Labour Ward Manager

Job description

Mid and South Essex NHS Foundation Trust is the only acute hospital provider in the Mid and South Essex Integrated Care System (ICS), which is a system of health and care partners working together for our local population.

Within Mid and South Essex there are 149 GP practices, operating from over 200 sites, forming 27 Primary Care Networks and one Ambulance Trust. There are also three main community and mental health service providers who work together through a community collaborative.

We collaborate with other valuable partners, including three Healthwatch organisations, nine voluntary and community sector organisations and three top tier local authorities, with seven district, borough and city councils, as well as our local universities.

Job overview

Southend Hospital's Labour Ward has an exciting opportunity for a permanent Labour Ward Manager!

As Labour Ward Manager you will take charge of leading the Labour Ward at Southend University Hospital, overseeing the entire maternity service with a focus on excellence in clinical care, leadership, and professionalism.

In this role, you will design and implement effective programmes for antenatal, intrapartum, and postpartum care, while providing highly specialised guidance to the multidisciplinary team.

You will be a key source of leadership, offering strong support to the Maternity Matron/Head of Midwifery, and sharing your expert clinical advice with staff and colleagues to ensure the highest standards of care.

Main duties of the job

As the Labour Ward Manager, you will take on the vital role of overseeing the day-to-day operations and leadership of the Central Delivery Suite (CDS), ensuring exceptional care for both staff and patients. You may be required to rotate to other clinical areas, participate in the duty and senior management on-call roster, and work flexible shifts, including days, nights, and weekends, to meet the evolving needs of the service.

With strong leadership and a commitment to ongoing professional development, you will:

• Cultivate a culture of women-centered care on CDS, supporting individualized care plans, particularly for women with complex needs.
• Promote safe, evidence-based care that meets the highest standards.
• Develop and publish auditable standards to showcase service compliance with current best practices.
• Provide operational and clinical leadership to all staff working on CDS.
• Be a visible, approachable leader for the multidisciplinary maternity team, women, their families, and the public, fostering open communication and ensuring effective care assessments.

Your leadership will inspire and motivate staff to achieve and maintain high standards of care for all women. You will actively explore current practices, identify areas for improvement, and lead meaningful change by leveraging research and experience to evaluate outcomes.

Working for our organisation

With a workforce of approximately 15,000 staff, we can now do more and go further in delivering health services to our local communities.

Our ambition is to deliver excellent local and specialist services, to improve the health and wellbeing of our patients, and provide a vibrant place for staff to develop, innovate and build careers.

Patients will experience improved care as well as fewer delays and cancellations. We are able to provide more once-in-a-lifetime specialist care region-wide. With our new trust size will come more opportunities for development, research, networking and innovation.

We aim to make the most of our skills and experiences so we can become the best we can be. As one organisation we will recruit the finest and retain more specialist staff due to more employment opportunities across our Trust.

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

Are you looking for an exciting role using your unique qualities, then we want to hear from you.

For full details about this varied and rewarding role, please see attached job description.

We look forward to your application.

Please be aware that we reserve the right to close this vacancy early if we receive a suitable number of applications.

Person specification

Registration

Essential criteria

• NMC PIN

Experience

Essential criteria

• Strong post registration experience
• Evidence of further development and study towards leadership role

Desirable criteria

• Must have worked in delivery suite environment
• Previous management experience

Flexibility

Desirable criteria

• Ability to commit to shift work - DM, SMOC and clinical

Please be aware as per the new Immigration guidelines we cannot sponsor candidates with a salary (full time or pro Rata) under the current minimum threshold.

Please note, the selection processes at Mid and South Essex NHS Foundation Trust are in place to ensure we recruit candidates with the right skills and values, please be advised that the use of AI in applications are monitored. We remain vigilant against candidates who misuse these tools to generate an application that doesn't accurately reflect their skills, and you will be required to declare on your application if AI has been used before submitting your application.

Employer certification / accreditation badges