Demonstrating impact

Autumn 2012

How Macmillan’s Service Development Teams can support you during a post or service change.

The current health and social care climate continues to be challenging. Many organisations are undertaking reviews and service reconfiguration to support the changing demands of services. As a result, some Macmillan posts are at risk.

 

Macmillan believes it is important that any changes continue to improve care and support for people affected by cancer, and are not short-term actions to achieve efficiency targets.

Keeping Macmillan involved

Macmillan aims to ensure that services for people affected by cancer continue to be delivered to the highest standard, by professionals with the right skills and training. It is important that we are involved in discussions about any changes to a Macmillan post or service. We can only provide support when we are made aware of potential plans to change a service. Therefore it is essential that you make your local Macmillan Development Manager (MDM) aware of:

 

1. Changes to your management structure.

 

2. Organisation reviews that include your service or post.

 

3. Macmillan post(s) within your service that are frozen when a colleague leaves.

 

4. Discussions relating to the use of the Macmillan title.

 

5. Discussions relating to a change in working conditions or service agreement.  

 

6. Discussions relating to the sustainability of a post or service.

Providing evidence

Macmillan services need to show that they are of a high quality and are cost effective. To support Macmillan professionals to do this, we have developed a series of ‘impact documents’ that summarise the best, current evidence relating to various Macmillan roles and services. These will support you in communicating the value and benefits of the service you provide. It's a good idea to gather evidence to support your role as early as possible, regardless of its status.

Working together

MDMs will monitor posts that have been identified as ‘at risk’. The MDM will work with the partner organisation to identify the issues and provide support and evidence around the proposed changes. There may be a variety of solutions, but whatever the circumstances, MDMs and Service Development Teams work on a case-by-case basis to achieve the best possible outcome.

 

On this website you can find details of your local MDM and Macmillan's impact documents|.

Case study

A team of three Macmillan professionals were under review in a trust facing financial challenges. Macmillan provided support in a number of ways:

 

- The local MDM was involved in the review process with the trust.

 

- Discussions were held between the MDM and the director of services to ensure the trust was fully informed of the impact the service had for people affected by cancer, the extent of Macmillan’s prior service support, and the original service agreement.

 

- Evidence of the service impact was presented by the team with support from the MDM.

 

- The trust, Macmillan and the team worked together to look at new ways of working to increase Quality, Innovation, Productivity and Prevention (QUIPP) within the service, and how the service might contribute to the Trust CQUIN (Commissioning for Quality and Innovation payment framework) and QUIPP agenda.

 

- The MDM advised the team on how to collect comprehensive evidence of user experience and service quality and present it in a compelling way.

 

Outcome

Two of the three posts kept the same grades at the end of the review. However, the professionals had accepted new ways of working that they felt would improve service delivery in the future.

 

The third post, which was vacant, underwent a grade change to provide a team with mixed skills.