Report by Chanelle Peters, National School of Healthcare Science Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Committee Chair.
In this annual report, the NSHCS Equality, Diversity and Inclusion committee (ED&IC) would like to acknowledge and reflect on some of the initiatives undertaken to promote diversity and inclusion across all areas of our operations. This retrospective looks back over work conducted from late 2022 to late 2023.
Building on the priorities mentioned in my last report, in this period we have focused on the following areas.
Scientist Training Programme (STP) recruitment data
I am excited to announce the publication online of a detailed demographic view of our STP recruitment data. This is a symbol of our dedication to transparency as it provides substantially more detail and context to the data we publish about recruitment applicants.
This commitment will extend beyond this milestone as we are determined to replicate this process annually for every recruitment cycle, ensuring a continuous flow of valuable insights for our aspiring scientists.
Publication of recruitment data in this format provides a narrative that will take place with each successive recruitment cycle, showcasing our transparency, and hopefully contributing to the inclusive development of the STP.
Please visit our data via the website here: EDI data and statistics
Involved in this process: Rosanna Nolan, Caroline Thompson and Liz Plumb (Recruitment team), Yusra Ahmed (Research and Data Associate), Michelle Madeley (Web and Multi-media Editor).
I would also like to acknowledge the trainees, past and present who have continuously been holding us as a School accountable for this information and being patient with us whilst we try to deliver this work in the most valuable way.
Accessing support or escalating concerns for Trainees and Trainers
Collaboration with School colleagues was pivotal in developing an escalating concerns diagram and guidance for both trainees and trainers. This development was felt to be important as part of our work to foster a supportive and safe learning environment for trainees.
Involved in this process: Louise Ayers (Head of Programme Support), Katherine Bayley (Training Support Case Manager), Liz Plumb (Head of Accreditation), Jas Daine (Quality and Accreditation Manager), Jo Horne (STP Training Programme Director).
All of the colleagues involved have a first-hand input when it comes to supporting our trainees and trainers in need of additional support during their training. This shared knowledge helped to ensure consistency and understanding for all individuals involved.
The purpose of this resource is to clearly highlight roles and responsibilities during what can already be a pressurised situation. This resource can be found on our website here: Accessing support or escalating concerns and issues
Review of Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion interview question bank
As a School we introduced ED&I interview questions in 2020. Since then, the requirement has been to include at least 2 questions during internal interviews and an ED&I representative on the panel. This has been well received not only by School colleagues but also by applicants based on feedback.
In this reporting period, the ED&I committee felt it would be beneficial to review the bank of questions. This involved categorising and organising questions into distinct groups based on relevance, complexity, and applicability. Each question was carefully considered to ensure alignment with internal diversity and inclusion objectives. This bank of questions serves as a valuable resource internally, providing structured guidance for interviewers to probe candidates on their understanding and commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion principles. By streamlining the interview process with a well-organised question bank, our School can effectively evaluate School staff’s alignment with their values and foster a more inclusive workplace culture.
We intend to monitor the impact of these questions by obtaining feedback from recruitment panellists and managers.
ED&I planning day
In November 2023 deputy chair of the committee, Amrita Nanra, and I met for an ED&I planning day, with the intention to get our admin in order and ensure we were on track for the priorities we wanted to achieve for the year. The highlights that came from this meeting also included:
Terms of reference (TORs) review – The ED&I committee’s TORs aim is to ensure alignment with current organisational goals and best practices. By reviewing these terms, the committee can enhance its effectiveness in promoting equity and inclusivity within the workplace. We considered existing processes, areas of development and how to meet realistic expectations. After 3 years, these TORs were then updated and shared with existing committee members, that we intend to continue to share with new members when they consider joining so they understand what is expected of them.
Equality Impact Assessment (EIA) templates – As a committee we have always conducted EIAs as part of our remit, whereby we systematically evaluate the potential impact of policy and procedure holders’ decisions on various demographic groups. However, we lacked a formal document that records and summarises our comments for the manager. Therefore, we created a new template to provide a structured approach for consideration of the effects these changes may have on ‘factors’ such as race, age, gender, disability. Our committee cannot force decisions to be made based on our input, but we hope that by incorporating this assessment into the decision-making process, teams within the School can proactively address disparities and promote fairness in their policies and practices.
In addition to the above changes, we considered some initiatives and priorities we would like to work on and gain more knowledge around in the future as a School in the coming year and promote in my next annual report, such as:
- safeguarding training
- reasonable adjustment training
- interruption to training guidance
- trainee perspective podcasts
- menopause awareness
Representation
As the Equality, Diversity and Inclusion officer, I actively participate in various meetings to ensure representation and that ED&I considerations are integrated into organisational decision-making processes. These meetings include:
- case review meetings
- trainee support meetings
- fair access panels
- trainee collaborative meeting
- trainee management panels
- senior management meetings
All of these are internal meetings at the School that take place on a regular basis. Each of these have presented opportunities to advocate for equitable practices.
On a personal note, these opportunities have allowed me to have a first-hand insight into the School’s existing processes that we successfully conduct whilst also having an input into changes that may need to happen to continue to promote inclusivity. Feedback from trainees, trainers and School colleagues of my involvement has been overwhelmingly positive as they express the comfort of having an individual with my perspective present and dedicated to support all involved to ensure we can work towards a common goal and create a supportive environment.
Collaborations
ED&I Oversight Committee
This past year I had the opportunity to collaborate with this Committee, which is part of the Chief Scientific Officer’s (CSO) EDI Programme.
Chaired by EDI Clinical Fellow, Basit Abdul, the work focused on producing a strategy and framework to support the aim of tackling health inequalities with the idea to develop a toolkit for healthcare professionals to refer to. With the School involvement in the conduct and analysis of the 2020 healthcare science staff survey, evidence-driven EDI insights were able to be used to inform the CSO and Academy for Healthcare Science EDI programme 2023-24.
Clinical Data Science Programme
I also had the opportunity to work with School colleagues Stuart Sutherland (Head of Digital) and Andrea Chirvase (Project Manager) on the Clinical Data Science PG Certificate programme’s applications and outcomes data. In collaboration with the programme team at the University of Manchester, we wanted to understand the professional and demographic composition of applicants and additionally whether the particular healthcare professional and demographic groups became under or over-represented as they passed through the application pipeline. This work produced a series of concrete recommendations that were then shared and worked on with the team at Manchester to influence future promotion of and applications to the programme.
Insights
The School’s dedicated ED&I inbox england.nshcs.edi@nhs.net receives regular queries, requests for information and requests to promote resources on a regular basis. We find most of the attention is driven from our website, not only from service users but external bodies.
The website is a space intended to keep our trainees, stakeholders and service users up to date with our ED&I work and encourage all to make use of our resources available:
- Conscious Inclusion training
- e-Learning for Health resources
You can also familiarise yourself with our Schools ED&I committee and see the faces behind a lot of the hard work that takes place to push these initiatives forward. You can also see my annual summary reports for 2020/21 and 2021/2022.
I look forward to continuously working towards an equitable learning environment and keep you informed of progress in the future.