Getting on with the job

The political shenanigans going on in our country over Brexit have been breathtaking.  The shambolic behaviour of politicians has left citizens feeling bewildered and let down. Who knows where it will lead? Meanwhile, the NHS continues to treat millions of people every week, the most vital public service and one I’m proud to be associated with. 

We ourselves are in the middle of a reorganisation and I hope we can continue the positive dialogue with the new regional NHS England/NHS Improvement appointees. One is HFMA board member Elizabeth O’Mahony, who moves from chief finance officer at NHS Improvement to become regional director for the South West. We wish her every success in her new role, as we do all the new appointees. 

We also welcome Julian Kelly as NHS chief financial officer. We hope to meet him shortly to identify how the association can be of assistance – though I guess signing off this year’s financial accounts for the NHS might be more pressing!

The HFMA is busy on a wide range of fronts.  December and our annual conference may be a long way off, but we are already working on the line-up for what I hope will be a fantastic event.  We are negotiating with a few headline speakers and hope to be announcing some shortly. 

We also have our popular summer conference in July, with Bristol providing this year’s venue. I’m delighted that we have the new NHS chief financial officer down to speak, as well as a host of others. It should be a great event.

We’ve been doing a lot of work on our apprenticeship offering, which we hope will be available by the start of 2020. If anyone wants to have a preliminary discussion about that, please do not hesitate to contact me at [email protected].

Our initial focus has been on a level 4 accountancy apprenticeship. We are looking to offer a programme tailored to the NHS environment, but fully portable. Our main level 7 qualification continues to do well, with many students now having taken it or actively studying. We feel we have a very strong offering and the feedback is very good. 

I’m also delighted that we have a small group who are now going through the MBA stage of the qualification with BPP University.

A real honour for me this past month was to attend and take part in the annual branches conference. This is an annual event where our local branch volunteers come together to discuss important matters within the organisation and provide us with feedback. It’s at times like this that I realise just how much members love the HFMA and how much they want it to succeed – not just at their branch level, but also nationally. 

We heard from a wide variety of people associated with the HFMA about our current strategy and what resources were available to branches. And we fielded questions about our present and future strategies.

As chief executive, I’m so grateful for all the work our volunteers do. Without it we simply could not function. Our members are why we are here. We may not have the power of the politicians, but we are getting on with the job.