This page is designed to answer the following questions:
- 3.3 Create service development plans to support the vision ensuring it is both shared and owned by those implementing and communicating the vision (Level 5 Diploma in Leadership and Management for Adult Care, Leadership and Management in Adult Care)
NOTE: Although this page has been marked as complete, it has not yet been peer-reviewed or quality-assured, therefore it should be considered a ‘first draft’ and any information should be fact-checked independently.
For this assessment criterion, you will need to demonstrate that you have created a service development plan, which supports the organisational vision and strategy. You will also need to show that the people that are implementing the plan have been able to participate in its development.
What is a Service Development Plan?
A service development plan is simply a document that details how a service will improve over time. Service development plans are usually reviewed and updated on annual basis but they could be more or less frequent depending on your organisation’s needs.
To develop a service development plan, you will need to analyse the current needs of your service and identify how they can be met or improved with the resources that have been allocated. Your plan should also be aligned with organisational values, goals and strategy and, in some cases, tie in with local and national plans and policies.
Service development plans may also be used to make evidence-based arguments for additional resources.
Some of the areas that you should look at when developing a service development are included below:
Management meetings
The planning process should include meetings with other managers as well as members of your team.
By collaborating with other managers, you will ensure that service development plans are in line with the organisation’s overarching goals, values and strategy as well as being able to share ideas.
Your team members will ultimately have the responsibility for implementing the service development, so it is important that they have the opportunity to be involved in the process. This will be necessary for both the planning and implementation stages.
During the planning stage, team members should be encouraged to bring forward their own ideas about how the service can be improved and these should be taken seriously. At the beginning of the implementation stage, it is essential that the service development is explained to them in detail so that they understand how it should be rolled out and what changes are required in their own work. It should be a two-way dialogue where team members are able to ask questions and provide feedback and you, as manager, are able to explain the reasons why the changes are necessary.
Staff supervision
Staff supervision also allows team members to discuss the service development plan but, unlike team meetings, this will be during a one-to-one session. Team members will be able to ask questions that they perhaps didn’t feel comfortable raising in the group environment as well as discussing how their own personal job role fits in with the service development plan. For example, they may wish to discuss a formal training course that they wish to be enrolled on that is aligned with the service development plan.
Strategic planning
Strategic planning can often lead to changes in the way an organisation works. This can include changes to organisational structure, job roles and responsibilities, policies and procedures and other ways of working.
To ensure a smooth transition, these changes must be effectively communicated to team members along with the reasons why they are necessary. By consulting with team members and being open and transparent during the process, it is more likely that they will ‘buy in‘ to the changes and morale will remain high.
Research and development activities
When assessing the needs of the service, it will be useful to conduct research so that any proposals for service development can be backed up by evidence.
This can include staff surveys, service user (and their family) surveys, case studies from similar organisations and literature reviews. Once analysed, this data can help to inform decisions about how the service should develop. This process could also be used to support team development – for example, it could tie in with a research project that a team member has to complete as part of a qualification that they are working towards.