Manchester took charge of the £6bn spent on health and social care services in the region.

The devolution deal also included a £450m Transformation Fund (over five years) to radically change the way health and care is provided. Greater Manchester has the fastest growing economy in the country and yet the combined health and social care deficit is estimated to reach £2bn by 2021, so change needs to be at pace and scale. This is where Pennine Care Foundation Trust comes in.

Shifting care from the acute sector into the community has the greatest potential for improving quality whilst reducing costs, which is at the heart of Pennine Care’s whole-person, place-based care strategy, as a leading provider of community and mental health services. Therefore, the chief executive of Pennine Care will be at the forefront of influencing future models of care that will improve patient outcomes and release cost efficiencies to the trust and the wider system.

As the leader of one of only three mental health providers in Greater Manchester, the chief executive will champion parity of esteem for mental health. The trust is embarking on an ambitious strategy to revolutionise the way it delivers mental healthcare at all stages of the pathway, which will directly influence the new Greater Manchester strategy for mental health.

Covering six of the 10 boroughs of Greater Manchester, Pennine Care is already working with partners on developing innovative care models through Locality Plans, including the Stockport vanguard programme, the all age integration of health and social care in Trafford and formation of local care models in Bury, Oldham, Rochdale and Tameside.

As a system leader, Pennine Care is uniquely placed to spread innovation and best practice across its 260 community and mental health services and beyond.

A key priority for the chief executive will be to lead the trust’s improvement programme in response to the ‘requires improvement’ rating given by the Care Quality Commission. Sixteen services were inspected in total, one service was rated as outstanding, nine as good and six as requires improvement. The trust is working on the recommendations made by the CQC so that it can achieve a good rating in the near future.

2. Why this trust?

Pennine Care’s 6,000 dedicated staff provide care to thousands of people every day, in fact its community and mental health services support around 2.6 million patient contacts each year.

Pennine Care’s core purpose is to help communities to live healthy lives, whilst acting with integrity and upholding its values – Compassionate, Accountable, Responsive, Effective and Safe. It means staff place the needs of patients and people first, every time.

Pennine Care is just as passionate about ensuring staff have a positive experience too, recognising that having a motivated and empowered workforce is the key to delivering high standards of care. Whilst employees are expected to uphold the values and maintain professionalism at all times, in return they will receive all the support and resources they need to flourish. This led to Pennine Care being named as one of the top 100 places to work in healthcare in 2015, as part of the HSJ and Nursing Times awards.

Pennine Care has received a number of accolades over the years, most recently being a finalist in the HSJ Value in Healthcare Awards for the last two years across a number of categories.

3. How will the role advance the candidates’ career?

The chief executive of Pennine Care will be operating at the highest level in one of the most complex and dynamic health and social care systems. They will have a lead role in systems and relationship management across a large proportion of the Greater Manchester footprint and be a main champion for community and mental health care, in a dominant acute sector.

As an established Foundation Trust, Pennine Care has the opportunity to directly influence and contribute to the Greater Manchester Sustainability and Transformation Plan, which is heralded as leading the way for STPs around the country.

At the same time, the trust has reviewed its five-year strategic plan only this year, to ensure it continues to have a clear direction for the future, but is responsive to the new more complex environment in which it operates. With the plan only just being finalised, now is the perfect opportunity for a new chief executive to come and lead the trust to achieve its ambitions.

We are delighted to be supported in this campaign by our recruiting partners GatenbySanderson

Find out more about the role here.