Chodskww//, Change & Project Manager

The Health Service Executive (HSE) is responsible for the provision of all health and personal social care services in the Republic of Ireland. With an annual budget in 2024 of €24 billion and over 150,000 employed in the HSE and the Section 38 Agencies with which the HSE has Service Level Agreements (SLAs), the HSE is the largest employer in the State and the largest of any public sector organisation.

The Health Regions Implementation involves the internal reorganisation of the HSE into six operational regions with responsibility for the planning and coordinated delivery of health and social care services within their respective defined geographies. While the full implementation will be a multi-year journey, the Health Region approach was stood up in March 2024 and will continue to progress throughout 2024 and 2025. These new arrangements are fundamental to the delivery of Sláintecare reforms and aim to improve the health service’s ability to deliver timely integrated care to patients and service users, care that is planned and funded in line with their needs at regional and local level. In addition, the following will be delivered:

· Alignment of hospital-based and community-based services to deliver joined-up, integrated care closer to home.

· Clarification and strengthening of corporate and clinical governance and accountability at all levels.

· A population-based approach to service planning and delivery.

· A balanced national consistency with local autonomy to maintain consistent quality of care across the country.

· An efficient, highly productive and transparent health and social care service with aligned incentives to provide people with timely access to safe, high quality integrated care.

· Support for local and regional innovations in service improvement for adoption across regions or at national level as appropriate.

The changes in healthcare governance arrangements are being designed to make our services easier to navigate for people, and to facilitate more integrated care, stronger accountability, and greater transparency across the sector. This in turn aims to foster change and innovation at a local level to deliver high-quality services to populations based on their needs, making our service a better place to work for our staff. The move to a regionalised approach, represents a major shift in the approach to the planning, funding and delivery of health and social care services. In line with international best practice, the new arrangements will support a population-based approach to the planning and resourcing of the geographic delivery of services to improve health outcomes for people in Ireland.

As part of these reforms, the operational focus is moving from the HSE Centre to the Health Regions and Integrated Healthcare Areas (IHAs), to allow the regional structures to have the intended level of appropriate authority and operational control of services in their region. The HSE Centre will develop and oversee standards and guidelines for implementation at regional level. The focus of HSE Centre will be supporting the Health Regions on planning, enabling, performance and assurance (PEPA).

Change and Innovation Hubs represent a new design as the ‘Implementation Vehicle’ in supporting the Health Region change programme. Positioned within each Health Region the Hubs will provide dedicated change, project management and organisation development support to Regional Executive Officers (REOs) and their Executive Management Teams (EMTs). The operating model will be aligned to meeting the National / Sláintecare & Health Region change programme providing dedicated support to the Integrated Healthcare Areas (IHA) and their respective front line teams.

Purpose of the Change and Innovation Service

1. Create a sustainable and self-sufficient change management operating modelwithin the Health Regions with a particular focus on:

a. Progressing Sláintecare & Health Region reforms, HSE Service Plan and Board priorities including the setting up and embedding of Health Regions, the integrated service delivery (ISD) model including Networks of Care and associated business processes.

b. Developing the skills and expertise to support and empower front line staff to embed change, innovation and continuous improvement as part of core business.

c. Continuing to build change capacity at local and regional level and embed a culture of continuous improvement and innovation as part of service delivery.

d. Promoting change and innovation as a driver of investment to meet future service needs.

2. Providing governance and oversight of large-scale change programmes to include regional and national reporting as required and ensuring that programmes are delivered to cost, time and quality requirements through the application of required standards, frameworks, tools and processes.

3. Focusing on the people and cultural aspects of change and identifying and supporting 'change networks' i.e. working directly with those in change / project management roles, creating coalitions, enabling knowledge exchange and fostering innovation

4. Making the best use of the complementary change / innovation skills, knowledge and resources to deliver maximum impact at whole region level by ensuring an integrated approach and streamlined interventions.

Informal Enquiries

Name: Kate Killeen White

Grade: Regional Executive Officer Dublin Midlands Region

Email: REO.DublinMidlands@hse.ie