Heartbeat: Developing high potential within our organisation
September 11, 2018
Now that the first round of the new aspiring to excellence personal development reviews have been completed and colleagues have had an opportunity to think about their roles and responsibilities, Heartbeat caught up with Deputy Director of Learning and Development, Bethan Downing to find out what our organisation is going to implement to support high performing colleagues.
Bethan said: “We have made a significant investment recently in not simply focusing our efforts on recruiting great staff in to our organisation, but to identify those colleagues who have been performing well and are showing potential to develop.
“As an organisation, we are passionate about making sure that colleagues have opportunities to learn and develop, whether that is through development opportunities like shadowing and coaching or access to development secondments and further training.”
During TeamTalk in July, colleagues were asked to think about what the offer should be to those employees who are performing highest.
“The feedback from TeamTalk indicated that development opportunities was the number one preference for our highest performing employees,” said Bethan.
“Therefore, those who score 4A in their PDR will have an individualised development plan, which is tracked by our organisation as a commitment to them to ensure they have access to development opportunities.
“Part of that development may be the recently launched nurse escalator programme, which offers our high performing and high potential nurses the opportunity to grow their knowledge and experience in areas they feel passionate about, this may be either clinical development or development into managerial roles.”
Bethan added: “The possibilities for development are exciting and diverse and we are committed to supporting our colleagues to meet their fullest potential.
“We are not offering a single, one size fits all approach to how we go about this, each and every colleague will have had a discussion with their manager at their PDR to agree their personal development plan for the year ahead and this discussion should be kept live and opportunities taken as they become available.
“Development within our departments is also important to ensure succession opportunities are available and that our employees feel developed to succeed in future roles as well as their current role.
“We see colleagues who work over and above to deliver amazing care and whilst we are keen for them to develop, we are also keen for all employees who want to develop to be given opportunity to grow with our organisation, to be part of something special and be proud to themselves and the organisation they work for.”
If you are keen to find out more about what the Trust has to offer to help you develop, contact Bethan Downing on email: Bethan.downing1@nhs.net