SWAPping Stories — and Experience — in an NHS Library

The acronym NHS may stand for the National Health Service in the UK, but every NHS Trust has its own ‘personality,’ integrating into the local community, as far as possible, in ways that fit with the particular issues facing that community.

In the North West of England Trust, where I now work, the local community faces many issues that touch the young, the old, and everyone in the middle. One of the major issues is the difficulty many community members face in trying to obtain work, through no fault of their own.

The North West of England was highly industrialised in the past, and while the Manchester metropolis continues to expand and prosper, some of the smaller towns have been left behind for some time. It isn’t always possible for local residents to obtain work in Manchester — the public transport system can be somewhat erratic, and the motorways and other roads that feed into the city centre are extremely congested — besides which, not everyone in the area has access to their own vehicle or even a driver’s licence.

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There’s a real focus on working in partnership with other local organisations like the council, and the SWAP programme is a new development in this respect. SWAP stands for ‘sector-based work academy program,’ and its aim is to improve employability for local residents. Other organisations are involved, including the Job Centre and the local further education college, where applicants gained a Level 1 qualification in Customer Service and Employability before joining us.

The NHS Trust I work at is one of the larger employers in the area, and it isn’t uncommon for members of the same family to work here, across generations. Moving between local NHS Trusts also happens very frequently,  including from and to the hospital in Bolton where I previously worked.

A large part of the SWAP programme involves the participants gaining practical hands-on experience in a live work setting. It’s always been something of a catch-22 situation: Applicants for vacant posts are often rejected due to a lack of experience, but how are they expected to get that experience if they can’t get that first job? Several departments in the hospital where I work took part in the pilot, including the library. Originally, the library service was due to take one placement student, but due to a combination of factors, we hosted three: two specialising in IT and one specialising in administration.

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The programme included a series of ‘shadowing’ sessions, some in the library itself and with several other teams in the wider Medical Education department, and some practical projects. As a pilot, it was a learning experience for all of us. Some departments had vacancies that the placement students could apply for and, in several cases, be hired. But at present, the NHS library service is undergoing reviews and reorganisations across England, and that includes ours. It may be possible, however, to use our experience to put together a ‘proof of concept’ for future vacancies.

Our administration placement student assisted with rationalising a backlog of files going back a couple of decades. Although there are certain documents that we need to retain for legal reasons, particularly if they contain financial information, we had a whole collection of papers that could definitely be recycled (including several Christmas quizzes from years gone by). In some cases, the documents could be recycled in the ordinary recycling or used to contribute towards our ‘net zero’ effort as scrap paper for our users. In others, it was necessary to ensure that those old files were placed in the correct confidential waste containers for later shredding by the company to which the task is outsourced.

All three of our SWAP students worked extremely hard and adapted incredibly well to the situations they found themselves in — with my favourite comment on one particularly frenetic day of dealing with new doctors being the phrase ‘authentic experience.’ All three helped with setting up new library accounts and practical day-to-day tasks, including shelving books (although it has made me realise how idiosyncratic our layout is!).

Our IT placement students also helped our users set up computer accounts, printing accounts, and referred more complex queries to one of our colleagues in the IT team who, for the first time, was on call in the library for the February doctors’ changeover — the second busiest day of the year for the entire education centre. (The other one is the August doctors’ induction.)

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Our IT placement students also helped with trouble-shooting Teams sound problems in the teaching rooms and testing defunct equipment in one of our ‘dumping ground’ rooms where IT speakers, computers, and other somewhat vintage equipment had been stored. They also liaised with our IT desktop support teams to report IT issues and make sure the equipment was disposed of in line with legal requirements.

The placement lasted for four weeks in total, three days a week, with a mutually agreed extension in one case, again, due to unexpected events. (The NHS is full of unexpected events, even in the library!)

We had positive feedback from the participants and the organisers, and it has been invaluable in helping library staff make a major start on a range of projects that had been lingering in filing cabinet drawers. I’ve also had a great insight into many of the areas that new recruits will need to know about to help us provide a responsive, patron-centred service. More intakes are planned throughout the year, although we haven’t decided yet if the library will take part again this calendar year.

What is certain, though, is that the next time we participate, we’ll be better prepared, thanks to the input from our SWAP students.

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