What specific skills can I demonstrate through service improvement experience? - Healthcare

The Employability Skills Matrix (ESM) provides guidelines for how employees working in different jobs can be aligned to nine different functional levels of employment. This framework starts at level 1, which is initial entry level, and rises to level 9 for the most senior staff within an organisation. Each level has a descriptor which identifies the types of staff whose job roles will fit within that level. A healthcare graduate will typically start work at level 5 of the Career Framework, referred to as practitioner level. The aim of the ESM is to provide a common language to assist both staff and employers with the mapping of employment skills, allowing you to see how you are expected to progress with each subsequent career step. One of the benefits of the ESM is that it allows you to identify how transferable skills may be relevant to other job roles, including those that are not readily identified via traditional routes.

The ESM approaches employability skills in a different way to the KSF. Rather than identifying specific topics or dimensions, it highlights the personal skills, qualities, values, attributes and behaviours that are expected of people working at each of the nine levels of the Career Framework. Once again improvement (and numerous associated terms) features at every level, even at entry level. This once again highlights the importance of service improvement experience when you are aiming to demonstrate that you are the right person for the job.
There are numerous skills, qualities, values, attributes and behaviours identified under level 5 (Practitioner Level) that can convincingly be demonstrated through service improvement experience; the following have been selected as examples for you to consider (Skills for Health, 2014, p. 21).

Communication and customer care

Listen to and ask a variety of questions to understand the points of view of others, including team members and service users.
Persuade and influence others.
Proactively raise concerns about the provision of services to service users with supervisor and managers.Solving problems

Assess situations and identify the root cause of a problem.
Seek different points of view, including the views of service users, and evaluate them on the basis of facts.
Readily use theoretical and practical knowledge to think, gain and share information, solve problems and make decisions.

All of these communication and problem-solving skills are required to successfully engage with service improvement methodology in practice. Identifying where problems exist and then exploring the processes or practices involved with all of the key stakeholders is a fundamental part of any improvement project. A constructive approach to finding the root cause of the problem can be ably demonstrated by the methodical use of improvement tools, and a proactive approach will be evident through your drive to find a solution to the problem. Your ability to effectively collect and present evidence that shows what the problem is and how it can best be addressed will be an excellent way to demonstrate that you are capable of evaluating things on the basis of facts. In addition, you can show your ability to persuade and influence by demonstrating how you have presented this evidence to others in support of your improvement idea.

Mathematics

Evaluate equipment, techniques and procedures with the aim of improving efficiency and effectiveness.
For an improvement idea to be successfully implemented it is essential that there is a clear idea of how the impact of the change will be measured. Therefore, during any change cycle there will be a need to collect, analyse and present data to monitor and evaluate the improvement. Experience of service improvement is, therefore, very good for developing and demonstrating the mathematical skills required for working in a modern healthcare environment.

Working with others

Work with others towards achieving shared goals to improve and maintain the quality of service provision.
Respect and be open to the thoughts, opinions and contributions of others, including colleagues, and service users.
Develop, with the team, a clear purpose and objectives to improve and maintain the quality of service provision.
Proactively identify creative and transferable solutions in relation to specific problems or conflict.
Provide leadership and/or support to others when appropriate, motivating a group to achieve high performance and cope with unpredictable change.

As service improvement is rarely undertaken alone, engagement with this type of activity will be very powerful for demonstrating effective team working. Working on a process map within a team, ensuring that everyone’s views are included and represented, and bringing the whole team along with you as the improvement idea is proposed and implemented, requires a range of these transferrable skills. Even though you may not have been able to gain experience in actually implementing improvement ideas, an awareness of the impact of change on teams and the many barriers that present in practice, will be extremely valuable. If you can also provide some potential strategies for overcoming those barriers, you will demonstrate a propensity to provide leadership and support during a change process, which are highly desirable traits for employers.

Demonstrate positive attitudes, values and behaviours

Identify and suggest alternative ways to get the job done whilst maintaining a compassionate and caring service provision.
Be creative and innovative in implementing solutions, maintaining honesty, integrity and transparency.
Make best use of resources including time, to achieve agreed goals for service delivery, taking responsibility for own actions and self-development and providing effective team leadership.
View change as an opportunity and cope with uncertainty, assessing and minimising risk.
Perhaps one of the most powerful benefits of engaging with meaningful service improvement activity is that is shows you have a positive attitude towards improving quality. Talking with confidence about your real experiences of how you have worked with a team to identify an area for improvement will help convey your desire to take responsibility for making the best use of resources through looking for ways of doing this differently. This may well involve creative and innovative ideas for improvement and will certainly demonstrate that you are the type of person who will embrace change and be proactive in looking for opportunities to improve.

Service improvement and leadership skills

In 2011, NHS Chief Executive Sir David Nicholson recognised that during a time of significant change for health and care services there is a need for ‘bold and thoughtful leadership, rethinking how we work, challenging current practice and thinking outside of our own organisation and professional interests’ (NHS Leadership Academy, 2011, p. 5).
If you have engaged in service improvement activities you will undoubtedly have demonstrated positive leadership skills. A person who engages with improvement activities will display the confidence to question the way things are done and a willingness to think creatively about changing practice. They will need diplomacy and sensitivity, as people often feel defensive when practice is being challenged. They will need to be able to encourage and motivate the whole team of people involved to work together in analysing their service to identify where things need to improve and then to find a meaningful solution. Once the need for improvement is established, leadership skills are required to bring together everyone’s opinions and ideas about what to do about it. Although it will often be an individual who comes up with an improvement idea, the team must appreciate and understand this idea if it is going to be successfully implemented. Leadership skills are then required to motivate the team to change what they are doing currently and to ensure that the impact of the change is fully evaluated. Many ideas fail at this stage because the human factors associated with change have not been carefully considered. If you can indicate how you might be able to lead your team successfully through an improvement cycle and help them to address the challenges associated with a change process, you will indeed be exhibiting leadership potential that any employer would value.