East Midlands Regional Maternity Workshop

5th July 2007

The fifth of the Skills for Health - Workforce Projects Team workforce planning capability workshops was held at the Leicester Tigers Stadium in Leicester on Thursday 5th July 2007 with 38 delegates representing organisations from the East Midlands SHA region.

The aim of this workforce planning development event was to develop the workforce planning capacity and capability within maternity services and help organisations to develop integrated plans for the implementation of Maternity Matters. The day was a mix of presentations and interactive workshops designed to help the delegates become familiar with the the Workforce Projects Team workforce planning approach.

The morning opened with a welcome and introduction by Trish Knight, deputy director of workforce at NHS East Midlands followed by a presentation by Karen Scott, strategic workforce development manager at NHS East Midlands on Maternity Matters – update on local progress/local workforce information. Karen then followed this by leading discussions in locality groups around strategy development for Maternity Matters asking each group to discuss what information is available as well as details of existing workforce plans.

Bryan Kessie from the Workforce Projects Team introduced the delegates to the Workforce Projects Team six step guide to workforce planning. The delegates then completed a number of high level exercises within their locality groups introduced by Stuart Taylor from the Workforce Projects Team. This group work centred around different scenarios experienced in maternity services and what skills and competencies do staff need to provide the choice agenda. Rather than providing an answer these sessions promoted use of effective workforce planning using the six steps and allowed the delegates to experience the workforce planning process which they may use in their localities to develop action plans to meet Maternity Matters. Bryan Kessie then discussed the final steps of the six step guide around action planning and review. He then summarised the workshop content and next steps for the delegates were discussed.

Due to limitations with session timings associated presentations - the national context of maternity workforce (Workforce Review Team) and skills and competencies of the maternity workforce (Skills for Health) - can be found on the right hand side menu.