Job overview

As the Associate Director for Maternity Assurance, you will be the conduit between the GMEC LMNS system group and wider ICB governance and take the lead in maternity safety assurance.  You will have confidence and experience of working at a senior strategic and operational level as a midwife at system and Trust level, holding current NMC registration, and have contemporary leadership and knowledge of clinical maternity services that has delivered clear and measurable improvements for service users and the teams that support them; to be able to demonstrate leadership, vision, and strategic thinking with an ability to influence senior system and regional leaders.

You will forge key relationships with the nine local maternity and neonatal providers as well as partners from the Strategic Clinical Network (SCN), GMEC Maternity and Neonatal Voices Partnership (MNVP), the Neonatal Operational Delivery Network (ODN), Health Innovation Manchester and the Northwest Maternal Medicine Network and regulatory bodies – Care Quality Commissioner (CQC), Nursing Midwifery Council (NMC), Royal Colleges – RCM/ RCOG, regional maternity team.

Main duties of the job

Through the maternity perinatal performance oversight panel (MPPOP), you will manage the local maternity providers’ performance and be responsible for leading the local maternity and neonatal system’s implementation of NHSE three-year single delivery plan, ensuring that local maternity services are aspiring to safe, high quality and well led, to improve standards of care. You will hold providers to account where this falls short, liaising with other agencies to provide support. 

Key Accountabilities for the post holder:

• Bring together providers involved within GMEC maternity care being assured the services are person-centred, safe and of a high quality for mothers and babies through pregnancy, birth and postnatal period
• Be assured service users, clinicians, key stakeholders and families have a voice in designing and developing services, identifying where improvements can be made
• Be accountable jointly to the GMEC LMNS Senior Responsible Officer (SRO) and NHS GM Chief Nursing Officer; you will work closely with the GMEC LMNS Safety Lead Midwife forging strong relationships with the LMNS and SCN team, Heads/Directors of Midwifery, Chief Nurses, the NHS GM Quality Team, NHS GM Place based locality leads, NHS GM Associate Directors of Quality (ADQs), and the North West of England Regional Maternity Team.

Working for our organisation

The Greater Manchester Local Maternity and Neonatal System (LMNS) is a partnership of people involved in maternity and neonatal services, working together to improve services, make them safer, more personal and kinder to people who use them. We are implementing the NHS England Three Year Delivery Plan for Maternity and Neonatal Services.

The Greater Manchester and Eastern Cheshire Strategic Clinical Network (SCN) supports health systems to improve health outcomes of their local communities by connecting commissioners, providers, professionals, patients and the public across pathways of care to share best practice and innovation, measure and benchmark quality and outcomes, and drive improvement.  

Integrated Care Systems (ICSs) are partnerships of health and care organisations that come together to plan and deliver joined up services and to improve the health and wellbeing of people who live and work in their area. Their purpose is to improve outcomes in population health and healthcare; tackle inequalities in outcomes, experience, and access; enhance productivity and value for money and support broader social and economic development in their area efficiency. This will be delivered in neighbourhood, place, combinations of places and GM system.