Greedy nurses and health care assistants?

BobQ

The moment ordinary health care workers start to question the fairness of their pay and pensions, they are criticised. Yet there seem to be quite a few NHS managers with their snouts in the trough who also seem to have escaped the pay freeze inflicted on nurses and other ordinary health care workers.

Alright there are some outstanding NHS consultants who are highly skilled and deserve to be well paid, but why are the numbers of pen pushers in the NHS still increasing?

OK Labour deserves to be criticised for its part in employing them on fat cat salaries. But the numbers continue to increase under Cameron. The reorganisation of the NHS will probably see some of them go to other health care positions on even higher salaries.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/10009054/The-8000-NHS-staff-on-six-figure-salaries.html

At Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust, which was condemned for its “appalling” lack of care after one of the worst health scandals in living memory, a total of 85 staff are paid more than £100,000, up from 79 the year before.

Darren Cattell, the trust’s interim finance director, was paid £340,000 last year — almost £1,475-a-day — as the trust headed towards financial meltdown.

Are these people worth their high salaries. Would a more modestly paid senior civil servant do any worse than Cattell?

Is Cameron doing enough to stop these excesses, given his criticism of Labour's past NHS management?

grizzly1911

BobQ wrote: »

The moment ordinary health care workers start to question the fairness of their pay and pensions, they are criticised. Yet there seem to be quite a few NHS managers with their snouts in the trough who also seem to have escaped the pay freeze inflicted on nurses and other ordinary health care workers.

Alright there are some outstanding NHS consultants who are highly skilled and deserve to be well paid, but why are the numbers of pen pushers in the NHS still increasing?

OK Labour deserves to be criticised for its part in employing them on fat cat salaries. But the numbers continue to increase under Cameron. The reorganisation of the NHS will probably see some of them go to other health care positions on even higher salaries.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/10009054/The-8000-NHS-staff-on-six-figure-salaries.html



Are these people worth their high salaries. Would a more modestly paid senior civil servant do any worse than Cattell?

Is Cameron doing enough to stop these excesses, given his criticism of Labour's past NHS management?

I very much doubt that most of them are, worth it, in "back office" management/admin roles. Some will be necessary.

Doesn't look like it. As we move to a "privatised" NHS I am sure we will continue to see more clinical money diverted into "commercial activities".

CLAPTON

if one wants non-clinical managers to run a large health organisation then maybe you could pay them £100,000 but I doubt you would get anyone with any experience or competence.

if you want a clinical managers then you pay at least what that person would earn as a doctor

the average full time GP earns over 100,000


mid staffs is a special case a bit like Haringey; why would any competent person work in senior role in either place unless you were paid at least 150% the going rate?

PasturesNew

There is a misguided belief that to get 'the best people' you have to pay 'the best salaries'. This has been disproven in the past. If every manager were dropped immediately, there'd be a dozen good people that would apply for the jobs. The recruitment process favours recruiting of people "just like them", so lots of really good people simply come 2nd or 3rd at interview because they weren't just like the interviewers. Or they failed to meet an arbitrary tick box criteria, or they simply answered the ill-worded question wrong in the eyes of the interviewer.

In interviews I have been asked "what is your management style?" ... not only does this question mean nothing to me, but it was irrelevant to the post as it wasn't managing of any people at all.... so, I missed out that vital tick box and "correct answer" .... and the company who didn't recruit me got what they wanted: more mediocre people that were "just like them".

grizzly1911

CLAPTON wrote: »

i


mid staffs is a special case a bit like Haringey; why would any competent person work in senior role in either place unless you were paid at least 150% the going rate?

For the challenge to put a nice big "gold star" on your CV when you have proven how good you are.

Perhaps they just don't want to roll their sleeves up and get stuck in to some real work.

HAMISH_MCTAVISH

PasturesNew wrote: »

There is a misguided belief that to get 'the best people' you have to pay 'the best salaries'. This has been disproven in the past. If every manager were dropped immediately, there'd be a dozen good people that would apply for the jobs.

Our company was concerned at escalating pay rates to recruit people with the exact experience needed from near identical roles at competitors.

So we conducted a trial and studied the financial impact of recruiting "good people" from similar industries, with similar skill sets, into mid-level management and above jobs. And then training them into the roles.

The financial loss was well into 6 figures per employee in the first year alone, and it was year three before they broke even with the outgoing experienced manager.

That's a hell of a hit to take to save a few percent in starting salary.

[Deleted User]

Recently, I had a hospital desperate to hire me as a contractor for an entire year. They immediately started their 'bid' with a salary of £90k. Now, i didn't want to leave my current job (a permanent one not paying anything like 90k) but by the end of 'negotiations' they were offering £150k.

I mean, 150k! Thats mental - my wife is an NHS nurse; and they were offering me 4x her salary to do a job in the IT department (admittedly, a pretty specialised one).

The NHS is nuts. Instead of hiring people at 'good' wages (and then training them how they need them), it pays contractors a fortune

Generali

Some jobs need a senior person to do: a CFO can't be any old person for example. Whether the CFO of a trust should earn £350,000 is very much open to question IMHO.