HFMA 2020: talent management offering

During a session at the virtual conference today, Hardev Virdee, group chief finance officer, Barts Health NHS Trust and Sandra Easton, director of operational finance and performance, NHS England and NHS Improvement, spoke about developments in London that could be replicated elsewhere.

In London, a talent board has been established to develop staff and ensure the finance community at every level reflects the population it serves. Mr Virdee said there is a glass ceiling at band 8D and above, and the work to address this fell into three categories:

• Recruitment – ‘Are NHS bodies recruiting the right people from the local community or are they paying recruitment consultants to find the same pool of people?’ he asked. Inclusion and diversity were not being promoted to the fullest extent.
• Learning and development – how does NHS organisations give staff the right tools to develop themselves? ‘At the moment, it feels like in many cases people put themselves through the latest Excel or PRINCE2 courses – things that are necessary for the here and now.’
• Progression – developing the opportunities for people ready to step up to a senior role to ensure they have the relevant experience, including soft skills such as having the confidence when engaging with non-executives.

Wrapped around this work is how to manage talent. ‘It’s safe to say that in the NHS we haven’t done ourselves justice in the finance community.’

This has led to an agreement to set up a London finance academy, through the talent board, covering staff in all types of NHS organisation. The academy will look at talent management for senior staff, building on the One NHS Finance work.

Ms Easton said other regions were enthusiastic about the academy and wanted to duplicate the idea locally. One piece of feedback she had been given is that when staff move from one region to another is that there are different ways of doing things. ‘This applies to processes, but also the way we care for people, how talent is managed.

‘We want to have a national approach delivered locally. You know your own teams better, but we want to set a few standards so all the other regions are not starting from scratch. As part of that we are thinking we need a national-level curriculum, whether it’s Excel or VAT training, or about leadership development.’

She added they were hopeful national standards would tackle recruitment and retention challenges. Talent management – identifying and nurturing talent – would be applied consistently across England, while a strategy would promote equality, inclusion and diversity.

Some staff had said the personal and professional development landscape was complex with a range of providers and responsibilities. This could make it difficult to navigate development opportunities. ‘I would like to see a simplification of that so as an individual you can see what your career path looks like.’

Finance leaders had made a commitment to staff that they would listen and act. ‘We have FFF in place, which is great, but in talent management there needs to be a bit more care, and owned by NHS England and NHS Improvement.’