News

Who's doing it? Malcolm Philip.

Where? Sainsbury Centre for Mental Health. The charity works to improve quality of life for people with severe mental health problems. It carries out research, development and training to influence policy and practice.

Job description: To lead and manage new workforce initiatives for mental health staff, including national training programmes.

Skills/qualifications needed: Good understanding of mental health workforce-related policy. At least five years' experience as senior NHS manager, or equivalent.

What's good about the job? The pleasure is working with like-minded people determined to make services better for service users. My colleagues are dedicated, creative and enthusiastic people who aren't worn out with the pressures of service delivery. I am in an organisation that encourages people to think and challenges services to improve.

What's bad about the job? Hearing about underfunded statutory services, staff shortages, and poor management. The gap between service policy and service provision is a major concern. Hearing of poor experiences by service users and carers can drive our team on, but also get them down.

Pay: £60-70K.

What's the job like? A great opportunity to do real development work on the mental health workforce, without the distractions of numerous other responsibilities. There is a workforce crisis which needs radical solutions. My job is enabling our workforce development team to be creative in designing courses, helping practice change, and looking to instill lasting change in workforce skills, practice and attitudes. Our training is tailored to have maximum impact on service users. We are working to heavily involve service users in training. We are looking at how to disseminate our good practice.