Workforce Matron

Job responsibilities

Management & Leadership Responsibilities

Provide strong, highly visible, accessible and approachable leadership acting as a clinical resource within areas of responsibility and ensuring the sustained delivery of high standards of all care and service standards.

Ensure Nursing and Midwifery Code of Professional Conduct is met by all staff.

Ensure all registered staff are registered with the NMC and that registration is maintained and periodically checked

Ensure the Trust policy for safe administration of medicines is adhered to.

Provide strong, clear leadership that creates a culture that empowers all staff to reach their full potential.

Ensure management of duty rotas/annual leave and study leave to ensure adequate midwifery cover and appropriate skill mix. Ensure KPIs around E-rostering are adhered to.

Lead on changes to workforce culture, performance that provide an excellent, responsible, cohesive and respectful team.

Be a role model for excellence in midwifery practice, applying best practice in motivating staff to drive improvements.

Provide leadership and accountability for the standards of care being delivered across defined clinical areas, instigating remedial action with the assistance from the practice education team to improve practice as necessary.

To work as a cohesive senior midwifery team. Providing cover for buddy Matrons and acting up in absence of the Head of Midwifery when asked.

Be responsible for holding regular team meetings with areas of responsibility and chair any forums as required.

Exercise leadership within the maternity unit to manage provision of effective care to mothers and babies to safeguard their well-being and interests and take appropriate action when safety of care cannot be provided.

Lead administrative and support services that enable staff to deliver high standards of care.

To undertake line management responsibility for Band 7s in the areas of responsibility.

Work with support services to ensure that standards of cleanliness and safety are met in all clinical areas. Actively intervene when standards fall short of those expected.

To act as Divisional representative on Trust wide or external groups when requested by the Deputy Director of Midwifery/ Head of Midwifery.

Clinical/Professional

To work collaboratively with the Deputy Director of Midwifery and Head of Midwifery to lead the operational management of the service ensuring:

Safe staffing levels

Effective patient flow

The effective and efficient process of the elective workload

That KPI and targets are met

Proactively support the quality agenda including the experience of women and their families. Support the development of innovative models of women centred care that are safe, flexible and enhance the maternity care experience.

Use appropriate strategies to support midwives to maximise their potential in practice, and proactively supporting the Professional Midwifery Advocate Team to assist, support and provide restorative clinical supervision to midwives.

Be involved in continuous monitoring and maintaining quality standards of clinical practice through a variety of ways for QCI, Quest, Ward Assessment and Accreditation.

Support midwives and Obstetricians to work in partnership with women to develop plans of personalised care which meet their individual needs, to listen to them and to advocate for them as required.

Maintain own expert clinical knowledge and skills by all appropriate means. Work one day a month back to the floor within areas of responsibility.

As a registered midwife, the post holder is professionally accountable for their practice and must adhere to the NMC Code of Conduct.

Play a key operational role in maintaining clinical flow service wide.

Assist midwives to develop their professional and career development choices. Contribute to talent management processes.

To facilitate, support and empower ward and department managers to manage their areas effectively, develop the individual, their teams, staff and their services.

Ensure that areas of responsibility are adequately resourced in terms of staff, equipment and that all staff are adequately trained to undertake their roles effectively and efficiently etc.

Collaborate effectively with Consultants and senior midwifery colleagues to ensure team members have the requisite skills and knowledge to provide safe, effective care, identifying any concerns and liaising with key stakeholders to address these issues.

Contribute to the development of an environment that enables quality education and learning through strong links with key education providers. Form strong relationships with then Practice Development Team and Professional Midwifery Advocate Team.

Participate in the Annual appraisal process of direct reports, ensuring each has a personal development plan aligned to the delivery of Trust objectives, and that they have a personal development plan that reflects their educational and development needs to fulfil their role and enable career progression.

Be vigilant of the statutory provision of the Childrens Act 1989 and play a key role in Child Protection issues within the service liaising with appropriate internal and external agencies and report and act on any child protection or safeguarding issues.

Report any child protection issues to the Named Midwife for Safeguarding.

Assist with the development of training needs analysis and training plans within the service.

To promote and implement research/evidence-based practice and audit clinical outcomes to inform and lead clinical practice and set clinical standards

Encourage staff to participate in the development, research and evaluation of new ideas and methods within the Division to ensure the implementation of best practice standards in all clinical areas.

To identify own training and development needs and work with line manager to develop skills and knowledge.

Be responsible for the promotion of evidence-based midwifery practice.

To work with Band 7s to support and empower them to make effective decisions, identify deficits and to develop programmes to address those issues.

Ensure the effective deployment of staff within the Directorate to meet service demands.

Work closely with the Band 7s to ensure safe and economic deployment of staff across all areas.

Advise the Deputy Director of Midwifery/ Head of Midwifery of deficiencies in staffing establishment and skill mix. Contribute to the formal monitoring of staffing levels.

Ensure that the daily workload is assessed frequently using appropriate tools. Oversee the prioritisation and allocation of staff to provide adequate staff/client ratio and encourage high standards care and their babies for women.

Participate, support and advise in all areas of the recruitment and retention of staff including job sharing, flexible working and other personnel practices in keeping with Trust policy that ensures that service needs are met.

Work collaboratively with the staff in other clinical areas, ensuring the provision of joint responsibility and support, to include (where possible) the promotion of joint handovers and sharing and supporting of workloads.

Clinical Governance/Quality Improvement/Clinical Effectiveness

Use expert knowledge and support the Deputy Director of Midwifery, Head of Midwifery and Consultant Midwife in implementing and monitoring the standards of clinical midwifery practice ensuring that there are robust clinical governance assurance systems in relation to midwifery.

Proactively support in sharing of good practice and lessons to be learnt through governance processes with the aim of reducing the incidence of avoidable harm, obstetric litigation cases and complaints.

Escalate any safety concerns/trends/themes becoming evident in the maternity service immediately.

Actively contribute on any quality improvement and safety initiatives and/or projects related to midwifery practice within areas of responsibility.

Ensure compliance with all Trust policies and reporting requirements, including, but not limited to, through regular quality and performance reviews that whilst being fair and equitable, empower individuals to develop further, to maintain professional standards as per Trust and NMC requirements and meet workforce standards.

Identify and coordinate opportunities for service user involvement and engagement in service development. Proactively manage all facets of consumer experience and provide a team environment that is a respectful, kind and willing to learn from womens experiences.

To play an active role within local Maternity Transformational plans for Better Births.

In conjunction with the Midwifery Governance team identify risks and take action to minimise or eliminate them. Participate in the collation of Incident forms and take part in the investigation and review process with the implementation of change in practice indicated by the findings.

Participate in the planning, benchmarking implementing, monitoring and evaluation of standards of care to reflect national standards.

To participate and promote multidisciplinary clinical audit and implement relevant findings which may improve the quality of care and in line with National standard recommendations.

Assist with planning, implementing and managing change in work methods and practice that will improve the standard of care for women.

To develop, update, implement and monitor clinical policies, guidelines and protocols within area of responsibilities.

Support the development of a learning and reflection culture that promotes professional development and lifelong learning. Staff and students will be empowered to share experiences and learn from one another and share best practice.

Education, training & qualifications

Essential

• Registered Midwife.
• Educated to MSc level or equivalent.
• Evidence of continuing professional development.
• Qualified and current sign off mentor.
• Evidence of the completion of formal leadership training.

Desirable

• Coaching qualification.

Knowledge & Experience

Essential

• Experienced in all areas of midwifery practice, with broad knowledge of midwifery practice.
• Highly developed specialist knowledge of underpinned by theory and an appreciation of strategic issues affecting health and health care provision: NHS & social care agenda, Professional, patient care, experience agenda, National & local maternity agenda, Maternity Transformation.
• Experience of a leadership role at a Band 7.
• Detailed and thorough knowledge of NMC Code.
• Knowledge and application of Clinical Governance and quality systems, clinical audit, performance management, HR procedures, complaints resolution.
• Experience of implementing and monitoring measurable improvement plans.

Desirable

• Has held a senior Matron level leadership post previously.
• Experience of working in all areas of midwifery at a senior level.
• Experience of chairing meetings.
• Knowledge and application of management and leadership theories and change management theories.

Skills

Essential

• Excellent interpersonal skills. Able to facilitate reflective practice. Able to chair, co-ordinate and facilitate meetings.
• Able to adopt appropriate communication style according to audience.
• Clearly demonstrates the Trust values in all interactions.
• Ability to work across professional teams and organisational boundaries.
• Proven ability to support ward and team leaders in maintaining an environment conducive to the delivery of excellent care.
• Ability and willingness to have difficult conversations. Possession of negotiation skills.
• Appreciate issues of confidentiality and demonstrate appropriateness in dealing with sensitive personal, patient and corporate information.
• Ability to synthesise complex facts or situations requiring analysis, formulating and monitoring delivery plans.
• Ability to monitor the quality of work in others, to identify their learning and development needs, devising strategies to resolve.
• Evidence of adopting proactive solution- focussed approaches to complex issues and situations.
• Experience of audit and other benchmarking strategies, using the results to implement change and improvement.
• Plan and organise across a broad range of complex activities, formulating and adjusting plans as required.
• Understands and is able to deliver safe effective women-centred care within the resources available, raising and escalating concerns as appropriate.
• Experience of prioritising and managing and delivering multiple projects to deadline.
• Able to take responsibility for policy implementation and service development and redesign.
• Evidence of initiating and implementing change processes, Proven track record of excellent ability to co-ordinate the work of the multidisciplinary team and lead on any actions required.
• Ability to work in a complex environment and cope with competing priorities.
• Experience of working autonomously in planning and organising own diary.
• Proven ability to maintaining an environment conducive to the delivery of excellence in care in safeguarding vulnerable people.
• Models excellent clinical skills and has the ability to implement these in practice.
• Demonstrates contemporary, evidenced based knowledge of current clinical and professional issues.
• Able to take accountability for service delivery within a context of safe patient care.
• Ability to assess care needs, develop and implement programmes of care.
• Ability to deal with and work in unpleasant situations such as exposure to bodily fluids.
• Demonstrable IT skills e.g. Power-point, Prezi, Excel.
• Knowledge and application of Maternity IT systems.
• Awareness of the Data Protection Act and Freedom of Information Act.

Desirable

• Writing for publication.
• Presentation skills.
• Research appraisal skills.
• Skills in Board Level report writing.

Key Comptencies, Personal Qualities & Attributes

Essential

• Self-motivating self-starter with the ability to motivate.
• Always take opportunities to improve, encouraging excellence.
• Demonstrates compassionate leadership.
• Honesty and integrity.
• Flexibility.
• Commitment to support personalised safe women-centered care.
• Physically fit to carry out the clinical aspects of the midwifery role.
• Ability to move and handle patients and inanimate loads using appropriate equipment in accordance with Trust Policy.
• Ability to stand and sit for long periods of time and able to undertake all midwifery duties.
• Demonstrable ability to cope professionally with distressing situations and challenging behaviours.
• Demonstrable ability of being able to respond to emergencies.
• Demonstrable ability to work professionally and managerially under pressure.
• Demonstrable ability to concentrate and maintain high degree of accuracy.
• Proven ability to emotionally support other staff and self-reflect on interpersonal style.

Disclosure and Barring Service Check

This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act (Exceptions Order) 1975 and as such it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service (formerly known as CRB) to check for any previous criminal convictions.

Certificate of Sponsorship

Applications from job seekers who require current Skilled worker sponsorship to work in the UK are welcome and will be considered alongside all other applications. For further information visit the UK Visas and Immigration website (Opens in a new tab).

From 6 April 2017, skilled worker applicants, applying for entry clearance into the UK, have had to present a criminal record certificate from each country they have resided continuously or cumulatively for 12 months or more in the past 10 years. Adult dependants (over 18 years old) are also subject to this requirement. Guidance can be found here Criminal records checks for overseas applicants (Opens in a new tab).