Driving exceptional standards in health with specialised training

NHS England is passionate about driving standards in health. For the past five years, we have been helping them to maintain compliance, simplify their procurement processes, and increase efficiencies through a managed learning and development contract (Crown Commercial Service L&D Managed Learning Service Framework RM3822). Prior to our involvement, their learning and development spend was disparate and paid directly to a series of suppliers. As costs grew, we were tasked to provide a best practice framework which would enable them to: procure learning from the marketplace at scale whilst remaining compliant; set-up multiple year training contracts to provide consistency and lock in costs; and directly manage suppliers on behalf of the organisation.

Transforming the procurement and delivery of safeguarding training

It was, therefore, a straightforward decision for NHS England to work with us again when they needed effective procurement planning and upskilling for hospital executives and clinical staff in sector-specific safeguarding legislation.

We set out to:

• Deliver 42 courses such as Executive and Clinical Leadership in Safeguarding.
• Train at least 800 people across hospital management and clinicians.
• Ensure value for money by filling classes to capacity, wherever possible.
• Increase delegate skills and knowledge by a minimum of 20%.
• Attain minimum delegate net promoter scores (NPS) of +60 (the national standard is +43).
• Make certain at least 90% of delegates could practically apply what they had learnt back in the workplace.

Innovative learning and development

In partnership with preferred supplier Bond Solon, we supported the initiative at scale, making sure NHS England had easy and cost-effective access to only the best training solutions available.

Together, we have trained thousands of frontline and executive leads in a new short, high impact course, entitled ‘Acting Ethically and Lawfully during the Coronavirus Act 2020.’ This was put together in record time and provided free of charge to health professionals across England. Designed to demystify this unprecedented set of legislation by breaking it down for easier understanding, the course has been instrumental in ensuring that difficult decisions made during the first coronavirus peak were both lawful and defendable. Due to its overwhelming success and the support it has offered NHS staff, it has been updated and adapted into our safeguarding leadership courses, becoming an integral part of the official surge and recovery phase of the pandemic.

The government has since recommended that the programme be revised to extend beyond health, to our other safeguarding partners as well. In response, Bond Solon designed and delivered their free ‘Multi Agency Executive Leadership in Safeguarding’ course. It is the first time that executive leads across partner agencies have joined forces to help drive safeguarding in a co-ordinated approach.

The structure of our team at Capita means that best practice learnings in one client contract can be replicated across other NHS organisations relatively simply, drastically reducing time and money spent procuring learning both within, and between, organisations in the public sector. This has allowed further safeguarding programmes to be commissioned across England, including Safeguarding Supervisions Skills, Restorative Supervision Skills, Liberty Protection Safeguards (LPS), Safeguarding while Commissioning and Contracting, and Legislation and Safeguarding for Key Workers.

Exceeding expectations: The impact

Our results speak for themselves. We were shortlisted for the Health Service Journal (HSJ) Awards in two categories in February 2020 (Best Educational Programme for the NHS and Procurement Project of the Year) - a national UK standard for healthcare excellence.

We delivered 49 sessions for NHS England and trained over 1,000 people. The evaluations, using eNPS scores, found that delegates’ skills and knowledge increased by 23.75% and we achieved a delegate net promoter score of +76.9.

One of our main goals was to implement a culture of safeguarding across the NHS, so we needed to ensure that learners recognised the value of our programmes, prioritised training over other commitments, and were able to apply their new skills in the workplace. Our programmes were well attended and three months after the training we followed up with delegates to assess the direct impact. We were thrilled to discover that 98.8% believed they would be able to apply what they had learnt in their everyday work and felt more confident in their ability to correctly perform their safeguarding duties, resulting in improved patient outcomes.

“It enabled me to put in place a robust plan to respond to the ongoing safeguarding agenda and to the changing picture of complexity and demand following COVID-19,” said Cheryl Lewis, head nurse for safeguarding, East and North Hertfordshire NHS Trust.

Through our involvement, NHS England has been able to compliantly access the best suppliers and save on inflationary rises in costs through multiple year training contracts. We use our purchasing power from across multiple customer contracts when negotiating with suppliers to drive discounts, which are then passed onto our customers to ensure best value for taxpayers’ money. As we managed the entire process on behalf of NHS England, there has been no need to involve other key resources in the organisation. This has directly resulted in a saving of 28%, which equates to over £65,000 for every year of the contract.

Our project team worked with NHS England at a local, regional and national level, resulting in an incredibly collaborative and constructive partnership. Together with Bond Solon, we’ve facilitated the best learner experience for compliance training (which is traditionally a challenging topic to maintain engagement for), supported system-wide change to improve safety, efficiency and reduce bureaucracy, and train large volumes of staff at a time when safeguarding remained front and centre for healthcare professionals during the pandemic.

To find out how we can help you with your safeguarding and training needs, contact Darren Outridge at darren.outridge@capita.com