NHS Professionals - Research Paper Example

NHS Professionals Introduction The term ‘remuneration’ is referred as the entire compensation or salary which an employee of an organisation draws in exchange for the services that he or she performs for the employer. It is also defined as the net compensation received by the employee or the worker against the services offered to the employer of the organisation. Remuneration or salary is a type of periodic imbursement which is paid to an employee on basis of explicit contract. It also includes certain details such as extra wages to be allotted to each employee for extra hours of work. Apart from these, it also consists of certain other details namely financial rewards, which might be beneficial for enhancement of self-esteem, self-respect needs and recognition as well. Thus, fiscal rewards also help to augment the self-actualization needs apart from primary desires thereby improving the dedication and the satisfaction towards work. Besides, in this era of modernisation and industrialisation, large numbers of complementary benefits are increasing in order to improve the remuneration methods. It may comprise of varied types such as bonuses, promotions or other profitable benefits among others. The prime objective behind this policy is to improve the productivity and profitability of an organisation thereby augmenting its corporate image and market share in the market among others (Organization for Economic Co-Operation and Development, 2008). Hence, various sources of remuneration help to retain experienced or technically sound employees in an organisation in order to improve its distinctiveness and uniqueness in the market. Moreover, in order to sustain, innovative products or services are offered to the customers by the experienced employees to enhance the responsiveness. Thus, the system of reward is one of the significant aspects of an organisation to retain in this competitive age. The study highlights the impact of remuneration strategy on employees as well as on an organisation. Moreover, it also focuses on the benefits of developing an optimal reward strategy for a newly created c department of NHS Professionals in the United Kingdom (UK). National Health Service (NHS) Professionals is one of the leading healthcare organizations of the UK which provides multiple options to the doctors, nurses and administration staff (NHS Professionals, n.d.). It also offers inventive flexible employment solutions with fair remuneration services to varied individuals related to medical departments within the UK. With the help of these prospects, it facilitates to create a balance between personal and professional lives of an individual. Thus, job satisfaction and commitment of the workers towards NHS can be enhanced (NHS Professionals, 2010). Discussion Overview of NHS Professionals National Health Service Professionals (NHSP) was developed in the year 2004 by the Department of Health of the UK. However, in recent times, NHSP has taken the shape of a limited organization entirely owned by the ‘Secretary of State of Health’ (NHS Professionals, 2010). NHS Professionals is one of the prime recruiters of locum healthcare practitioners or nurses in the UK. It is one of the largest and oldest ‘solitary financier healthcare schemes’ in the world. It is one of the reputed healthcare organizations which mainly attempts to offer pioneering flexible recruitment solutions to diverse medical related individuals of the UK. NHS Professionals offer services to about 50,000 nurses, doctors, administration, clerical staffs and other healthcare proficient individuals among others (NHS Professionals, n.d.). NHS Professionals place shifts in excess of 1.5 million in a specific year thereby engaging nearly 600 fully-trained as well as vetted supple workers in a specific month. Moreover, it also offers highly qualified workers to about ‘80 NHS Trusts’ within the region of England. In addition, the NHS Professionals assist the trusts in augmenting the clinical authority as well as facilitates in reducing the overall costs (NHS Professionals, 2010). NHS Professionals work along with each client-trust as a team and with local account administration in order to offer quality services to the citizens of the UK (NHS Litigation Authority, 2011). The prime principle of NHS is to meet the requirements of the citizens in an efficient and effective way and the prime objective is to provide ample range of services to the citizens. Moreover, NHS Professionals also attempt to offer innovative services and facilities to the patients in order to enhance the satisfaction and responsiveness. NHS Professionals is more dedicated to the flexible staffs and associate trusts as well (NHS Professionals, 2010). NHS Professionals is a reputed healthcare service provider of the UK. In addition, almost all hospital doctors and nurses are employed by NHS to offer effective services to the diverse and ailing citizens of the UK (NHS Professionals, 2010). NHS Professionals includes both trained as well as fresher to work in their hospitals. Moreover, the medical related individuals are also interested to work with NHS as it provides entire supports to both personal and professional lives, which facilitates in fulfilment of the career goals and objectives. Furthermore, NHS Professionals manages two types of services namely ‘locum service’ and ‘flexible workforce guidance’ (NHS Professionals, 2012). Locum service refers the opportunity of providing substitute medical practitioners or nurses for temporary purposes to handle any critical patient. Besides, NHSP encourages NHS Trust to reduce the utilisation of expensive outsourcing organizations along with using own doctors in order to minimise the expenditure. Thus, in order to fulfil this objective, NHS makes continuous attempts to recruit skilled professionals to offer quality services at times of emergencies (NHS Professionals, n.d). Moreover, NHS also offers flexible workforce training programs as well in order to reduce diversity and to promote equality among all. The main objective is to treat all the working staff equally irrespective of any biasness due to gender, colour, marital grade, religion, race, nationality, culture, age and disability among others (NHS Professionals, 2010). Thus, it offers equal opportunities and remunerations to every individual regardless of cultural diversities. In addition, NHS Professionals also certifies that no specific obligation or stipulation would be imposed on any individual without any valid explanation. Otherwise, it might discourage the commitment of an individual towards work thereby hampering the corporate image and brand loyalty among others in the international market of the UK. Locum Department Hence, in order to improve the brand position and recognition of NHSP in the market of the UK, the management of the organisation might introduce a new department named locum practitioners with quite high remunerations. It would reduce the expenditure of NHS trust while hiring skilled medical persons at times of emergency. In addition, extra fiscal rewards might also be offered to the experienced doctors while operating with critical cases. Moreover, due to introduction of this department, varied inventive types of facilities can also be provided to the patients, which might prove beneficial for them. In addition, utilisation of varied innovative equipments for the treatment of the patients might also enhance the awareness and dependency over NHSP. Thus, it would facilitate NHSP to improve its position in the market of the UK among others. Along with these, as the doctors are not hired from other outsourcing agencies, so better treatment can be offered to the patients at reasonable cost, which might enhance the number of new patients. This innovative department would attract skilled practitioners of the UK thereby enhancing the quality of services to the patients. This would improve the consistency and reliability of the services towards the patients thereby enhancing the reputation of NHSP in the market of the UK. Moreover, this strategy would also facilitate NHSP to expand its business as well as organisational regime thereby enhancing its profitability and market portfolio. Approach to Remuneration NHSP is a reputed organisation dealing in healthcare sector of the UK. It attempts to offer equal wages to all of its workers irrespective of culture, experience and racial status. This is due to the fact that remuneration or salary is the prime objective which helps to attract or to retain existing patients in the organisation. There are varied factors that affect employee remuneration which can be described in a concise way. The varied factors include living standard, government regulations, society and labour market among others. Hence, it can be affirmed that good remuneration would be offered to skilled workers in order to motivate and improve their dedication towards work. This might also enhance the productivity and the profitability of the organisation. There are varied types of remuneration strategies followed by diverse organizations namely fixed, short-term and long- term incentives among others. Besides, NHSP utilises the strategy of fixed remuneration for the medical persons who are involved in the organisation for a specific time period and for an explicit number of days. This is followed in order to attract skilled talents or professionals in the organisation of NHSP. Along with this, NHSP also offers the opportunity of pension to its retired employees in order support its staff. Thus, NHSP also introduced a scheme named as cash equivalent transfer value (CETV) for the benefit of the retired work staff. It is the actuarially calculated capital cost of the pension scheme whose benefits can be processed by an individual member of the family at a specific point of time. The amounts of this scheme are the accumulated remuneration of an individual of NHSP during his/her working period (NHS Professionals, 2010). An individual working in NHSP might also transfer the amount of CETV in the name of his/her spouse as well. A CETV is a type of imbursement offered with the pension scheme or agreement to secure the pension amount through a different pension scheme in order to obtain full advantage from the scheme in future days (NHS Employers, 2012). Furthermore, NHSP also provides the facility of “pension commutation”. In this type of scheme, the members or the employees practising is denied by the ‘Scheme Regulations’, which offered a significant impact on the lifestyles of individuals. It came into effect from the year 2008. As a result, in order to cope up with this challenge, NHSP introduced the above discussed scheme. In this scheme, the members can select to offer a certain amount of their annual income after retirement for any requisite purpose. Other than these, NHSP also offers certain other facilities namely a specific amount as ‘ill-health retirement scheme’, ‘death bonus’, ‘additional voluntary Contributions’ (AVCs) and transfer among funds in order to attract new talents and skills. Moreover, NHSP also offers certain reimbursements for untimely separation of the individuals from the jobs. In addition, varied short-term reimbursement or remuneration benefits are also provided by NHSP in order to retain skilled employees in the organization. It includes salaries, incomes and many other payments that are considered in the working period of an employee, apart from ‘non consolidated payment’. Thus, it can be avowed evidently from the above discussion that NHSP also offers variety of services and facilities in order to retain the employees. In addition, NHSP also follows the strategy of equal pay or remuneration to every employee which is the other significant aspect of the organisation and is rather noteworthy (NHS Professionals, 2010). Moreover, the remuneration policies or strategies are finalised by remuneration committee of NHSP. It includes varied methods while deciding the salaries of the senior members of the organisation. It is mainly based on two factors namely job estimation and the standards of roles and responsibilities of the employees. Due to this strategy, the board members obtain full opportunity to evaluate the duties of every individual member of NHSP. Hence, the remuneration is decided which reduces the scope of conflict among the employees and the employers as well (NHS, 2011). Thus, it can be affirmed from the above discussion, that appropriate remuneration is the only policy which can help an organisation to retain its employees in the long run. In addition, it also helps to draw new skills to get attracted towards the higher paying organization thereby enhancing its productivity and efficiency among others in the market. In addition, NHSP also offers overtime payments to the employees in order to retain them in the organization. If the employees or staffs are called to work in ‘on-call period’ then they are paid for the entire period of time along with travelling expenses as well. Other than these, NHSP also provides annual holidays and general unrestricted holidays, ailment leave, maternity leave, redundancy pay and mileage stipend among others (NHS Employers, 2012). Moreover, it also provides the facilities of various rates of payments for the nurses in a specific chart in order to encourage them towards work. The chart of payment rates is shown below: Payment Chart Source: (NHS Employers, 2012) Hence, from the above discussion, it can be revealed that NHSP attempts to offer best remuneration to its employees along with varied other facilities in order to motivate and persuade the workers for better work. This is due to the improvement of productivity and market share of NHSP in the market of UK among others. It also endeavours to attract newer and skilled individuals in order to provide innovative and satisfactory services to the patients. This would help to improve the number of patients along with corporate image of NHSP. Optimal Reward Strategy and Policy Compensation is one of the significant aspects for an employee as well as an organisation. It helps to motivate an employee and the inspiration enhances the dedication and commitment of a worker towards working assignments. Thus, it improves both employee and organisational standards and earnings among others. Moreover, compensation also augments the organisational culture and internal environment thereby encouraging coordination and harmonisation among the employees. Thus, in order to retain the employees, it is essential to offer extra reward systems along with remunerations by the organisations. The total reward system includes varied elements such as wages, extra benefits, performance and appreciation along with future growth opportunities among others (Armstrong, 2000). Along with wages, an organisation could also offer extra benefits such as Medicare facilities, social security insurances, leaves and retirement facilities in order to support an individual. Moreover, specific rewards namely service rewards, retirement benefits and peer appreciation prize are few to motivate the employees. In addition, varied types of training programs and in-job training could be organised by an organization in order to enhance the skills and knowledge of the individuals (Armstrong, 2002). This helps to improve the career opportunities of an employee which helps in development of innovative products or services in order to satisfy customer needs and demands. This might facilitate an organisation to sustain in this competitive environment in the long run. Thus, optimal reward system or policy is one of the noteworthy phenomena utilised by the organizations of modern era in order to remain competitive in the market. This is because it is a part of human resource management (HRM) which facilitates in attracting, controlling, preserving employee and individual capital and culture for the accomplishment of the objectives of a company. This is the prime motive of an organisational management in order to sustain in this era of globalisation and industrialisation (Armstrong, 2000). On the basis of the above discussion, as a HR reward consultant, it is essential to implement optimal reward strategy in locum department of NHSP in order to enhance its reputation and brand image among others in the UK. It is also necessary to retain the employees in the organisation of NHSP for the long run so that quality services can be offered to the patients. It would facilitate in enhancement of satisfaction and contentment of the patients towards NHSP in the market of the UK. The locum department of NHSP would attempt to include varied skilled professionals specialising in diverse areas namely psychiatrist, pathology, cardiologists, ENT specialists, nephrologists, neurologists and physiotherapists among others to serve every critical case. Certain other surgery specialists would also be appointed in the locum department of NHSP in order to offer urgent services to the ailing patients. Furthermore, the management of NHSP would appoint varied practitioners both on short-term as well as long-term basis in order to reduce the process of hiring from external agencies. This might lessen the cost of hiring practitioners from external agencies. Moreover, if a specific department is introduced comprising of several skilled practitioners with best remuneration then it would become easier to serve the emergency patients. In addition, the cost of the treatment might also be rather less as compared to others, which would attract more number of patients. Thus, it would increase the total revenue and the brand image of NHSP in the UK. Apart from skilled doctors, various innovative tools and techniques can be implemented in order to serve the patients in a better way. The locum department would also include 24 hour nursing facilities for the patients suffering from serious trauma cases. Moreover, specialists regarding surgery would also become available in this department in order to serve the maternity patients. In addition to the above discussion, in order to attract more and more experienced doctors and staffs, along with remuneration, certain extra benefits would also be provided such as additional pay for extra hours of work. Travelling expenses would be provided to the employees in case of emergencies. Moreover, fresher medical pass outs might also grab an opportunity of working with the senior doctors thereby enhancing their skills and knowledge. This would be beneficial in the future days while striving to establish their position among others. The fresher would also be offered a competitive salary along with other benefits (Lawler III, 1995). Furthermore, the pay structure of this department would be revised in a new way in order to motivate the performances of the employees. Both intrinsic and extrinsic reward policy would be maintained in order to sustain an appropriate corporate culture. Extrinsic rewards include the wage necessary to meet the primary needs of an individual whereas intrinsic rewards are also known as psychological rewards. These are essential for job satisfaction and commitment in order to improve the performance of the individuals. Intrinsic rewards facilitate in fulfilment of the self-esteem needs of an individual which acts as a motivator. Thus, as a HR reward consultant, it is advisable to implement both the above described strategies in the new department of NHSP. Moreover, performance related rewards systems would also be introduced in order to improve the performance of the individual employees (Koala Consulting and Training, 2008). These types of rewards systems would attract new talents and would reduce the problem of unemployment to a certain extent from the economy of the UK. Thus, decline of unemployment might also diminish the issue of poverty thereby improving the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of the economy. Along with reward policies, NHSP would also implement the strategy of direct and indirect pay systems for the betterment of the new department. Direct pay would include wage or salary, overtime payment, merit payment, parental leave, commission, company’s profit sharing, bonus and paid leave. The indirect pay systems or benefits would comprise health and life insurance packages, retirement and pension policies, car facilities, health club membership, mobile expenses, tour facilities and subsidised amusement expenses as well in order to enhance the motivation and the satisfaction of the employees. It also would help in retaining the employees in the long run, which is one of the significant aspects for the growth of the organisation (Koala Consulting and Training, 2008). Furthermore, certain other policies would also be implemented such as centralised and decentralised reward systems among others. Centralised reward system includes consistent pay grades, promotions and job-evaluation policies. Along with this, decentralised reward system would include variations in the ranges of salary and incentive based on performances. Besides, in case of the locum department of NHSP, centralised reward design would be utilised in order to maintain homogeneity rather than decentralised policy (Center for Effective Organizations, 1993). Thus, the reward system of NHSP would be prepared in such a way so that it should be at par with the rules and the regulations of ‘The Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD)’ of the UK so that no discrimination arises among the employees (The Chartered Institute of Personnel And Development, 2012). Moreover, equal and lawful treatment can be followed which facilitates every one. This can make the reward management policy rather successful for NHSP (The Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development, 2012). Hence, it is essential to maintain the above described reward policies or strategies in order to improve the organisational structure as it plays a prime role in shaping organisational design. Thus, an effective and efficient reward system guideline is one of the most significant strategies, which would be utilised for the improvement of the organisational image. Conclusion Conclusively, it can be affirmed that the optimal reward strategy is one of the significant policies which should be implemented in order to enhance the growth of an organization such as NHSP. Besides, reward policies should be introduced in such a way that it facilitates every individual of an organisation, thereby improving coordination and harmonisation among the employees. This might enhance employee relationship along with dedication and commitment towards work. Thus, an optimal reward management strategy should be introduced which might enhance both organisational productivity as well as employee morale. It would also facilitate in gaining future sustainability for the organisation. References Armstrong, M., 2002. Employee Reward. CIPD Publishing. Armstrong, M., 2000. 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