A fundamental problem in GP practices is that the entire burden of compliance falls on the practice manager's shoulders. Once staff gets into the frame of mind that "this is not my job" and push it on to the manager, the practice manager is forever stuck in this cycle where they feel they have to do everything, else it just doesn't get done.
Hopefully you might not have this problem, but if you do, here is a suggested agenda for how to get staff organised. This will be a tricky area as some staff may oppose change, but you need to be firm because if any member of the team does not pull their weight, the whole system suffers. If you do not take a firm stand, the end result will be that the task will end up on the manager's desk again.
- Give a written notice to staff about the coming changes and their role in the daily compliance regime
- Send a memo/guidelines about self-responsibility – The whole ethos is about self-responsibility and you cannot now leave everything to the PM. Everyone has to be competent or there is no practice and there is no job.
- Here are the new rules:-
- Our licence depends on this, so everyone has to go through training
- Staff need to be aware of things + need to be knowledgeable to do their jobs
- Competency & suitability tests now compulsory – if you cannot do the job, we are not allowed to let you do it
- You will have to go through a training process
- You will have to go through self-certification else we cannot let you log on to system and you cannot do your job:-
- IG Toolkit
- Caldicott rules and importance of confidentiality
- Your duties have to be modified
- Patient care/safety/outcomes is the most important theme – everyone likely to come into any contact with patients [including admin staff answering the odd call] must go through training and must follow the rules
- Allocate protected time to get things done
- Issue new contracts to staff
- Publicise the policies and processes – make sure everyone knows so there is no dispute afterwards