EHI launches Health CIO Network

One of the less frequently discussed consequences of the National Programme for IT is the impact that it had on chief information officers, IT directors, and other senior IT and information leaders.

James Thomas, director of ICT for University College London Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, and CIO Magazine’s ‘CIO of the Year’ 2013, sums it up.

“It took away their ability to act independently and think about what they should be doing to drive their organisations,” he says. “It was very restrictive on CIO roles.”

So now we find ourselves in a world with no more central budgets and no more centrally procured systems. Yes, it is exciting and a real opportunity for CIOs and others to shine, says Thomas.

“But it is difficult. A lot of the people in the CIO community or IT director community are not supported, skilled, or networked well enough to know how to embrace that opportunity. And it’s made doubly difficult by all the disruptive technology we see today.”

A network of networks

On top of all that, the demise of strategic health authorities earlier this year saw an end to support for the regional CIO networks set up as part of attempts to make NPfIT more locally focused.

Some local communities of CIOs have responded by setting up their own initiatives. In the North East of England, for example, 15 CIOs now meet regularly to share experiences and understand where they can work together.

In London, a new NHS CIO group attracted 30 CIOs to its second meeting and has already set up a patient portal sub group involving 15 CIOs working on patient portals. The North West has a nascent network, as do other regions.

However, there is nothing to bring these networks together, to address CIOs as a profession, or to give them a stronger voice in national policy. Which is why EHI launched the Health CIO Network at EHI Live 2013.

The North East and London networks are on board, and the initiative has already gained the support of Beverley Bryant, director of strategic systems and technology at NHS England, on whose desk the professional development of the IT and informatics workforce sits.

“The demise of the SHAs means we have lost our networks,” she says. “I need them back. I don’t have the bandwidth to meet individuals but I do have the bandwidth to meet with networks.”

What’s in a name?

Visitors to EHI Live welcomed the network; although some questioned its name. The NHS has very few CIOs – trusts are much more likely to have a director of ICT, IM&T, or just IT.

“That’s a real challenge,” says Thomas who, although he was named CIO of the Year, has the official title ‘ICT Director’ at his trust.

“In the wider world, the CIO title has been accepted for more than five years as the right title for the person leading on information and technology. In the public sector, there is a real stigma around ‘chief’ anything, especially in health. There is a chief executive and a chief nurse and that’s it.”

Thomas is not hung up on the title, though. “I am not prissy about it because I have access and support to deliver the agenda; and I do not think that is the case for other organisations.”

From mending laptops to setting strategy

Thomas is concerned that other NHS IT directors get put in the cubbyhole of being technicians. How many IT directors, he asks, have suffered the indignity of the chief executive asking them to mend a laptop?

The modern Health CIO – whatever title they actually hold – should be recognised as having a far more strategic role, he argues.

Asked for one, single piece of advice to help others to get into this strategic position he suggests appointing a head of IT to look after the technical stuff and to free them up to do the strategy and leadership.

“Too many have the mentality of the IT manager or head of IT,” he says. “Instead, they should be looking at innovation, leveraging digital efforts, and propagating the consumption of information to make intelligent decisions.”

Thomas gives an example of how his team demonstrated that 270,000 patients a year from outside the M25 attend a ten-minute outpatient appointment at his central London hospital – and how much could be saved by offering this encounter in a digital format.

“The implications are massive. It’s about having people who feel empowered enough to say ‘we should do bits of our business differently’.”

Boosting the profession

Di Millen, informatics leadership and development lead for NHS England, agrees. “We need to create a shift in the way we see ourselves and the way others see us,” she says.“If we do that we may well have made a significant step in relating quality and informatics to the quality of the service.”

Making this shift will not be easy. There are cultural issues around how organisations use information.

Does a trust still regard it as a good use of analysts’ time to churn out retrospective Excel reports giving last month’s view of how many breaches took place in A&E? Or does it demand forecasting information that allows it to predict when breaches are about to occur and then prevent them?

The role of the CIO in these cultures is significantly different and influencing it is only partly in the CIO’s gift.

The consensus at EHI Live was that CIOs need to emerge as leaders and that some of that will come down to them grasping their own professional development and demonstrating their professionalism.

Bryant is already recruiting IT managers to the NHS Leadership Academy’s Nye Bevan Programme, which is designed to develop the NHS executives of the future.

But more widely, there is confusion about where to go for this professionalisation. A session at EHI Live that explored this made uncomfortable listening for BCS – the Chartered Institute for IT and UKCHIP, which has been trying to build a register of IT and information professionals.

The two organisations were variously told that they were not offering value to members or the wider IT and informatics community. They promised to go away and take a long hard look at their offerings.

Health CIO Network: bringing people together

CIOs need to celebrate success more, the meeting agreed, and find outlets for telling the good news stories rather than being the brunt of bad news about IT failures. There also needs to be more mentoring and coaching of up and coming informatics professionals.

Dr Ira Laketic-Ljubojevic, head of informatics skills and capability development at the Health and Social Care Information Centre, told the meeting: “People are saying that IT is mission critical – and that means that talent management must also be mission critical.”

EHI hopes that by setting up the Health CIO Network these and other topics will not only be discussed but lead to real change and reinvigoration of the beleaguered CIO community.

The network will work in much the same way as the CCIO Leaders Network that held a very successful second annual conference at EHI Live 2013; by working with existing networks and individuals, and focusing on events and online interaction.

A summer school and annual conference are already being planned, and there will be new, dedicated pages, forums, and other networking tools on the EHI website.

“We will be focusing on events and meetings run jointly with local groups,” says EHI editor Jon Hoeskma. “We are not a provider of professional education, and have no views on registration or accreditation, but we are very good at bringing people together.”