Earlier this week, the Rayne Foundation published its Year 1 learning report for Better Careers for Better Care., a proactive funding programme focussed on workforce development within Social Care, and we’ve been reflecting on our own experience as part of the programme.
Leeds Health and Care Academy and Leeds City Council, working with partners across the city and with funding from the Rayne Foundation, have been leading a Leeds based project with a focus on developing the team around the person. Here’s a summary of what we have learned through our approach so far:
Building the team around the person – teams already come in all shapes and sizes, and better understanding about which people need to work together to support one individual (truly person-centred care) might make a fundamental difference to our definition of ‘team’. As we better understand the increasing complexity of people’s needs, teams need to have more flexible boundaries, bring together more diverse expertise, and focus more on relational skills.
Professional support and career development for staff in social care undoubtedly needs to be strengthened but it will not succeed in isolation. We must recognise the interdependencies with families and unpaid carers, community groups and local services, and staff in the NHS and wider health services. This provides opportunity as well as challenge – learning from other sectors, sharing resources in local areas, opening up wider opportunities and collaborating for greater impact.
Being part of a BCBC network over the last year has helped refine our understanding of shared challenges and opportunities – such as creating sustainable pathways to embed Nursing Associates within providers without established clinical supervision structures – while also recognising aspects that are highly context-dependent, including local approaches to supervision, backfill, and task delegation. These insights have directly informed our sector-wide communication and engagement strategy, while surfacing critical challenges around clinical supervision and backfill. In addition, Care City’s governance framework for the safe delegation of clinical tasks from District Nurses to Nursing Associates has been shared to guide place-based approaches and support future workforce development.
The opportunity to accelerate learning and make a real—and hopefully lasting—difference to our workforce support in Leeds has been fantastic. Whilst there is still a lot to do, it’s been great to pause and celebrate what has been achieved over the last year, including: the successful delivery of PEG-feeding training to 17 Care Workers, strengthening capability and patient safety; enhanced nurse-led training for 48 Care Workers on falls, sepsis, and pressure care, contributing to a reduction in GP visits within the Community Health and Wellbeing Service cohort compared to a matched group elsewhere in the city; the successful implementation of Community Health and Wellbeing Apprentices, working exclusively in the pilot area for the transformation model; the second cohort of Occupational Therapist Apprentices; and the Team Leeds Nurse Associate Apprenticeship cohort planned to start in February 2026.
It’s been an incredible year of progress and learning and along with the Rayne Foundation projects across the country, we’re really looking forward to year 2!
Kate O’Connell, Director of Leeds Health and Care Academy and Strategic Workforce
To keep in touch with us on this work, contact lhca@nhs.net