Wider Healthcare Team
Career options: Corporate services
Staff in a variety of key areas deliver the core services on which the whole organisation depends. Some, such as health education officers and chaplains, have direct contact with patients and relatives but more often corporate staff work behind the scenes in areas such as finance, human resources or building design. Together they ensure the modern health service provides the kind of care the public expects today.
Roles in this area include:
Architects
As an architect in the NHS, you’ll be involved in designing new buildings and extensions to original buildings and also renovations. Your expertise will be particularly vital when working with the many listed buildings that form part of the NHS estate. This is an exciting time to be working in the NHS. An ambitious building programme is currently underway involving some major projects, funded through partnerships between the public and private sectors.
Chaplains
Chaplains offer spiritual care and emotional support to patients and staff. They usually work in hospital-based teams. Most are Anglicans, but chaplains are recruited from across the faith communities, according to the needs of local people.
Engineers
In this role, you will manage hospital maintenance programmes – for heating systems for example – and repair important machinery. Increased seniority would bring you the opportunity to design systems or move into estates or operations management.
Finance
Qualified and unqualified staff are employed in finance departments. At junior levels, you might handle invoices or run a payroll system. As a senior staff member, you could be involved in financial analysis, planning and reporting, management accounting and negotiations over funding.
Health education/health promotion officers
Health education officers are qualified professionals. In this position you’ll give advice and training on lifestyle and disease prevention to people in the community and to NHS staff. You might run weight-loss clinics and sessions on giving up smoking, for example.
Hospital play staff
You will be a key member of the team looking after children and young people in hospital. As a member of the hospital play staff you will use play and other activities such as art to help children cope with a hospital stay or undergo a medical procedure. You’ll also have close contact with families, helping to support them through a difficult time.
Human resources
The human resources department deals with everything relating to the employment of staff – from doctors and nurses to librarians and gardeners. You will be involved in recruitment, complaints and grievance procedures and in bringing in new local and national employment policies. An increasingly important part of your job would be to help employees benefit from the NHS’s work-life balance policies. You will work closely with health unions and professional bodies.
Librarians
Library staff provide an essential research and information service for doctors and other health professionals, and for health service managers. As a librarian, you will work increasingly with the internet and new technology to source reference material.
Nursery nurses
Provide care for children up to five years old. They work mainly with young patients, although some are employed in nurseries looking after children of NHS staff. Nursery assistants will work alongside and usually under the supervision of qualified nursery nurses.
Surveyors
As a surveyor, your skills will be important when working alongside architects in new building and renovations, in particular on large-scale projects where major capital expenditure is involved. Partnerships between the private sector and the NHS are encouraging some exciting new construction.
