Interim Executive Director of People

South Western Ambulance Service NHS Foundation Trust (SWAST) are looking for someone exceptional to join them in an interim position to cover the maternity leave of their existing Executive Director of People.  

SWAST are passionate about developing people and creating a fantastic place for people to grow and excel in roles they enjoy.  Embedding a high-performance culture, supported by great team dynamics, excellence in leadership and truly meaningful engagement where the whole SWAST team plays their role, collectively and individually in providing quality and responsive patient care.

Employing 6000 colleagues and 950 volunteers and nearly 800 students in education and on placement, SWAST cover a fifth of the UK land mass and operate over 92 sites.  The geography and nature of work presents considerable challenge in how they best connect with, learn from, and innovate with their colleagues which are key to ensuring each and every individual behaves and contributes to making SWASFT the very best it can be.

SWAST’s strategic aim is go from good to great, through improvement and innovation. In this interim position, you will play a pivotal role, working with the rest of      the executive team to lead the organisation into the future as they aim to deliver the very best patient and colleague outcomes.  Within the term of this interim position, they have three specific priority areas for our successful candidate to focus on:

• Organisational Design and Development;
• Progressing our Cultural Development Journey;
• Workforce Planning and Workplace Supply.

You will find a strong and talented people directorate are in place with work programs already underway aligned to these priorities.  SWAST are looking for someone excited by the opportunity to bring their expertise, leadership and influence to these areas of focus and to join a team passionate about making a difference and delivering change for the future.

• SWAST would love to hear from candidates from a diverse and wide range of backgrounds and strongly encourage applications from people with a disability, black and minority ethnic people, LGBTQ+ people, and women.

• Ideally SWAST would like the successful candidate to join them from mid-end of June 2023, for a period of 12 months allowing for introduction and handover with the substantive post holder.

• Head Quarters are based in Exeter: in person attendance is required a couple of days a week (Tuesdays is an exec day) The remainder could be working from home.

For more information including the job description / person specification and to discuss the role in more detail, please contact: Helene Usherwood (07719 322 669 / Helene.usherwood@andersonquigley.com ) or Claire Carter (07732 900 579 / claire.carter@andersonquigley.com )