Recruitment Newsletter - February 2024

Published 6th March 2024

So, we've blinked and it's now March! How did that happen?

February was an exciting month with lots going on in the world of recruitment.

We welcomed 54 new colleagues to SaTH this month, including 2 newly qualified Occupational Therapists. They join us for an exciting rotational position, where they will be supported to develop their skills alongside other therapy and MDT colleagues. We wish them the best of luck in their careers!

Also within Occupational Therapy, the team attended Coventry University careers fair on the 27th. It was great to meet so many passionate students looking for their first roles after qualifying. The team were on hand to offer advice and guidance around our fantastic preceptorship programme and our OT training and development pathway.

Our final cohort of 13 internationally recruited nurses arrived into the UK this month, bringing our total number of international nurse recruits to 205 in this financial year. A big welcome to all who joined and we hope you are settling in well to your new roles!

We welcomed 23 new doctors to the trust in February 2024, in a bid to improve our on-boarding experience the team have been working on a welcome booklet for new starters, we will be working with the communications team to enhance the content and hope to be going live with the booklet in Spring 2024.

National Apprenticeship Week took place from 5th - 11th February. This week was a brilliant opportunity for us to celebrate the achievements of our apprentices within the Trust, as well as showcasing the many different types of apprenticeships that are available within the NHS. You can find out more about apprenticeships at SaTH along with a list of our current apprenticeship opportunities over on the jobs pages.

Also during this week, we attended the All About Apprenticeships show at the Shrewsbury Football Ground. It was great to meet so many people interested in an apprenticeship with SaTH. We also enjoyed surprising a lot of you with the variety of apprenticeships available here - not every role in the hospital is clinical!

Within Medical People Services, we have now implemented the full use of the TRAC system to enhance reporting features and monitor KPI’s. We have been looking at retention incentives and our current recruitment strategy, we have increased Specialty Doctor posts to provide sustainable permanent career pathways, including conversion of long-term Locally Employed Doctors, Significant growth of LED posts incorporated with access to clinical fellowship programme, SAS and LEDs accessing portfolio pathway programme with Medical Education, Rotational FY3 programmes for post-foundation exploring alternative career routes.

In February we advertised and held interviews for Healthcare Assistants to join the Trust. We had a fantastic response and some excellent applications, and from the interviews we made a massive 25 offers of employment. If you missed the last advert, we are currently looking for Healthcare Assistants to join the team at The Royal Shrewsbury Hospital! Be quick - the advert closes on Sunday 10th March so be sure to submit your application before then. Don't forget to check out our top tips for applying as well!

As we continue to review our onboarding processes and the online portal, your feedback and comments are crucial to ensuring we can deliver a service that is beneficial for you. Therefore we would like to encourage any recent new colleagues to check their inbox for the link to provide feedback. If you would like to provide feedback / suggestions in relation to the onboarding process and do not have access to the online survey, please contact kirstie.thomas2@nhs.net

Looking ahead into March, we will be attending a few different careers events - please check our events page for a full list of upcoming events.

Finally, just a friendly reminder that we'll be at the Telford Skills Show on 14th March, if you haven't already you can secure your free place now.

Telford Skills Show, 14th March. The International Centre Telford 11.30am - 7pm