HFMA 2020: Catherine Phillips is Finance Director of the Year

11 December 2020 Seamus Ward

Trophies landscapeThe North Bristol NHS Trust finance director’s commitment to partnership working across the local health system was demonstrated when she became finance lead for the Bristol Nightingale Hospital. She ensured the new hospital’s finance team would be drawn from all local health organisations, including providers, the clinical commissioning group, and the regional team. She also showed her determination to ensure that the Nightingale was value for money, and provided opportunities for finance team development.

Despite her work at the Nightingale, Ms Phillips was able to fulfil her duties at the North Bristol trust, ensuring the trust delivered its 2019/20 control total at year-end. She also led work on external audit across the South West.

In total 10 industry awards were made, including Finance Team of the Year – won by Warrington and Halton Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust for its pandemic response – and Deputy Finance Director of the Year, which was awarded to Jonny Gamble of Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust. Mr Gamble was nominated for his work as finance director of the Nightingale Hospital, Yorkshire and Humber, which is on top of his day job as the Leeds trust’s deputy director of finance for financial management.

There was also a double celebration for Alder Hey Children's NHS Foundation Trust, which took both the Value and Innovation Award and the Havelock Training Award.

There were two new awards for 2020 – the Overcoming Adversity Award and the Embracing Technology Award. The Overcoming Adversity Award was won by the NHS Business Services Authority for its central role in setting up or updating more than 30 different services to support the national response to Covid-19. These included a self-isolation text service and network connectivity to the Nightingale hospitals.

East Lancashire Hospitals NHS Trust took the Embracing Technology Award after developing two systems in-house to automate parts of the finance and reporting process that eradicated non value-adding tasks. The systems included automation of data flow between reports and its ledger and statistical analysis of cost centres.

The winners are:

Finance Director of the Year (sponsored by Prime)

Catherine Phillips, North Bristol NHS Trust

 

Deputy Finance Director of the Year

Jonathan Gamble, The Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust

 

Finance Team of the Year

Warrington and Halton Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust

 

Working with Finance, Clinician of the Year

Kulandaivel Sakthivel, United Lincolnshire Hospitals NHS Trust

 

Costing Award

Royal Cornwall Hospitals NHS Trust

 

Havelock Training Award

Alder Hey Children's NHS Foundation Trust

 

Governance Award

East Suffolk and North Essex NHS Foundation Trust

 

Value and Innovation Award

Alder Hey Children's NHS Foundation Trust

 

Embracing Technology Award (sponsored by PA Consulting)

East Lancashire Hospitals NHS Trust

 

Overcoming Adversity Award

NHS Business Services Authority

 

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