Arras People – Surging through the NHS Maze
October 21, 2009 @ How to Manage a Camel - Project Management and Recruitment from MiliPatel
Arras People and the NHS have worked together in previous years up to today, where Arras is currently a supplier for the NHS Commercial Framework.
Did you know the NHS is one of the biggest recruiter in the world? Only the Chinese People’s Liberation Army, the Wal-Mart supermarket chain and the Indian Railways directly employ more people. To put it simply, 43 out of every 1000 UK jobs (4.3%) are with the NHS.
I’ve recently come on board with Arras People to help with their campaign as a certified NHS Commercial Supplier, and the experience thus far is something I could only term as the “NHS Spaghetti Junction”. Think of the NHS structure as being just like a maze; it has been built with walls (Trusts and Authorities) and rooms (Hospitals), with hedges (PCT’s), turf (Health Centres), corn stalks (GP’s), hay bales (Opticians), books (Dentist) or with paving stones of contrasting colours or designs. Mazes can be very large; they are usually only kept for one growing season, so they can be different every year, and are promoted as seasonal tourist attractions.
Strictly speaking, the Recruitment Office or Human Resources Department (HR), has responsibility for the overall recruitment of staff in an organisation. If only it were that simple! Moreover, the NHS is broken into a series of mazes, each becoming even more confounding with their own tiny little mazes within. HR/recruitment services are sometimes based off-site and only deal with general staffing issues.
So my question to you is this: How does the NHS recruit for the magnitude of Project and Programme Management Resources it utilises? Each and every day, a new NHS Trust or Authority is in need of a Project Manager. But who is responsible for bringing this person on board? I am still getting my head around the Project Management world, so where on Earth does an HR staff find the time to deal with such specialist recruitment requirements? Who puts the job specifications together with terminology like ‘implementation through the project lifecycle and application of PRINCE2 (or equivalent methodology’? Is it HR? Or have they turned to that elusive Project Manager with all that time on their hands, one who’s able to volunteer to also handle the recruitment of project and programme management commercial resources within their NHS?
Is there anyone out there who can shed some light on the Project and Programmes Managers in the NHS? How did they get there?!
Leave me a comment or feel free to share your experience.
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