Weeknotes 2023-07-17

After a long break away from weeknotes, I'm picking this back up. This may be foolhardy on the last day before kids break up for 6 weeks of holiday, but I'm going to give it my best shot.

What's changed?

I can't cover everything since last update, but this is a good excuse to look back at highlights.

Last time, I mentioned the NUH analytics conference, which is where I first met two new colleagues. That was before they joined NUH, but now they're both here, and I've really enjoyed the early weeks of working together. Together, we are the Insight Managers for the 3 clinical divisions (out of 6) who have decided to invest more strongly in analytical capability. Together, we're a blend of jack-of-all-trades (that's me), stats and modern tools expertise, and deep knowledge of hospital operations, BI, and applied analytics. Together we're going to make a big difference (that's the plan).

Alignment

I think I've talked about this in other posts, but alignment is getting better and better. Alignment with the business and it's challenges, with management (both divisional and analytical), and also with trust leadership. There are multiple data points that continue to convince me that this is real not imagined. Among them are appraisals, loose but supportive coaching, invitations to significant meetings, involvement in strategic work, and a general sense that doors are being unlocked. This can only be a good thing for my team and the teams we work with. More to do, but this is a positive feeling.

Relationships

I and the team have increasingly found ourselves working with other teams from the trust, and happily rather than merely consuming expertise, we are managing to add value back. Whether it be building a joined-up view of historic operating theatre activity to feed into future theatre list planning, feeding into early conversations on how captial investment might look, or working with analysts from other parts of the trust on how ethniciy and deprivation could factor more into service planning, the fact that these relationships now exist is a very good thing. I'm a firm believer in making your own luck, but I've been feeling lucky (and very grateful) to be working with all these people.

Two way commissioning of work

Workload means I was unable to join the first Health and Care Analytics Conference HACA, either in person or online. But I was watching from afar, and this quote from the deputy COO of NHS England caught my eye...

Analytical work cannot be commissioned in an email. Analysts need to be in the executive meetings to develop the hypotheses to understand what the work is for.

Amen, and thank you to all those who are supporting NHS analysts to push in this direction.

See you (hopefully) next week!