Quality Improvement and Audit Lead

The Christie NHS Foundation Trust; Manchester; On-site; GBP 50,000 - 70,000; Full time

Job summary

An NHS healthcare provider in Manchester is seeking a Quality Improvement & Clinical Audit Lead to oversee the Trust's Quality Improvement Plan and Clinical Audit programme. The candidate should have substantial experience in healthcare senior management, demonstrating quality improvement skills, and leadership in clinical audit activities. This role emphasizes enhancing patient experience and ensuring compliance with national standards, alongside effective reporting structures. A commitment to continuous improvement and collaboration within healthcare teams is essential.

Qualifications

• Demonstrable experience in senior management within a healthcare setting.
• Experience in quality improvement and clinical audit.
• Ability to influence peers and management teams.

Responsibilities

• Lead the design and delivery of the Trust's Quality Improvement Plan.
• Manage the Quality Improvement & Clinical Audit Team.
• Produce monthly and quarterly QI and Audit performance reports.

Skills

Leadership in Quality Improvement

Expertise in Clinical Audit

Effective communication

Interpersonal skills

Education

Degree or equivalent experience in Health related area

QI Qualification or relevant work experience

Job description

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

JOB PURPOSE

The Quality Improvement & Clinical Audit Lead is responsible for delivering key components of The Christie's Quality Plan 2026-2029, leading programmes of work across Quality Improvement (QI), Clinical Audit, and Patient Experience to ensure positive experience, safe, and effective care.

• Lead the design, delivery and evaluation of the Trust's Quality Improvement Plan
• Lead on the Clinical Audit programme in alignment with local and national standards
• Support the Associate Chief Nurse for Quality & Standards to deliver the aims of the Christie Involvement & Engagement Plan
• Act as Lead officer, supporting the Chair(s), of Patient Experience Committee and Clinical Research & Effectiveness Committee
• Day to Day management of the Quality Improvement & Clinical Audit Team
• Strengthen organisational capability through the NHS Elect training framework (Levels 1-3)
• Ensure improvements align with Safe, Effective, Experience and PSIRF learning themes
• The role will champion a culture of system learning, psychological safety, co-production, and continuous improvement across the Trust.
• To establish robust structures and processes to ensure the experience of patients, families and carers are central to improving quality and experience of services.
• Support the Associate Director of Quality Governance in delivering Trust-wide improvement plan
• Lead the development, implementation and monitoring of the Trust-wide Quality Improvement Programme.
• Ensure all QI and audit activity explicitly supports the Quality Strategy goals (Safe, Effective, Experience).
• Provide strategic leadership for the patient experience agenda, embedding co-design and "You Said, We Did" processes.
• Work with senior leaders to embed QI across clinical, operational and corporate services.
• Drive alignment of QI, audit and patient experience within ICs and cancer alliance networks.

QUALITY IMPROVEMENT

Lead the adoption and implementation of the NHS Model for Improvement across the Trust.

Provide expert QI coaching using PDSA, driver diagrams, process mapping, measurement for improvement and SPC.

• Lead and expand the QI Faculty, building a strong internal coaching and improvement capability.
• Coordinate delivery of the NHS Elect training programme (Level 1 Intro, Level 2 Practitioner, Level 3 Coach).
• Lead the design and delivery of QI training, workshops and coaching programmes.
• Support PSIRF learning responses, ensuring improvement methodology underpins all action plans.
• Provide methodological oversight of complex Trust-wide improvement programmes (e.g. pathways, safety, governance).

CLINICAL AUDIT

• Lead and modernise the Clinical Audit Programme, ensuring compliance with: HQIP standards, NICE, NCAPOP, National and local audit requirements
• Ensure every audit follows the full cycle with measurable action and re-audit.
• Advise divisions on audit prioritisation, standards selection, methodology and data interpretation.
• Produce quarterly audit dashboards and exception reports for board assurance
• Oversee the integration of audit outcomes into QI and service improvement cycles.

PATIENT EXPERIENCE

• Lead the Trust's patient experience strategy, working with Associate Chief Nurse for Quality & Standards on patient and carer involvement, co-design in QI projects, regular thematic analysis of patient feedback, delivery of FFT requirements, production of "You Said, We Did" improvement outputs, ensure inclusion, equity and diverse voices inform improvement activity.

GOVERNANCE & REPORTING

• Provide monthly and quarterly QI and Audit performance reports to Divisional and Trust-wide assurance committees
• Ensure robust registration, prioritisation and monitoring of QI and audit activity.
• Ensure audit and QI recommendations are tracked, completed and evidenced.
• Maintain the QI and Audit dashboard systems, working with CODU
• Produce the Annual Quality Improvement & Clinical Audit Report

WORKFORCE DEVELOPMENT

• Support organisational learning through mentoring, coaching and training.
• Lead the Trust-wide improvement capability framework linked to the People Strategy.
• Develop the QI and audit team's competencies and succession planning.

PERSONAL

• Participate in the performance review by indicating own learning goals, support needs and setting personal development objectives with feedback from others.
• Ensure own professional knowledge is regularly updated and keep abreast of relevant developments, making effective use of learning opportunities and actively promoting the workplace as a learning environment.
• Undertake theoretical education/academic courses as necessary to maintain specialist knowledge base relating to cancer care, general management, and human resources issues.
• Actively seek mentorship/supervision/coaching to enable reflection and own personal development within the role.
• Promote a culture of continuous improvement, psychological safety and learning.
• Facilitate improvement collaborations, workshops and communities of practice.
• Engage patients, carers, and staff in co-production.
• Represent the Trust at ICs, GM Cancer Alliance or national QI forums.

SCOPE

• Expected to have freedom to make decisions that improve the service provision within the team, whilst working within the scope of the Trusts policies.
• Expected to deep dive into clinical service activities for the purpose of investigation and quality improvement in line with risk identification.
• Expected to escalte and act on information which may have an impact of the Trusts integrity and objectives.
• Patient safety and quality of care should be central to each active decision made about service review and improvement activity.

RISK MANAGEMENT

It is a standard element of the role and responsibility of all staff of the Trust that they fulfil a proactive role towards the management of risk in all of their actions. This entails the risk assessment of all situations, the taking of appropriate actions and reporting of all incidents, near misses and hazards.

Person specification

Qualifications

• Essential criteria: Degree or equivalent experience in Health related area.
• Essential criteria: QI Qualification or relevant work experience
• Desirable criteria: Masters Degree or equivalent in Health related subject
• Desirable criteria: Teaching Qualification
• Desirable criteria: Project Management Qualification

Experience

• Essential criteria: Demonstrable experience of Senior Management within the healthcare setting.
• Essential criteria: Demonstrable evidence of substantial experience in quality improvement and clinical audit2
• Essential criteria: Able to articulate and interpret the impact of national directives, strategies and need for assurance activities.
• Essential criteria: Demonstrable evidence of interpretation of CQC regulations and systems.
• Essential criteria: Evidence of developing, delivering and evaluating training across the organisation.
• Desirable criteria: Demonstrable experience of working with patients / public as partners in developing and improving services
• Desirable criteria: Demonstrable experience of clinical audit / national audits
• Desirable criteria: Understanding of NICE guidance
• Desirable criteria: Understanding of CQC and other regulatory agencies / standards
• Desirable criteria: Patient involvement and co-design

Interpersonal Skills

• Essential criteria: Able to apply advanced communication skills in a variety of situations/settings.
• Essential criteria: Evidence of effective people management and leadership skills
• Essential criteria: Ability to influence peers and management teams to achieve objectives.
• Essential criteria: Highly effective verbal communication
• Essential criteria: Highly effective report writing and written communication skills
• Essential criteria: Able to present information to professional groups.
• Essential criteria: Ability to sustain effective interpersonal relationships with colleagues across health and social care setting.
• Essential criteria: Evidence of effective team working across professional and organisational boundaries.
• Essential criteria: Able to manage time effectively and reach set targets
• Essential criteria: Able to work under pressure and to tight deadlines
• Essential criteria: Responsive to service demands.

Knowledge

• Essential criteria: Knowledge of professional and NHS issues and policy.
• Essential criteria: Detailed understanding of the Care Quality Commission.
• Essential criteria: Detailed understanding of NHS national and local policy.
• Essential criteria: Identification of Key stakeholders and all regulatory bodies.
• Essential criteria: Proficient in the use of office applications.
• Essential criteria: Proficient analysis skills and experience that provides ability to interpret information.
• Desirable criteria: Knowledge of PSIRF and systems thinking
• Desirable criteria: Knowledge of NHS governance, CQC Well-Led, NICE, GIRFT, NCAPOP
• Desirable criteria: Knowledge of measurement for improvement and SPC

Values

• Essential criteria: Ability to demonstrate the organisational values and behaviours

Other

• Essential criteria: Demonstrates flexibility in working hours.
• Essential criteria: Able to perform a wide range of duties.

The closing date for this post may be extended if there are insufficient applicants or brought forward if there is a high volume of applicants.

Application Information

Application Information - If you have not heard from us within four weeks of the closing date, I regret that on this occasion your application will have been unsuccessful.

Sponsorship Information

We are an approved sponsoring organisation. Applications will be considered from applicants requiring sponsorship alongside all other applications. Please be aware, not all roles are eligible for sponsorship. You can review the list of eligible role and requirements on the government website.

Pre-Employment Checks

To confirm your suitability for the role, we will carry out pre‑employment checks in line with NHS Employment Check Standards. These include

• Identity verification
• Right to work check
• Disclosure and barring service (DBS)/Criminal record check (dependent on role, payment of this will be the applicants responsibility)
• Professional registration and/or qualification check
• Occupational health assessment
• Employment history and reference validation

All applicants external to The Christie NHS Foundation Trust will be required to provide their HMRC employment history to cover the most recent three years employment. This information will used to validate employment history and references.

If you require sponsorship, we will assess your eligibility based on current government guidance. If the role is not eligible and you cannot demonstrate your right to work, your conditional offer may be withdrawn.

If You're Offered the Role - you will be agreeing to The Christie NHS Foundation Trust transferring the information contained in this application to its preferred applicant management system. If you are offered a job information will also be transferred into the national NHS Electronic Staff Records system. Please note, all communication regarding your application will be made via email, please ensure you check your junk/spam folders as emails are sometimes filtered there.

The Inter‑Authority Transfer (IAT) process is a critical and beneficial component of ESR and will form part of the recruitment process. In the event that you are successful following interview your previous NHS employment data, if applicable will be transferred from your current / most recent employer.

No Smoking Policy

You should be aware the Trust operates a No Smoking Policy and therefore employees are not permitted to smoke at work.

Additional Information

We want to ensure that everyone who works at the Christie or uses our services is welcomed, valued and treated with dignity and respect. The Christie values diversity and is committed to ensuring equal opportunities for all and fair representation across the organisation at all levels. In support of these commitments, we particularly welcome applications from Black, Asian and other ethnic minority people and people with disabilities for this post. Appointment will be only on merit.

We are committed to creating a balanced and diverse workforce. As such we welcome and encourage applications from people of all backgrounds. Together we will foster inclusion and tackle inequity and health inequalities in cancer care.

As users of the disability confident scheme, we guarantee to interview all disabled applicants who meet the minimum criteria for the vacancy.

The Christie NHS Foundation Trust is committed to the highest standards of ethical conduct and integrity in all our activities. We have a zero‑tolerance approach to modern slavery in any of its forms, including slavery, servitude, forced or compulsory labour, and human trafficking. We are fully committed to acting ethically and with transparency in all our business dealings and relationships, and to implementing and enforcing effective systems and controls to ensure modern slavery is not taking place anywhere in our organisation or supply chains.

Description of the job can be found by downloading: JD & PS (PDF, 155.9KB), The Christie Values and Behaviours (PDF, 919.5KB), Strategy Brochure (PDF, 1.0MB), Travel to The Christie (PDF, 3.8MB).