Employability in The Healthcare Sector

Employability can be defined as the desirable attributes and skills that employees should strive to attain in order to enter and remain in employment throughout their working lives. In terms of employability in the healthcare sector, maintaining and displaying professionalism and acquiring knowledge is fundamental. At present, the need to expand on said skills is essential as employees should be able to adapt and adjust to the amplified demand on the constantly transforming healthcare sector. To be successful during staff selection, employees must manifest competence in as many areas as possible. Job descriptions, code of conduct and core competencies are excellent and informative resources for staff as it allows them to maintain their employability. However, there are a number of factors that can adversely impact employee satisfaction and employability. These factors involve ethical issues including discrimination, staff shortage and working conditions.

To establish a safe and secure working environment and maintain employability, these situations can be subjugated by ensuring that everyone is aware of necessary legislations such as Equality Act 2010, Disability Discrimination Act 1995, Race Relation Act and Equality Bill. According to O’Connell (2014), professionals in the health sector are working in both familiar and unfamiliar conditions; this enables them to attain relevant skills, advanced knowledge and values that can be applied to any given situation. This makes an employee more desirable to the health sector. Additionally, it has been emphasized by Nash and Fitzpatrick (2015) that ‘care should be approached in a holistic manner’. This essentially means that in order to deliver effective care, health care workers should take the initiative to improve their communication skills and knowledge and obtain the ability to identify and manage the dying process. The Institute of Medicine (2003) states that all care workers should possess five core competencies that includes: ‘providing person centered care, working as a member of multidisciplinary team, emphasizing evidence based practice, applying quality improvement, and utilizing informatics’. In addition, the core competencies for health care worker are provided by Skills for health.

The core competencies are identified as personal development, effective communication, equality, diversity and inclusion, duty of care, safeguarding, person-centered care and support, handling information, infection prevention and control, health and safety, and moving and assisting. Brooks (1979) has expressed that gaining substantial insight of relevant attitudes is particularly beneficial when predicting or influencing behaviors that are favorable in mitigating both mortality and morbidity. Furthermore, Guest (1987) suggests that a wide array of skills accompanied with flexibility also encourages employability.

To influence both patient satisfaction and employability, motives, traits, self-concepts, knowledge and skills are essential factors that employees must take into consideration. According to Care Quality Commision, those previously exposed to caring and nursing backgrounds are considered more employable compared to others as it is identified as an essential skill; thus those with more experience are more employable.

Leonard et al. (2004) recognized that there are rising issues in the healthcare sector that can be held accountable by the abstract hierarchy in the sector. As a result, this hierarchy can adversely affect communication and thus place patients at risk as opposed to effective communication that enables strategic care planning that inevitably declines errors. Alongside inter-professional collaboration and eloquent communication, another essential part of providing patient care include effective team work. The better quality of teamwork reduces the health care cost whilst increasing job satisfaction. The criteria for good quality care places emphasis on meeting the needs and being aware of the patients preferences whilst maintaining a professional relationship involving substantial involvement and commitment.

Beach et al. (2005) strongly states that another vital part of employability skills is cultural competence as this helps minimize racial and ethnic inequality in care and thus improving patient satisfaction. Moreover, Betancourt et.al.(2003) stresses that attaining a basic understanding of social and cultural influences on a patient’s health and behaviors is essential as it allows healthcare workers to provide patient centered care. Following the Francis Report, RCN (2014) has brought attention to the fact that the Department of Health has established the fundamental standards of care that centers around meeting patient’s needs and preferences in a respectful manner whilst maintaining their dignity and following health and safety regulations. Employability rises if employees display good character and demonstrate the ability to provide a safe environment. RCN (2016) continues to reinforce the idea that there is a duty of all care amongst all healthcare professionals as well as the fact that they are each held responsible to follow their contract of duty. Professionalism is an abstract concept that encompasses over multiple factors. These revolve around how people think, look and behave on the job. Work ethic, attitude, adaptability, optimism and self-confidence are combined under the umbrella term of ‘soft skills’ that are components of professionalism. In addition to these soft skills, time management, problem solving and effective communication are included. In some cases, it has been expressed that for numerous occupations, soft skills are much more significant and important than technical skills.

Regardless of industry, workers that reflect professionalism are valued by both employers and consumers. However, those working in the healthcare sector are more susceptible to become emotionally sensitive and vulnerable; this can often tamper with the level of professionalism displayed. Emotional vulnerability can be developed from having to attend to patient’s personal fears and stress whilst receiving treatment. Therefore, maintaining professionalism is particularly significant here as it can ‘instill trust and competent care to the individuals’ according to Purtilo and Haddad, (2015). The most fundamental concept to acknowledge is that healthcare professionals have higher standards compared to most other professions as it is important for them to keep the patient’s dignity and preferences in mind whilst treating them.

According to Imison and Bohmer (2013), the current professional workforce are ‘trained and developed to work in model centered-around single episodes of treatment in hospitals’. At present, there is a shortage in the availability of district nurses and thus skill mixing has become necessary in order to provide patient care where trained healthcare assistants are performing leg ulcer care and catheter care in the community with supervision. The increase in demand of health care service and shortage of nurses can be reflected from the expanded role of band 4 where healthcare assistants replace nurses to perform complex work. Imison and Bohmer (2013) have stated that the ever-transforming healthcare sector has become increasingly challenging due to higher demands especially for the increased number of the ageing population with multi-morbidities.

Another reason of higher demand is because of the advancement of medical treatments that extends life spans. RCN (2013) have compared the number of district nurses between 2001 and 2011 and found that there is 38% decrease and consequently a rising demand for more multi-skilled professionals to work in the NHS and provide services in communities and hospitals. This portrays the increases chances of employability. According to Fenton (2011), it has been estimated that there will be a 35% short-fall by 2025. To overcome the inevitable shortage of staff, it is necessary to reform the current workforce in order to be meet potential service needs and be able to adapt to the ever-changing health. In accordance with such changes, it is plausible to increase patients independence in their own health care; this would allow them to purchase medicine over the counter as opposed to seeking service from GPs and thus reduce the overall demand.

The five-year forward analysis suggests that for the healthcare approach models to be transformed, we should have an adequate workforce available with considerable skills and an a motive to deliver better, improved care. Therefore, it is crucial that the current existing staff are abundantly supported to ensure that they develop their skills and are prepared to face the forthcoming challenges in the near future. Smedley et al. (2003) indicates that the most common ethical issues present in the healthcare environment is racism and discrimination. Although this can have an unfavorable influence on the racial/ethnic disparities, it also has a negative impact on the recipient of the care in terms of safety and quality.

Fukunda (2004) highlights that discrimination, due to race, ethnicity and religion is a predominant issue across the world with one in every seven of the world population experiencing some form of discrimination. Despite the fact that racism in healthcare is strictly prohibited in accordance with health professional ethics (Allen et al., 2009), many still struggle to achieve healthcare equality. In order to protect and guide healthcare workers and understand employability, it is crucial to be well acquainted with the various legislations in place such as: Employment Law, The European Charter of Human Rights, The Disability Discrimination Act 1995, The Commission for Racial Equality Code of Practice on Racial Equality in Employment, The Equality Bill (2010), and Disability Discrimination within the Equality Act 2010.

In conclusion, it has become apparent that the rapid growth of the health care sector has accumulated a rising demand of its services. There are two opposing perspectives of this statement. On one hand, it generates greater job opportunities in the industry where employees are more qualified and subsequently provide better quality care for their patients. In contrast, those in the current workforce are required to expand their skills and abilities to be able to keep up with the new workforce and adapt and adjust to the changing needs. In order to maintain employability, it is of significant value to be aware of the current legislations especially due to rising issues regarding discrimination and other ethical affairs which can inevitably impact both employability and patient satisfaction.