The NHS Confederation delivers a wide range of work programmes to meet the needs of its members.

In 2009 we will continue to help our members make sense of new and existing policy and how the system is being shaped and developed. We also have a number of priority work areas planned for 2009 which are designed to address the key challenges currently facing the whole of the NHS.

Leadership

Leadership was a key theme arising from the Next Stage Review and our work in this area will be targeted at addressing some of the challenges around leadership and talent management. We will be looking at how we can improve leadership across the board, including at middle-management level and plan to deliver a range of seminars and publications on issues such as talent management, innovation and developing clinical leaders. We will also be highlighting the positive contribution local NHS leaders are making through innovation and best practice.

Finance and productivity

In the current economic climate, we will be supporting NHS leaders to respond to increasing financial pressures. We will be looking at the key problems, uncovering the range of responses from within the service and showcasing members’ approaches to productivity and improvement. We will also consider how to link productivity gains to strategic transformational change.

Quality

Our work in this area is aimed at helping our members to understand the quality agenda. We will be responding to and influencing emerging policy as well as highlighting how our members are driving quality improvements.

Regulation

Our work on regulation will focus on helping to ensure that regulation is proportionate and fit-for-purpose. We will be working to influence the development of the Care Quality Commission (CQC) and other regulatory mechanisms, and trying to disentangle some of the problems of overlap and ambiguity between system management and regulation.

Further information about these strands of work and how you can get involved will be made available in the New Year.

Other work areas

Our policy team will continue to work on other areas of importance to our members such as informatics, research policy, pandemic flu, the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE), patient and public involvement and climate change.

Networks

In addition to addressing these broader issues, we will continue to address the needs and priorities of individual parts of the service through our family of networks and forums. Please go the individual network pages to find out more.