Case study – Mental Health Workforce Planning with Health Education and Improvement Wales
Introduction
The Strategic Mental Health Workforce Plan for Health and Social Care (SMHWFP), published in November 2022, represents a significant initiative to address mental health workforce challenges in Wales.
Launched by the Deputy Minister for Mental Health and wellbeing, the plan was developed and is being implemented by Health Education and Improvement Wales (HEIW) and Social Care Wales. The plan has 33 actions based on the 7 themes of the 10-year Workforce Strategy for health and social care with the fundamental principles of wellbeing, inclusion and the Welsh language woven through all of the actions. The plan aims to deliver an engaged, motivated and healthy mental health workforce with the capacity, competence and confidence to deliver excellent mental health services to the people of Wales.
The need
HEIW sought support with delivering critical workstreams in perinatal mental health, child and adolescent mental health services (CAMHS), and psychological therapies, all of which are core components of the SMHWFP.
Skills for Health were recognised as a trusted partner with expansive expertise, having delivered significant transformational programmes in Wales, and were approached by HEIW for collaboration.
The impact
Skills for Health co-designed a six workstream programme that defined key activities and outputs required within a three-month timeframe. Activities related to workforce planning, career pathways and embedding new roles in mental health services, as well as engagement activities.
The collaboration between Skills for Health and HEIW resulted in several high-quality deliverables that will have significant impact on mental health workforce planning in Wales
Key achievements include:
- Bespoke guidance documents: creation of tailored ‘how to’ guides to support workforce planning in a mental health context.
- Key stakeholder engagement: surveys and virtual workshops involving over 100 partners and stakeholders from the volunteer sector to gather insights and develop the workforce.
- Career pathway recommendations: detailed reports with key recommendations to enhance career pathways and embed new roles within the workforce.
Plus, a review of recovery college evidence base and recommended evaluation approaches for the national model and intelligence reports on the voluntary mental health workforce following engagement.
The project involved working at pace to achieve ambitious aims and high-quality outputs.
“We valued the partnership approach taken by Skills for Health, which resulted in a successful collaboration and high-quality resources that will support the delivery of this ambitious plan. The collaboration between Skills for Health and HEIW further exemplifies effective partnership and high-quality delivery in addressing mental health workforce challenges, setting a strong foundation for future phases of the SMHWFP.” – Anglie Olive, Deputy Director, Workforce & OD at HEIW.
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