Case study

NHS Employers / NHS Confederation

Age Positive Employer Champion

NHS Employers is the Employers’ Organisation for the National Health Service. We represent, support and negotiate on behalf of employers in the NHS. We provide guidance on a wide range of workforce matters including age diversity and act as an independent voice for the largest employer in Europe. NHS Employers is a part of the NHS Confederation working on behalf of the NHS.

We are committed to retaining and attracting talented people of all ages and there is ample evidence that by improving working practices this will enable us to compete effectively in a changing labour market.

Carole Smith, Age Diversity in the Workforce programme manager, NHS Employers

OUR AGE POSITIVE GOOD PRACTICE:

We recognise, both for ourselves as a relatively new organisation and for the NHS which is comprised of many organisations large and small, that there needs to be a strategic organisational response to demographic change as well as a personal response to stamping out ageism in our workplaces. Our examples relate to our internal practices as well as the innovative approaches we are seeking to bring to the NHS as a whole.

Guidance, support materials and ‘good practice’ information

All our material developed for the NHS is tested internally first and incorporated into our age diversity strategy and HR plan. These include: Briefing Notes on Developing a Strategic Approach to Age Diversity; draft Regulations and what employers need to do now; Age profiling Your Organisation.

These are sent to every Chief Executive and HR Director of NHS organisations and are also accessible to employees and the general public on our website. The Age Profiling material also has downloadable interactive components.

Feedback has been really positive: “These are excellent”, “Really helpful and enable us to get on with the job in hand”.

Preparing for Age Legislation Checklist

This has been used internally as a framework for our action plan and to initiate Board level discussion. This is being used widely around the NHS by Equality and Diversity and HR staff to shape their work programmes.

We have very positive feedback. A hospital chaplain commented “Thank you so much. I feel I understand what we are trying to do now and this will help me to ask intelligent questions at the Board meeting tomorrow.”

Age Diversity Awareness Training materials: 'The Age Agenda – What everyone needs to know'

This power point presentation is available on our website along with speaker notes. It can be tailored by NHS organisations to include information on progress with preparing for age legislation. It was tested internally first and is now being used widely by the NHS.

Evidence Based Practice

NHS Employers actively supports research which can provide evidence on what and how we can improve employment practice in relation to age diversity. Some studies are being carried out domestically and we have been instrumental in finding pilot sites. Our work has also facilitated connections across other countries. Regular updates on findings are published on our website.

In sharing this information with other European countries, along with information about the age diversity resources we provide, the NHS Employers’ approach has been described as “impressive”.

Forthcoming materials

These include an interactive tool for managers and staff called 'Returning to Work, Working Longer, Working Healthier in the NHS' and materials to support Extended Working.

Communications Strategy

NHS Employers ensures that it is able to promote Age Diverse practices through a comprehensive communications strategy. This included a high profile launch at our national conference HR in the NHS in 2005 and media briefings. We also make regular visits to strategic networks around the country, speak at a wide range of conferences and appear in national and trade media.

How we are working to improve recruitment processes in line with age legislation across the NHS

NHS Employers hosts and manages the e-recruitment service NHS Jobs. In dialogue with colleagues in the recruitment and retention team we are advising on a modification of the application process to a) comply with forthcoming age legislation and b) to enhance the process by promoting the use of competences during selection rather than using career history and length of experience. These changes will require the commission of changes to the software and will be in place ahead of 1st October. There will also be presentations to representatives of strategic health communities to seek commitment for the changes. We anticipate that organisations will, in time, amend their paper based systems to mirror the e-recruitment forms.

Impact on NHS careers by developing age neutral careers guidance for the NHS

This is another example of how we are working internally for the benefit of NHS organisations. Every careers leaflet is being updated and improved during 2006. Following a proactive approach to the NHS Careers project manager we are reviewing every document to ensure that our information, images and messages are age neutral. In addition we are holding workshops for all staff at NHS Careers offices in Bristol to brief them on the implications of the forthcoming age legislation.

More information

Website for NHS Employers - age equality and diversity

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AGE DIVERSITY AND FLEXIBILITY IN THE NHS

If your organisation has stopped setting age limits when advertising for staff and no longer forces people to retire as soon as they reach 65, you may think that you've got the whole age issue sorted. If so, you need to think again. That is no more than a first step, according to Carole Smith, who leads the work that NHS Employers is doing on age diversity.

"The next step is to make sure we genuinely change attitudes, and that's the hardest bit," she says. "People may put the practical things – the bare bones – in place, but it takes longer to reshape attitudes and it would be unrealistic to assume that everybody will change these by the time the legislation comes into force in October."

As the employers' organisation for the health service in England, NHS Employers can do a certain amount to challenge existing attitudes, but in an increasingly decentralised NHS it is up to individual organisations to decide how they are going to deal with age issues. What Smith can do is encourage them to adopt a strategic approach that will enable them to make the most of their workforce in the years ahead.

"We know that in 25 years' time, half of our population will be over 50," she says. "So as you walk along the street, every other person that you see will be at least 50, and in any work team half the people will be 50-plus."

The effects of demographic change are already visible in the age profile of the NHS workforce. Out of more than 1.1 million non-medical staff (a group that includes all nurses) around a quarter are currently aged 50 or over. And as the birth rate continues to fall, NHS organisations, like other employers, will no longer be able to rely on school leavers and young graduates as their main source of recruitment.

The Age Diversity in the Workforce programme that Smith manages seeks to help NHS organisations address such issues. Carole Smith knows many of the chief executives and senior HR people in the NHS who are in a position to turn the rhetoric on age diversity into reality. What, then, would she advise these movers and shakers to do before the age legislation comes in?

"The first thing I'd expect is a board-level discussion of the implications both of the legislation and of demographic change," she says. Employers should also decide early on if they are going to have a fixed retirement age (the government's planned default retirement age is 65), in which case they will need a process for considering requests from employees who want to work longer.

Organisations that decide to scrap their retirement age will have to make sure employees understand that they have the right to keep on working and that it's up to them to let their employer know when they do want to retire.

Smith says she would also expect senior managers and HR teams to work with trade unions on developing an age strategy. Any strategy would need to cover recruitment and selection processes, although it wouldn't be enough simply to drop age requirements from job advertisements and other recruitment materials. Employers that ask for minimum levels of experience, for example, rather than for the skills and know-how needed to do a job, could stand accused of indirectly discriminating against younger people. Those who won't hire older people for jobs that require training could also find themselves on the wrong side of the new law.

"Individuals are often very happy to take on a new role later in life that requires some training, so organisations need to look at what their arrangements are for training and development to make sure they are not being ageist," says Smith.

NHS Employers is identifying and spreading good practice and providing NHS organisations with tools to profile the age of their workforce and measure progress in relation to age issues. It is also sponsoring research into how NHS organisations can hold on to existing employees for longer. This includes looking at ways of helping people with chronic medical conditions to work safely and comfortably, rather than having to take early or ill-health retirement.

With many health-service jobs involving heavy physical work, one way of improving retention would be to give older workers the chance to move into new roles. The NHS pension scheme, currently under review, already gives staff the option of switching to part-time work or stepping down to less demanding roles without harming their pension entitlement.

But Smith argues that the idea of flexibility could be taken even further. A paramedic who no longer felt up to pulling survivors of road traffic accidents out of vehicles might, for example, want to move out of the ambulance service and into a hospital accident and emergency department. Similarly, a nurse working with patients with long-term conditions might prefer to work with different patient groups in the same or a neighbouring organisation.

"If we can bring down the walls around the employment of people in different organisations or in different parts of the same organisation, that could be quite helpful," says Smith.

But are senior managers in NHS organisations ready to go that far? "The honest answer is maybe not yet," she replies. "What I would say is that if they are being more thoughtful about deploying people of different ages in different ways, that will actually save money in the long run and prevent the loss of valuable skills."

(source: People Management)

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