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People First

The ability to focus on and prioritise the things that matter most to our patients, partners and communities is a key strategic capability. For any organisation to succeed, it must be clear about its purpose. People First provides a defined set of priorities to ensure we arrive at transparent and timely decision making to support our strategic goals, meet the expectations of our patients and partners and provide confidence to our regulators in our ability to address the challenges we face.

Every day our dedicated workforce strives to provide quality care and make things better but individual, organisational, and system-wide barriers often get in the way. We have identified our three main barriers to success:

 

  1. Emergency care flow and its consequent impact on delays and all our waiting times
  2. Recruitment and retention
  3. Leadership and culture

These three barriers are constraining many, if not all, of the services and functions at NUH. We are taking a strategic approach to key interventions to make NUH a better place to receive care and a better place to work. Organisational changes must be delivered consistently and transparently, engaging all colleagues and partners in an inclusive way. To do so, People First makes three key recommendations:

  1. To accept that improving emergency care flow (and its consequent impact on all our waiting times), recruitment and retention, and leadership and culture are the top priorities for NUH.
  2. To develop and deliver a series of interlocking strategies designed to achieve our three top priorities.
  3. The adoption of a Trust-wide quality management system to lead change and development in an inclusive and transparent way, and which encourages a bottom-up approach to ideas for innovation, efficiency, and effectiveness.

The clinical and enabling strategies have been developed throughout 2023, with all People First strategies to be agreed at Trust Board by May 2024. An annual People First report will be produced for Trust Board in May 2024 to update on progress and agree priorities for 2024/25. The new Chief People Officer will make an important contribution towards the implementation of People First across the medical workforce and the wider organisation.