Medical & Healthcare Jobs in Northern Ireland

Head of Occupational Health Nursing

Hours of Work: Full-Time 

Location: Carrickfergus

Closing Date / Time: 08/10/2021 3:00pm

Reference Number: HROHN3321

Job Background: 

The Head of Occupational Health Nursing is a member of the Occupational Health and Wellbeing Senior Management Team, with responsibility for leading and developing Occupational Health Nursing service delivery within a large multidisciplinary team of professionals. This role involves providing advice to the Chief Constable, police officers and police staff on Occupational Health and Wellbeing.

The primary purpose of the role is to work with internal and external stakeholders in order to develop and manage an Occupational Health Nursing team with the appropriate skill mix required to meet organisational demand. The role holder will also have lead responsibility for developing Occupational Health nursing policy, practice, clinical audit, and the provision of Occupational Health nursing consultancy advice. 

Hours of Work: Monday – Friday 37 hours per week (42 hours gross) 

Flexible working patterns may also be considered. 

Salary: £49,806 - £54,588 (grade/banding and salary under review)

Main Activities: 

The main duties and responsibilities associated with the role include the following:

Develop Professional Nursing Policy, Practice and Clinical Audit

• Perform clinical audits of nursing activities against defined protocols to ensure a quality OHW service is provided throughout the organisation. 
• Develop standard operating procedures, policy and practice in response to clinical audits as part of OHW’s commitment to continuous improvement.
• Develop policies and procedures for OHW practice and consultancy throughout the organisation. 
• Contribute to achieving overarching organisational health and wellbeing objectives, for example, supporting health improvement and protection activities alongside attendance management initiatives.
• Engage with key partners to drive effective utilisation and marketing of OHW services throughout the organisation.

Management and Development

• Provide leadership, development and supervision for the OH Nursing Team.
• Support multi-disciplinary team practitioner development.
• Manage Occupational Health Nursing team service delivery to meet business objectives. 
• Mentor Specialist OHW nurses to supervise and assess specialist OH student nurses, OH Technicians and OH Practice Nurses in their day-to-day roles, providing advice and support as required.
• Manage the performance of the OHW nursing team in line with organisational performance management systems. 
• Monitor individual workloads throughout the team to ensure equal distribution of work and best use of resources. 
• Provide OHW nursing team job plans linked to the operational resource planner and operational capacity.
• Mentor specialist OHW nurses to supervise and assess the learning and development needs of nursing team members. 
• Provide business cases to secure budgetary resource to support the development of staff linked to industry standards reflecting business need.
• Develop OHW organisational awareness sessions.
• Deliver OHW subject matter in collaboration with Police College, Health & Safety, Human Resource, District and specialist policing colleagues.  

Clinical Work

• Provide clinical supervision for the OH nursing team.
• Participate in clinical work in relation to an agreed job plan reflecting the operational management / practice weighting for the role; (practice such as fitness for work assessments, more complex clinical case management, health screening and immunisation will usually be undertaken to support, assess and supervise and develop direct or indirect reports, and to undertake audit of practice).
• Contribute to developing and promoting in person, digital or virtual wellbeing initiatives throughout the organisation.  

Liaising with Others 

• Represent OHW SMT in internal and external meetings project groups.
• Liaise with Human Resources Department and line managers to provide OHW consultancy and advice. 
• Liaise with Health and Safety Branch and the Health and Safety Executive to ensure organisational compliance with statutory health and safety obligations. 
• Engage with organisational to stakeholders develop health surveillance programmes targeting health improvement and harm reduction. 
• Liaise with external health agencies, for example, Action Cancer, Health Promotion Agency to obtain advice and information on relevant health initiatives.  
• Work across organisational boundaries to understand a variety of stakeholder (internal and external) perspectives and establish associated networks, for example National Police Chiefs’ Council, Public Health Authority, Department of Health, Occupational Health Nurse Advisers to the Police Service. 

Personal development and accountability

• Continue Professional Development in order to keep up-to-date with clinical development and advances in nursing to support clinical practice.
• Work independently with minimum supervision, as well as in the context of a team.
• Keep accurate and complete records consistent with professional guidelines, ethics, policies and procedures. 
• Develop tender specifications and participate in tender evaluation panels for the procurement of OHW services.
• Participate in Internal and External audit complying with business process
• Carry out evidence based research and integrate best practice and findings into OHW practice. 
• Conduct environmental scanning to identify relevant changes in legislation and subsequent impact on OH practice.   

The main duties and responsibilities reflect the main elements of those associated with this position. It is not intended to be exclusive or exhaustive.

Person Specification

Essential Qualifications

• Registered Nurse NMC Part 1, with additional specialist qualification in Occupational Health Nursing, i.e. post basic qualification Diploma, Degree or MSc (Occupational Health Nursing)

AND

• Currently registered on the 3rd part of the NMC Register as an Occupational Health Nurse.
• Certificate in Occupational Health management or be willing to undertake and successfully complete this within the first year of accepting this position. 

Essential Skills and Experience

• 2 years post-basic general nursing experience with an additional minimum of 5 years working within an occupational health setting.
• Experience of working as a senior member of a multi-disciplinary health and wellbeing team in managing clinicians, systems, processes and finance.
• Proven skills in developing audit frameworks and carrying out clinical audits. 
• Proven line management skills in recruiting Occupational Health practitioners, allocating resources and leading a team of nursing professionals.
• Experience of collaborating with relevant stakeholders to devise and manage safe systems of work for OHW nursing service delivery.
• Experience of liaising with HR professionals and line management in relation to fitness for work and the provision of occupational health nursing advice.
• Experience of collaborating with local and national level stakeholders to support professional development in occupational health nursing.

Professional Development and Accountability:

The Head of Occupational Health Nursing is accountable to the NMC. The role holder must observe the NMC Code and personally participate in the NMC revalidation process in addition to supporting others to do so.

At interview, candidates must provide evidence of mandatory basic and specialist courses, a managed portfolio with adequate preparation to satisfy confirmation within timescale for the registrants’ NMC revalidation. Thereafter, the same standard will apply in service.

This information will also be used to validate the knowledge training, experience, key competences and values required for the post. At interview, candidates must also provide evidence of personal insurance indemnity arrangements in addition to those provided by the Police Service of Northern Ireland.

Essential Other

• Applicants must have a valid driving licence and a car available for official business use, or access to a form of personal transport that will enable you to meet the requirements of the post in full. 
• IT literate specifically in the use of the Microsoft Office suite (including MS Word, MS PowerPoint, MS Excel and MS Outlook).

Selection Methodology

Your evidence of both mandatory basic and specialist courses and a managed portfolio with adequate preparation to satisfy confirmation within timescale for the registrants’ NMC revalidation.

Competency and Values Based Assessment

Values

• Integrity
• Transparency
• Public Service

Competencies - Level 3

• We take ownership
• We take analyse critically
• We are collaborative

For further information and to apply, please click APPLY FOR THIS JOB