EBME Forums Forums Management Professional Issues Agenda For Change Qualification + Experience = Band 6, factual information required

You show me yours and I'll show you mine. Gnarf, Gnarf, Oooer.

A fine example of solidarity ,I dont think.Its no wonder band 4/5 looms ahead !!!

You don't think it's been a forgone conclusion for a long time then? I have since I started hearing rumours from all around the country that EBMEs have been retructuring from top to bottom to ensure that key staff in MTO3 and MTO4 grades are being placed in positions where their job-roles can be differentiated from others by being given supervisory and specialist duties. My impression is that "only key-staff run maintenance departments and make them work" the rest of the working grades must take their chances at AfC.

Keeping a core of "key-staff" sweet will prevent departments from collapsing whilst the compromised MTO3s leave their band5 equivalent posts to search for something with prospects and without the shadow of R&R, whether it's long-term or not, and are replaced with band4 replacements.

I have been of the opinion that MTO3 will be Band5 and that MTO3*s and above, excluding MTO5s, will be placed onto band6 for a long time. Management where I work seem to think that it's ok as long as there is R&R so they're not interested that there will be no prospect of progression for the majority of "working grade" technicians at the top of MTO3 like myself.

I have watched and heard of 20-odd of my colleagues from ATO up to MTO5 being restructured and told that I have no say because it doesn't affect me - thus the majority of the department has been reorganised or been given new job-descriptions, promotions, or been offered responsibilities or additional duties, prior to AfC, that could influence AfC matching, except for a few MTO3s like myself who are now a minority in their own department (in terms of being offered the chance to develop into roles within the proposed system, post AfC).

AfC is apparently being used as a means to develop the service where I work and my understanding is that AfC is not there to do this. Job roles should be what is currently being done not what's planned in the future. If that's happening elsewhere then it's a stitch-up or an abuse of the system and you have to be blind not to see it. That's the thanks you get for working hard and sharing knowledge, skills and experience and helping to hold things together.

Tracy,
The profiles for MTO's are under review.It may well be that the final versions are the same or very similar to the existing or there could be significant changes. The same happened to the portering profiles approx 3-4 weeks ago and a higher level profile at band 2 was added. This meant that the job matches had to be rematched against the new profiles.
This is the statement from the NHS modernisation agency and the Medical Engineering Technician profile is one that is listed as being still under review. They were expecting an answer by mid Feb but as yet nothing has been issued.

"The State of Play on Profiles: an advisory note from the NHS Staff Council

There have been many queries recently over the state of play on profiles, either generally or in relation to specific profiles. This note explains the current state of play in respect of reviewed and new profiles. It is intended to assist organisations in drawing up matching schedules, but should not be seen as definitive"

Hello Ken
Thanks for the info on the profiles, had a look at the site. More profiles were released today, but none were Med eng/tech. Everyone here thought the profiles were agreed. There were a lot of changes in estates and biomedical depts.

Hello Mark,
Yes the whole department will recieve their out-comes at the same time. We are expecting a letter at the end of may and no earlier.

Hello richard,
I too have heard the rumours that MTO 3's will be matched grade 5. There was a chap from Scotland who said he had beeen matched who commented on this site some time ago. The rumour mill also says other med eng's in PFI hosp in the region who were nhs staff also matched mto 3 to grade 5.

My job description was drawn from what is currently done, not future plans.

My degree is not essential and the job does not demand it, so it was not included. So all the discussions, regarding qualifications, that seem to have filled many hours are pointless.

I can not tell you specificaly the results from jd parts 2 & 12 as our jd had to be laid out NOT in the style of the national profiles. It did mention everything as stated in jd for medical engineer profile and some of the specialist engineer proflie.

I have only this to draw conclusions from.

I am not filled with optimism.

Tracy

Hi all.

This has been quite an interesting discussion. We appear to be a lot further behind in Scotland with PTB groups due to be matched in June and July. Here in Tayside we are even further behind and matching is likely to start next week when I hope start putting my training to good use!

I have quoted the the knowledge and training section from from a job description I have done for a specialist clinical technologist (MTO3?). I hope this is of interest.

comments welcome

Rod

Hello Rod,

Your job description is very good, but according to agenda for change this is not a specialised medical engineer:
There is no specialist discipline mentioned ie. renal. Knowing a great deal of a variety of disciplines accounts for nothing.
The post holder is not implementing policies, only following them.

All this currently seems irrelevant as the AFC job descriptions are not finalise and looking at other departments that have been in the DH reviw, many changes are possible.

Thankyou everyone for your comments on this.

Tracy

Hello Rod,

Your job description is very good, but according to agenda for change this is not a specialised medical engineer:
There is no specialist discipline mentioned ie. renal. Knowing a great deal of a variety of disciplines accounts for nothing.
The post holder is not implementing policies, only following them.

All this currently seems irrelevant as the AFC job descriptions are not finalised and looking at other departments that have been in the DH review, many changes are possible.

Thankyou everyone for your comments on this matter.

Tracy

Re job descriptions profiles etc.

I should have mentioned the job description was still a draft and might be subject to modification before being signed off. I also lost all the formatting when I copied it from word.

The reference to specialist in the job title is an attempt to link the job description to the relevant profile (Specialist Medical Engineering Technician). Most of the MTO professions have technician, specialist and highly specialist profiles and the knowledge and skills factor is critical to the evaluation of the job description.

Rod

Rod,

Our manager here tried that trick but had all our job descriptions rejected by the panel on the basis that we 'trying to influence them'!

Good luck, hopefully your panel with be less stringent.