The right performance review system can solve 5 NHS challenges

The National Health Service has to deal with significant change. The latest priorities are non-stop – from new government targets and leadership academy initiatives to nurse revalidations. Therefore, delivering change effectively can be a challenge. Tools that align staff and aid communication are therefore valuable. Systems like ESR do have value, however, they are only repositories for data, they are not behavioural enablers. Embedding the right performance review system can solve 5 NHS challenges.

So, how do we present the business case to show this?

The business case for a Performance Review System

1. Helps Improve Employee Engagement

There is an overwhelming body of evidence which demonstrates that engaged staff deliver better health care. National Health Service providers with high levels of staff engagement (measured in the annual NHS Staff Survey) tend to have lower levels of patient mortality, make better use of resources, and deliver stronger financial performance (West and Dawson 2012). Engaged staff are more likely to show empathy and compassion even despite work pressure.

The Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust had among the lowest levels of staff engagement in the National Health Service throughout the mid-2000s. Unfortunately, this was not recognised and it seems like the disparities amongst organisations are wider and the risks can be fatal. Using an employee review system like Actus can be a first step for embedding good quality management behaviour where staff engagement is shaky. Actus Performance Review Software is different from ESR and other systems as it is designed to empower the user and encourage ongoing people management activities.

2. Effectively manage talent and encourage high performance

Much is made of the importance of talent management and leadership. The Kings Fund states that an effective NHS talent management strategy needs to focus on four areas:

– Recruiting the right staff to meet current and future needs
– Retaining and developing staff by valuing their contribution and encouraging personal growth
– Deploying talent effectively by providing stretch opportunities and rotating leadership roles
– Succession planning to identify critical roles and consider how internal candidates might fill these

However, at Actus we believe that everyone has the potential to be ‘talent’. Whatsmore, we believe that the way in which staff are managed will make all the difference as to whether they perform effectively or not. The Actus Performance Review System will help you to embed an effective talent and people management culture, helping you to retain your talent and enable people to perform.

3. Using a performance review system for Clinical and Nurse Revalidation

Keeping information up-to-date using ESR is challenging as staff don’t always have direct access or use it regularly. This makes it difficult to ensure the qualifications and evidence of CPD are up-to-date. Using the Actus Performance Review System; Qualifications and CPD functionality can easily be managed. The Software generates automatically revalidation reminders and allows for reporting on existing validation levels or CPD completion at any point in time. This allows for greater accessibility, providing better usage and accuracy. Switching from standalone clinical revalidation software to a performance review system can also save money as it incorporates revalidation for free.

4. A Performance Review System can help to embed change

Delivering change through an organisation the size of the average NHS can be really challenging when relying on word-of-mouth or paper-based processes. You can use Actus to cascade goals and organisational priorities, and view levels of alignment at a glance.

5. Helps to enable pay progression

Pay progression has been on and off the National Health Service agenda. However, the bottom line is that you can’t deliver performance-related pay or withhold increments unless certain that the performance rating or judgement is fair. A performance review system will document expectations, record performance against these and detail the rationale for ratings to make them happen. This automatically provides HR with information to allow ratings to be moderating and analysed.

Having a performance review system that documents expectations, records performance against these expectations and details the rationale for any rating is essential to make this happen. Such performance review systems provide HR with information that allows ratings to be moderated and analysed. If you would like more information we can provide personal guidance and support around upskilling managers or Trusts to introduce a robust approach to rating performance enabling pay progression fairly. Request a free demo by clicking the button below. Alternatively, download our free guide on implementing pay progression.

Request A Free Software Demo

Implementing Performance Related Pay In 7 Simple Steps