Visits to many organisations this month have emphasised an ongoing focus on effectiveness and efficiency as most public sector employers try to balance reducing costs with rising activity and quality standards. At Synuron we have embarked on transforming HR processes and using technology solutions to reduce costs. At Guy’s & St Thomas’s and Great Ormond Street, we are showing line managers that managing people and driving up performance can have better outcomes with innovative technology. Someone said to me that our new e-recruitment tool is really a great performance management tool. It measure everything you would ever want to know both from the line and HR business partner perspective. For a Finance Director and CEO, it can also look down the pipeline of resourcing intentions online… no paper! and no wasted time in meetings approving vacancies… or not!
I have also met with Karen Taylor at the National Audit Office again as they near the end of the study on acute trusts productivity. As mentioned in a blog post a few weeks ago, our field work with the Institute of Employment Studies with members on performance management will support employers on issues such as accountability for appraisal, performance and job planning. Some of the issues arising from the IES group, which includes a cross section of organisations both public and private include how the goals of the organisation are articulated to staff, that fact that all organisations are simplifying these processes, and how to motivate with no money. The aim in this groundbreaking work will be to find out what the best are doing and share it across our membership.
Finally, we have been asking employers this month what the impact of the temporary immigration cap will be. A touchy subject I know. I hope that health and social care employers made their views known directly to the Home Office Border Agency during the consultation. There is a view that a furore will ensue and it will make the argument for a long term answer. In the meantime, I have a fear of foreboding as some of our members have already embarked on significant rounds of international recruitment programmes, to now discover that they cannot recruit the people. The case of social workers recruited from US and Canada is a good example. Of all the employment issues to result from the political landscape recently, this one will be significant for our members over the coming months.
Sian
