NHS Streamlining, Totara and the Core Skills Training Framework (CSTF).

Across all the regional NHS Streamlining programmes one key component consistently strengthens and ties the Statutory and Mandatory workstreams together – the Core Skills Training Framework (CSTF)

With a highly mobile workforce, employers often need to identify a recruits previous training. Where information is lacking, people can repeat training unnecessarily, wasting time and money. The CSTF was developed to standardise the outcomes of mandatory training and make it easy for an employer to assess the quality of training new hires received at their previous organisation. Knowing the training delivered meets the outcomes expected across the NHS allows organisations to:

1. Reduce unnecessary training during induction.
2. Save considerable time and money.
3. Quickly release new employees to front-line services.

Since being launched in 2013, the CSTF has been maintained and updated by Skills for Health to include clinical and care subjects. The framework is relevant across all healthcare employers in the UK, which offers significant benefits as organisations merge and form new partnerships in social care and the NHS as part of Sustainability and Transformations Partnerships (STPs).

To deliver a seamless education experience in this new, complex healthcare world, you need flexible and adaptable technology to underpin regional and national networks working outside traditional organisational boundaries. As the largest supplier of Totara Learn to the NHS we have worked hard to ensure our implementation projects support national streamlining agendas and the CSTF.

How does Totara Learn support the national streamlining agendas and the CSTF?

• Totara Learn allows you to implement pre-hire learning.
• You can directly access to national e-learning content from Skills for Health, the NHS e-learning repository and regional or local e-learning programmes from within Totara Learn.
• You can clearly label statutory and mandatory training as CSTF in the widely recognised format e.g. CSTF | Fire – 1 Year.
• CSTF compliance courses can be accessed by healthcare students, social care and GP practices from within Totara Learn.
• Functionality and processes support Drs on rotation.
• Data can be downloaded in the correct format to upload directly into the Electronic Staff Record (ESR) providing an integrated solution.
• Inter-Authority Transfer (IAT) is not possible between non NHS organisations, but Totara Learn provides all learners with a custom, locally branded, report of their current and historic training. This a significant benefit if individuals are moving from higher education or social care into the NHS or vice-versa. Giving access to this report to learners enables them to send this to a new organisation early in the recruitment process to remove any blockage caused by recruitment activities. Learning and Development teams are then able to customise induction programmes based on an individuals’ needs.

If you’d like to know more about how Totara Learn can support the Streamlining and the core skills training framework please contact us.