Band 7 Employee Relations Specialist - Case Investigator

Our trust has over 17,000 staff serving 2 million patients every year. It comprises Barnet Hospital, Chase Farm Hospital, the Royal Free Hospital, North Middlesex University Hospital and more than 30 services in the community. This larger scale organisation provides an unprecedented opportunity for us to continue our pioneering work, particularly in finding ways to deliver even better care to our patients.

Our mission is to deliver world class care and expertise in our clinical services, underpinned by world class teaching and research and we will continue to measure our progress against our five governing objectives: excellent outcomes, excellent patient and staff experience, excellent value for taxpayers’ money, being safe and meeting our external duties, and building a strong organisation.

Everyone is welcome at Royal Free London NHS Foundation Trust. We're proud of our diversity and we continue to undertake new initiatives to advance equality for LGBT+, BME, gender equality, staff carers and people with disabilities and lived experiences to promote good relations and understanding between our staff.

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Job overview

It is to establish facts as guided by terms of reference for investigation not to apportion blame or liability.

This role will seek to improve investigation practice and standards across the wider RFL group through its own practice and delivery of training and continuous improvement.

The key responsibility of the post holder is to deliver (and to support others to deliver) expert investigations, ensuring full potential is harnessed to inform learning, a just and learning culture and patient safety improvement.

Please see attached job description for more information about this role and working at Royal Free London NHS Foundation Trust.

Main duties of the job

This investigatory role will provide a pivotal first-class investigatory service across the Trust, conducting investigations as directed by the Deputy / Head of Employee Relations, framing terms of reference, and engaging with divisional management teams.

In your specialist investigatory role you will be a member of the Employee Relations Team, and play a key role in supporting the review and development of policies, procedures, tools, training, quality assurance and quality improvement systems

You will be working with highly complex, sensitive, and emotive information requiring analysis and interpretation to inform sound decision making by case managers.

You will be experienced and adept at working with all parties who have been involved in, and affected by, cases where investigation is deemed necessary and dealing with emotive and sensitive information which may also be contentious in nature.

Working to agreed deadlines ensuring that Trust policy and best practice is adhered to, you must be able to organise and plan in a flexible approach and managing workloads to ensure all investigations are completed in a timely manner ensuring that they are comprehensive, accurate and relevant.

This includes scheduling of meetings, attending hearings, preparing case papers, providing advice on cases and procedures where appropriate, and taking minutes of meetings if required and providing highly coherent written reports to be presented at hearings.

Working for our organisation

The Royal Free London NHS Foundation Trust is one of the UK’s biggest and most innovative trusts. Across three main hospitals, our dedicated army of staff care for over 1.6million patients, treat more than 200,000 in A&E, deliver over 8,000 babies and carry out more than 17million tests.

Our size, scale and influence offer you unrivalled career opportunities and a forward-thinking approach to working that works around your lifestyle. From flexible hours and generous benefits, to next level training, we make it easier to take your career to the top For more information please follow link https://www.royalfreelondonjobs.co.uk/

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

Please see attached job description for more information about this role and working at Royal Free London NHS Foundation Trust.

Person specification

Royal Free World Class Values

• Demonstrable ability to meet the Trust Values

Education & professional Qualifications

• Educated to a degree level or equivalent
• Extensive knowledge of specialist area, acquired through post graduate diploma or equivalent experience or investigator training plus further specialist knowledge or experience to postgraduate’s level equivalent
• Evidence of continuing professional development

• Educated to masters level or equivalent level of experience of working at a senior level
• CIPD

Experience

• Investigation experience in a complex, multi-disciplinary and culturally diverse organization
• Experience of operating effectively in a customer facing environment
• Up to date knowledge of employment legislation and understanding of the risks of non-compliance
• Experience and knowledge on HR policies and procedures and best practice and how to apply them
• Experience of judging or reviewing against a standard

• Experience and knowledge on Agenda for Change and Medical & Dental Terms and Conditions of Employment
• Experience of working in a multi-unionized environment
• Experience of preparing Employment Tribunal information

Skills and aptitudes

• Able to plan and organize the work themselves and others to ensure the achievements of targets and outcomes
• Ability to work to tight deadlines
• Developed questioning skills
• Works within own limits of competence and understands sources of potential support and expertise and how to access this (e.g. medical, financial)
• Ability to seek out and reference relevant standards (e.g. NICE, NMC, GMC) eek out and reference relevant standards (e.g. NICE, NMC, GMC)
• High level of interpersonal and communication skills, including the ability to interview witnesses who may be vulnerable
• Ability to interpret relevant guidance documentation and standards
• Ability to judge relevance of information collected during investigation
• Ability to give weight to (prioritise importance of) relevant evidence gathered
• Ability to judge credibility of witnesses
• Ability to ensure safeguards are in place to avoid breached of confidentiality
• Ability to structure and write a comprehensive report which answers the questions in the terms of reference
• Able to analyse complex information and identify appropriate recommendations
• Well developed influencing and negotiation skills
• Basic IT skills

Personal Qualities & attributes

• A strong customer focus
• Resilient and objective in challenging situations
• High levels of personal influence
• Interested on continuous professional development for the role
• Covid-19 Vaccination

• AT* - Apprenticeship Training. Where AT* is entered next to the job title indicates that this vacancy is for an apprenticeship role.
• By applying for this role, you accept if successful, that your personal data may be transferred from the Trust to another NHS organisation where your employment transfers within the NHS. This is in accordance with the streamlining programme which aims at saving you time and improving efficiencies within the NHS when your employment transfers. Therefore we require you to complete your stat and Man e-learning modules prior to joining our organisation.
• If you are an EU/EEA citizen who does not have EU Settlement or Pre-Settled status, you will require a visa to work in the UK.
• Applications from job seekers who require sponsorship to work in the UK are welcome and will be considered alongside all other applications. Before submitting your application and to avoid disappointment please check that you are eligible under the UKVI points based system.
• If you are offered a role with one of the NLPSS partner trusts, as part of pre-employment checks your identity and right to work documentation will be verified remotely (in most circumstances), using a certified identity verification service provider TrustID. You will be asked to capture an image of the relevant documents as well as a “selfie” using your smartphone/tablet (if available) for facial matching. TrustID will also perform a digital address check using Trunarrative and Equifax, which is a soft check and does not leave a footprint on your credit rating. For more information, visit www.trustid.co.uk
• The Trust uses electronic new starter forms on Trac to collect personal details. Information collected is securely stored and used to set up the employee record on the ESR HR system.
• The Trust will request a DBS (CRB) if post involves regulated activities. The Trust is compliant with the Disclosure and Barring Service Codes of practice and the Rehabilitation of offenders act.
• By applying for this post you are agreeing to Royal Free London NHS Foundation Trust transferring the information contained in this application to its preferred applicant management system. If you are offered a job, information will also be transferred into the national NHS Electronic Staff Records system.
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