On 18 July 2024, Arden & GEM hosted a networking and development session for NHS Trusts and provider collaboratives to discuss opportunities, share best practice and learn from each other to tackle finance and productivity challenges.
The session covered how finance and productivity challenges are being tackled through spreading best practice and reducing variation, and how commercial frameworks and supply chain savings can be driven with the NHS.
The event was chaired by Jason Bloomfield, Customer Account Director at Arden & GEM, who was joined by:
- Alison Tonge, Executive Director of Strategy, Planning and Innovation at Arden & GEM, who provided an overarching lens of the benefits of connected planning across healthcare providers.
- Terry Huff, Productivity Lead at Arden & GEM facilitated a group session on the challenges for better resource management and driving-out efficiencies.
- Ben Roberts, Associate Director of Finance at West Yorkshire Association of Acute Trusts, who discussed his experiences in harnessing efficiencies through provider collaboratives for the improvement of their procurement contracts. Succeeding in consolidating contracts as a collaborative.
- Kim Fletcher and Scott Hodgson, of Nottingham University Hospital (NUH) Wave programme who jointly gave a presentation on how the WAVE initiative facilitates identifying and scoping for delivery projects which contribute to NUH Strategic goals covering operational, financial and patient risk. The programme efforts have supported reducing waste and improving the quality of services provided.
- Hamish Makanji, Chris Morris and Leanne Wareing, of NHS Supply Chain who gave a presentation on opportunities to work better together to deliver efficiencies, improve the patient experience and deliver system savings.
- Collette Palmer, Associate Director of Procurement (Specialised Commissioning) from Arden & GEM who provided detail on the Provider Selection Regime and how it supports greater integration, wider collaboration across systems, and offers flexible and proportionate processes for selecting providers of healthcare services.
Through these presentations and conversations, we discussed examples and concepts for developing innovative solutions and collaborations that can significantly improve the sustainability of the health and care sector including connected planning and resources for provider collaborations.
A large number of attendees within procurement and finance roles from across the health and care sector attended the webinar. The session sparked meaningful and thought-provoking discussions and an opportunity for new approaches and relationships to develop within the NHS.
We hope to expand the learnings and knowledge from these events by providing access to the presentation slides to those who can benefit from these conversations. You can also view a recording of the session below.
If you would like to join our future customer engagement sessions to share experiences with peers and help shape the support being developed by CSUs, then click here to express your interest.