Vacancy -- Appointment of Chair - Welsh Ambulance Services NHS Trust

Role and Responsibilities - Welsh Ambulance Services (NHS) Trust

Background

The Welsh Ambulance Service was established as a NHS Trust in 1998, with NHS Direct Wales becoming an integral part of the Trust in April 2007.

Our services cover the whole of Wales - that’s about 8,000 square miles, serving a population of around 3 million spread across a diverse and challenging urban and rural landscape.

The Trust employs 3,240 staff throughout Wales (allied health professionals (including. paramedics), clinical services staff, nursing, administrative and clerical and other staff) and operates from over 80 ambulance stations, five Clinical Contact Centres, four office locations and five vehicle workshops. The Trust also has its own national training facility to ensure staff maintain high levels of performance and receive regular professional development.

The Trust’s services are focused in three main areas – unscheduled care, planned non-emergency transport and telephone and online advice:

• Unscheduled care services (emergency and urgent care (EMS) provide support to patients with illnesses that are immediately life-threatening through to minor injuries and the Trust is increasingly providing pathways to divert patients out of the hospital environment in order to treat people closer to home, where it is appropriate to do so.

• Planned Non-Emergency Patient Transport Services (NEPTS) help thousands of patients each year to get to their hospital and medical appointments.

• NHS Direct Wales (NHSDW) provides telephone and online advice to patients who feel unwell, helping to signpost patients to, or arrange, the most appropriate care for them. The pathfinder 111 service, which was newly introduced in some parts of Wales in 2016 and is being rolled our across Wales incrementally, provides the basis for a more integrated model of future health care provision.
EMS and NHSDW services are commissioned by the Emergency Ambulance Services Committee (EASC) and the Chief Ambulance Services Commissioner (CASC) on behalf of the seven Local Health Boards in Wales. Ambulance commissioning in Wales is a collaborative process underpinned by a National Collaborative Quality and Delivery Framework. Similar arrangements are currently being developed for NEPTS services. Further information on the role of EASC can be found on their website.

For EMS, the Quality and Delivery framework outlines an innovative “five step” ambulance care pathway which focuses on the way in which  patients flow through the care system from helping patients choose the right service (step 1) through to taking very ill patients to hospital (step 5).

Our strategic ambition is to ‘shift left’ on the five step pathway, using the skills of our clinicians and an increasing range of alternate pathways to treat people closer to their homes, avoiding, in appropriate circumstances, the necessity to transfer people to hospital.

In 2015/16 the Trust launched a ground-breaking clinical response model as a one-year pilot. The aim of the pilot was to focus on treating those with life threatening conditions quickest. Other, less life threatening conditions are dealt with on the basis of a bespoke clinical response, which is based on their health needs.

The pilot was implemented in response to the McClelland review of Ambulance Services in Wales which recommended that the Welsh Government should consider moving away from the eight-minute response time target - introduced in 1974 - to a system which puts greater emphasis on patient outcome and experience. The pilot was independently evaluated and has now been formally adopted by the Trust. Other UK and worldwide ambulance services are looking at and learning from this model.
Working with the Trust, EASC has developed a set of comprehensive Ambulance Quality Indictors (AQIs) which measure the Trust’s performance against the triple aims of clinical outcome, patient experience and value for money.

Wales is a very geographically diverse area which encompasses remote rural locations, busy seaside resorts and large urban conurbations. The Trust has to ensure its services are flexible in order to meet the differing needs of each of the communities.

The Role of the Chair

The Chair will be accountable to the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Social Services for the performance of the Board and its effective governance, upholding the values of the NHS, and promoting the confidence of the public and partners throughout Wales.

The Chair of the Welsh Ambulance Service NHS Trust will:-

• Develop a Strategic Vision for the Ambulance Service of the future, identifying and realising the inherent potential and skills within the organisation to develop an innovative and world leading ambulance service;

• Work effectively with the commissioners’ of Ambulance Services specifically the Emergency Ambulance Services Committee (EASC), the Chair of EASC and the Chief Ambulance Services Commissioner (CASC) to develop emergency ambulance as clinical service embedded in the unscheduled care system.

• Provide strong, effective and visible leadership across the breadth of the Trust’s responsibilities, internally through the Board and externally through his/her connections with a wide range of stakeholders and partners at community, local authority, Local Health Board and national levels;

• Ensure the Board delivers effectively together the strategic and operational aims of the Trust through delivery of strategic aims, policy and governance;

• Be responsible for maintaining the highest quality of public health standards and practices, and improving quality and safety of healthcare;

• Be accountable for the performance of the Trust at community, local authority, Trust and national levels through the agreement of a three year integrated medium term plan (IMTP) and an annual delivery plan and the annual evaluation of achievements against the plan in public by the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Social Services;

• Hold the Chief Executive to account across the breadth of his/her responsibilities;

• Work effectively with partners, in particular with other Local Health Boards, Local Authorities, the Third Sector and Social Partners, and also with primary care contractors, to ensure the planning and delivery of safe, effective services;

• Provide the assurance and governance for the proper stewardship of public money and other resources for which the Board is accountable;

• Provide the assurance for ensuring that the Trust is governed effectively within the framework and standards set for the NHS in Wales;

• Undertake an external ambassador role, delivering in the public spotlight and instilling public confidence.

The Chair will demonstrate the following qualities:-

Knowledge and Experience

• Ability to develop the strategic vision for the ambulance service of the future;
• Ability to provide systems leadership and to work with EASC, Health Boards, Welsh Government, community groups, patients and other stakeholders to develop and drive forward that strategic vision;
• An understanding of health issues and priorities in the Welsh Ambulance Services NHS Trust and the ability to understand the role and work of the Board;
• Understanding of the commissioning context in Wales and the ability to work with the commissioners;
• Ability to hold the executives to account for performance whilst maintaining a constructive relationship;
• Ability to provide a knowledgeable, impartial and balanced perspective on a range of sensitive and complex issues;
• A broad understanding of governance issues and how governance applies to the corporate, clinical and information management.

Personal Attributes and Skills

• Ability to lead and inspire staff, to look ahead and identify key issues for the Trust;
• Strong interpersonal skills with personal impact and credibility to be an effective advocate and ambassador with strong influencing and negotiating skills;
• Drive and determination, with the ability to instil vision and develop defined strategies to pursue long and short-term goals;
• Excellent communication skills, with the ability to be clear and succinct, and to be able to engage with people at all levels;
• Ability to facilitate, understanding of complex issues while demonstrating respect for the views of others;
• Ability to ensure a board works together effectively through their active involvement in a robust and transparent decision making process;
• Ability to motivate and develop the board to define roles and responsibilities to ensure ownership and accountability;
• Sound judgement, sensitivity and political awareness;
• Capacity to be independent and resilient.

The Chair must also demonstrate:-

A clear understanding and commitment to equality.

Contacts:

For further information regarding the selection process, please contact:

The Corporate Shared Service Centre
Tel: 029 2082 5454
Email: sharedservicehelpdesk@wales.gsi.gov.uk

For further information or to arrange an informal discussion about the role of the Chair please contact Dr Andrew Goodall, NHS Wales Chief Executive, or Mick Giannasi the current Chair of the Welsh Ambulance Services NHS Trust

Tel: 029 2080 1182 (Dr Goodall) or 07557 549057 (Mick Giannasi).
Email: Andrew.Goodall@wales.gsi.gov.uk or mick.giannasi@wales.nhs.uk

For further information about the Welsh Ambulance Service (NHS) Trust, you may wish to visit the Trust’s internet web site: https://www.ambulance.wales.nhs.uk

For further information on the commissioning arrangements, you may wish to visit the Emergency Ambulance Services Committee website: http://www.wales.nhs.uk/easc/home

If you need any further assistance in applying for this role, please contact the Welsh Government’s Corporate Shared Service Centre Helpdesk on 029 2082 5454 or SharedServiceHelpdesk@wales.gsi.gov.uk

For further information about Public Appointments in Wales, please visit www.gov.wales/publicappointments

To apply for this role, click on the ‘Apply’ button below. The first time you apply for a post, you will need to complete a registration form for the Welsh Government’s online application system.  You will only need to register once, and you will be able to keep yourself updated on the progress of your application, and any other applications you make, via your registered account.

Once you’ve registered, you’ll be able to access the application form.  In addition to the application form you will need to submit a full, up to date CV and, in no more than two sides of A4, a description of  how your knowledge, skills and experience meet the criteria for the role as outlined in the Information for Candidates pack. The two documents should be uploaded to the ‘Reasons for applying’ section of the online application form.

In your application, you will also be asked to provide details of any activities which have helped you to develop skills that would be useful in a public appointment role, and list the organisations for which you undertook these activities.  We also need to know about any political activity that you’ve undertaken over the last 5 years. 

It is recommended that you register for an account and access the application form as soon as possible so that you see how the application form is structured, before starting to prepare your evidence.  You don’t have to complete the application form all in one go.  You can save your responses, and log in and out as required, until you’re ready to submit – just follow the guidance in the application form.

If you’d like to apply for this opportunity in Welsh, please use the ‘Newid Iaith / Change Language’ link at the top of this page to take you to the Welsh version of this advert, from which you can apply in Welsh.

If you need any further assistance in applying for this role, please contact the Welsh Government’s Corporate Shared Service Centre Helpdesk on 029 2082 5454 or SharedServiceHelpdesk@gov.wales

For further information about Public Appointments in Wales, please visit www.gov.wales/publicappointments