Who are we?
We are the ACP Workforce and organisational development workstream which is made up of 14 core members from across the ACP partner organisations. We are currently looking for representation from the Voluntary Sector.
We are working together to create a flourishing and thriving Sheffield by developing our people in a joined up way to deliver holistic, person-centred and integrated care.
The work we are doing
We are currently working on finalising our priorities but work is already ongoing to develop a workforce strategy and to improve the skills and confidence of our system leaders.
Developing a system wide workforce strategy: In the spring of 2018, the Care Quality Commission carried out a Local System Review of Sheffield’s health and care support for older people. Sheffield was one of twenty areas chosen by CQC for a Local System Review because performance was not as good as many other parts of the country.
In their review, they looked at how health and care organisations worked together and made several recommendations including the need for a shared citywide workforce strategy to support front-line staff in delivering a city wide vision and in particular further develops multi-agency working.
Work to address this began and produced draft ACP workforce strategy is currently out for consultation. This involved gathering the views of over 150 local service users and front-line staff from across Health and Social Care services in Sheffield.
Improving the skills & confidence of our system leaders: Having successfully completed the first cohort of the Leading Sheffield programme in May 2019 we are now organising the second cohort to run from September. This is a 5-day leadership development experience that provides staff with some tools and techniques for adapting to and applying system leadership as well as providing the opportunity to work with staff from other organisations on a challenge topic.
In May we also launched the ACP Shadow Board. The ACP Shadow Board aims to prepare future system leaders, including aspiring Directors, and to provide senior leaders with an insight into ACP system working.
Our biggest challenges: The limited capacity of workforce-focused staff within organisations may affect our plan to develop and implement the workforce plan. Consultations are ongoing to secure commitment.
The capacity of the Voluntary Sector is stretched and core people and organisations may not be able to participate in strategic development, implementation and development opportunities related to the workforce strategy.
What impacts have we seen?
Since completing the Leading Sheffield Programme one of our system leaders has used the experience to change their approach to meetings and has seen them working with another team to the benefit of their clients:
“The course has made me think more laterally about my work and think more about the wide range of stakeholders who I include in meetings. This way, I can be assured that all pertinent points of view can be covered by all who have an interest in what is being discussed. I feel more confident in my working practice as a result of this. I really feel that it is a better way of leading teams as opposed to some of the current leadership styles that are in use.”
“The Social Prescribing Team is now used by the Nurses in my team – a resource that was not known to Continuing Health Care before. This is making a difference to clients’ care packages in that it bridges some gaps in service that we struggled to fill previously.”
The programme coaches also benefited and learnt new skills:
“It was hard to step back and be a coach, but rewarding to see your challenge group coming up with new ideas and putting together their plans. As coach you learn to keep them on track and encourage them to reflect regularly on how they are doing. Additionally, I was able to learn and test coaching skills that I had not known about before and they have helped me in my day to day working with my teams at work.”
