Regional Maternity Retention Manager | NHS England

As a Regional Retention Manager/Professional Midwifery Advocate (PMA) Lead the postholder will work closely with colleagues listed below and will be responsible for:

• Co-ordinating regional delivery of the maternity retention programme and PMA's, acting as a key contact for integrated care systems and local maternity units.
• Assimilating and analysing regional midwifery workforce data, research, and intelligence to analyse risks and target interventions.
• Working collaboratively with Regional Retention Managers to facilitate effective communication and engagement in the programme across ICS systems and midwifery units.
• Facilitating and participating in direct support for maternity units/ ICS systems as required
• Working collaboratively with the Regional Chief Midwife and Deputy Chief Midwife to inform and evaluate national retention offer for midwives.
• Participating in national and regional education and development programmes related to the role.
• In collaboration with the national midwifery educational lead developing a regional community of practice for unit-based retention post-holders facilitating education and shared learning activities that facilitate innovation and improvement.
• Work collaboratively with Freedom to Speak Up Guardian (FTSUG), Equality Inclusion & Diversity (EDI) and International Workforce leads to ensure the voices of lived experience inform regional strategy.
The regional retention/PMA lead will facilitate PMA's across the region to identify and implement opportunities for staff support and reflection during challenging situations which encourages insight and may enhance retention of staff. They will work in collaboration with retention and workforce leads, Nationally, Regionally and within provider trusts to identify opportunities, support implementation of change and share learning. The NHS England board have set out the top-level purpose for the new organisation to lead the NHS in England to deliver high-quality services for all, which will inform the detailed design work and we will achieve this purpose by:
• Enabling local systems and providers to improve the health of their people and patients and reduce health inequalities.
• Making the NHS a great place to work, where our people can make a difference and achieve their potential.
• Working collaboratively to ensure our healthcare workforce has the right knowledge, skills, values and behaviours to deliver accessible, compassionate care
• Optimising the use of digital technology, research, and innovation
• Delivering value for money.
If you would like to know more or require further information, please visit https://www.england.nhs.uk/. Colleagues with a contractual office base are expected to spend, on average, at least 40% of their time working in-person. Operational
• To oversee team members to deliver requirements listed above and engage and liaise with key stakeholders, in particular.
• To support the delivery of day-today activities, projects, and programmes.
• To manage team and drive delivery of a range of business initiatives and projects
• To operate in a highly political and sensitive environment
• Support the portfolio of initiatives in demonstrating value for money for the current spend.
• To monitor, interpret and quality assure progress against deliverables to NHS England that often require adjustments specifically in relation to the complex corporate business agenda, strategic objectives, and the business planning process.
• To develop business plans and provide expert strategic and policy advice and guidance on all areas of the National Director's portfolio.
Project Management
• Lead the team in the delivery of project plans, allocating tasks as appropriate, identifying risks, issues, and dependencies, considering best practice and current options, and ultimately making decisions in the best interest of the project.
• Pro-actively manage stakeholders, respond to, and resolve conflict when this arises through facilitation or other appropriate mechanisms.
• Be responsible for a high standard of work supporting the delivery of projects on time, to quality standards and in a cost-effective manner.
• Maintain the project initiation document and associated plans with regular team meetings to monitor progress and resources.
• Demonstrate effective stakeholder management.
• Support other project managers as and when required.
• Consider the impact of any change the projects will have on the business and oversee handover of any products to ensure full ownership and buy-in within the business advocate the projects at senior and executive levels and ensure active engagement and sponsorship within NHS.
• Ensure that the projects maintain business focus, have clear authority and that the context, including risks, is actively managed in alignment with the strategic priorities of NHS.
Financial and Physical Resources
• Act in a way that is compliant with Standing Orders and Standing Financial Instructions in the discharge of budget management responsibilities, monitor expenditure on a regular basis.
• Budget holder for assigned function/team, budget setting with the Head of Department. Responsible for ongoing monitoring of expenditure against budget and ensuring the appropriate documentation is available for scrutiny.
• Identify products, equipment, services, and facilities for assigned activities, achieving stakeholder buy-in as required. Placing orders and signing invoices.
• Responsible for making recommendations, providing advice and able to prepare strategic reports/briefings for the Head of Department, and relevant forums.
People Management
• Directly manages the team of staff, responsible for day-to-day work assigned to the Team.
• Responsible for recruitment and selection.
• Responsible for undertaking appraisal and personal development and managing any employee relations issues.
• Forge close positive working relationships, to support an effective matrix approach to achieve NHS objectives.
• To support, motivate and develop people within the team.
• Managing third parties (such as consultants/interims) to ensure deliverables are met in a timely manner and within budget.
Information Management
• Drafting detailed reports summarising status on issues, appraising outcomes, and providing progress reports for the Head of Department.
• Collate as required, a range of information and lead appropriate analysis to develop robust business cases and contribute to project 'products'.
• Analyse, interpret and present data to highlight issues, risks and support decision making.
Policy and Service Development
• Responsible for proposing and drafting changes, implementation and interpretation to policies, guidelines, and service level agreements (SLA's) which may impact service.
• Proposes changes to own function making recommendations for other service delivery.
• The post holder will need to maintain a good knowledge of emerging policies from government departments for example pensions, change management, constitution.
Research and Development
• Plan, develop and evaluate methods and processes for gathering, analysing, interpreting, and presenting data and information
• Co-ordinating Research & Development initiatives, delegating as appropriate.
Planning and Organisation
• Contribute to the strategic planning of team projects, identifying interdependencies across projects/functions, potential impacts on the wider organisation, resource requirements and building in contingency and adjustments, as necessary.
• Contribute to short, medium- and long-term business plans, achieving quality outcomes.
Key Working Relationships
• Operate effectively in a flexible and demanding environment and proactively engage with key stakeholders.
• Work effectively with a variety of external consultancies working on other projects and programmes within other NHS directorates as required.
• Communicates and provides highly complex information to a wide range of internal and external stakeholders. (verbal, written and numerical)
• Deal with resulting potentially aggressive/antagonistic situations as required.
• Work and engage constructively with stakeholders on a range of business sensitive issues.
• Nurture key relationships and maintain networks internally and externally.
• Ensure close liaison with the Communications and Stakeholder team on public relations and marketing activities.
• Apply a structured change management approach and methodology in relation to change management.
• May deputise for the Head of Department as required.
Key Relationships (External)
• ICS Workforce Leads
• HR Directors
• Royal College of Nursing
• NMC
• Unions
• Trusts within the region
Key Relationships (Internal)
• Regional Chief Midwife, Deputy Regional Chief Midwife, ICB Retention Managers and the national maternity retention team
• Regional Chief Midwife
• ICB Retention Managers
• National Maternity Retention Team
• Regional IR teams
• Deputy Chief People Office
• People Directorate SMEs
• Workforce Training and Education
You can find further details about the job, in the attached Job Description and other supporting documents.