Good practice - international staff at Lewisham and Greenwich NHS Trust

We aim to be exceptional in the quality of our patient care, our support for colleagues and in the difference we make through our partnerships and in our local communities.

To do this, we must have a supported workforce: a team of practitioners who are able, and willing, to provide care with respect and compassion.

Recruiting well-trained, committed, internationally educated AHPs provides us with a wealth of experience and diversity. Our approach is intended to ensure that we provide all of these recruits with the tools they need to adapt and thrive, so that our whole team can deliver highly efficient, highly effective care.

1: Recruitment

When it comes to AHPs, workforce challenges have been widely documented. The NHS long-term plan, for example, shows a clear requirement for additional AHPs. With this in mind, stronger support for AHPs who trained overseas became a key part of our Workforce Development Strategy here at Lewisham and Greenwich Trust (LGT).

Our first dedicated international recruitment campaign in 2022, was part of the pan-London response to workforce challenges. We combined our learnings from this with staff feedback and input from other Trusts, and made a lot of changes. We continue to consider all applications via the traditional method of recruitment from everyone interested in working with us.

2: Support and retention

We recognise that moving to a new country with a different culture and healthcare structure can be daunting and challenging. As humans, we need time to adapt.

To help, our approach treats each professional as an individual. We provide supervision and bespoke development plans and we emphasise the importance of identifying strengths and using them.  We also emphasise employees’ wellbeing, with wrap-around support given where possible.

Our approach also provides structures and frameworks that allow recruits to adapt to our ways of working. These are based on our vision and values as a Trust. They include:

• A robust preceptorship package. This is a 12-month period of structured support which combines face-to-face training with virtual learning. Recruits receive one-to-one support from their preceptor. The package is also multi-disciplinary, which allows for networking, and it includes sessions delivered by the HCPC. It was recently awarded Capital AHP Quality Mark.
• A ‘Welcome to UK Practice’ course. This was originally delivered in person, but has developed into an online course for efficiency and ease of access, even remotely. The course covers professional standards, reflective practice, autonomous practice, raising concerns, NHS structures and life in the UK
• An international colleagues’ network and several supportive staff networks. These include multicultural inclusion and women’s disability awareness. We also run a multicultural celebration event every year
• Profession-specific development programmes. These are run internally and provide development opportunities including clinical training
• Lifelong learning development opportunities across the four pillars of practice. We offer a range of these, from formal courses to masters degrees and apprenticeships
• A detailed wellbeing offering that includes sessions and workshop like regular wellbeing conversations with managers, events like pilates tasters, art competitions and gardening clubs, and access to psychological support (such as counselling) if required
• Evaluation and improvement. We continue to do this by gathering feedback and following the latest research around resilience in teams.
  
  

In developing our approach we became even more aware of the value of culturally-aware leadership. Our senior leadership team has affirmed that all cultures should be able to access our offerings; each divisional director is required to have an EDI portfolio and we also offer leadership training on multiculturalism, supported by our active EDI team.

To embed this from top to bottom, our vision and values are represented in all job descriptions.

The NHS has a proud history of welcoming internationally-educated staff with open arms, and at LGT we are no different. We love to welcome new international recruits and we continue to look forward to seeing our colleagues continue to flourish in supportive environments.

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