SDMS V Staff Development and Learning Management for Windows not only addresses the Training Planning and Administration needs of Social and Adult Services departments but also addresses the related Workforce Management - such as the production of NMDS-SC, Staffing Return SD0001 and other Work Force Data issues such as those defined by LGMB Workforce Analysis requirements in the early 1990s.
Social Services have perhaps led the way in reinstating qualifications and competencies at the heart of training rather than “softer" approaches. This of course stems from the long term crisis of social services staffing – not enough appropriately qualified staff being recruited or retained - compared to the demand for Social Care given the UKs demographics.
Much of the data required by National Minimum Data Set of Skills for Care would be gathered in the normal course of managing training with SDMS – basic information about staff, recording of qualifications and skills as staff proceed through learning, job and related information often imported from corporate payroll systems into SDMS etc.
The NMDS Module rationalises this by bringing all the data required for the return into a single set of Quick Entry screens – data already entered is shown here together with missing data so that it can be entered.
What is NMDS-SC
For Employers and key stakeholders in the sector, the benefits of the NMDS-SC are numerous. The NMDS-SC will:
- Benchmark your services with other Organisations in your locality or region.
- Identify Staff Skills, Needs and Achievements.
- Enable you to create a Staff Development and Training Plan that meets the needs of the Organisation and which reflects the National Minimum Standards.
- Plan effectively for your current and future Social Care Workforce.
- Enable Personal Development planning for individual Staff.
- Identify recruitment and retention issues and enable you to develop succession-planning strategies.
- Enable you to develop staff skills and competence in line with regulation and good Social Care practice.
- Identify skill shortages.
- Provide information for Skills for Care to represent the Social Care Sector and to attract resources to support the Social Care Skills Agenda.
- Enable your Organisation to be recognised by the different strategic and Funding Agencies in your region when they consider the economic and educational support available in your locality.
SDMS Software can accommodate all the data specified in the National Minimum Data Set for Social Care and allows the user to produce the data to be sent to Skills for Care. The data can be held for individuals and for organisations and includes:
NMDS-SC Employee Data Items in SDMS
| • | Name of Business or Establishment |
| • | Business Post Code |
| • | National Insurance Number |
| • | Home Post Code |
| • | Gender |
| • | Date of Birth |
| • | Ethnic Group |
| • | Disability |
| • | Date Form Completed |
| • | Person Involved in Completing |
| • | Job Role for Main Job |
| • | Start Date of Main Job |
| • | Recruited from - Main Job |
| • | Job Status Main Job |
| • | Contracted Hours Main Job Plus Others |
| • | Contracted Hours Status |
| • | Other Jobs – Role |
| • | Additional hours-paid/unpaid previous 7 days |
| • | Working arrangements |
| • | Total sickness Days – previous 12 months |
| • | Basic Pay |
| • | Start In Service Date |
| • | Continuity of Service |
| • | Induction Training |
| • | Qualifications Held |
| • | Qualifications working towards |
NMDS-SC Organisational Data Items in SDMS
| • | Agree Copy of Data to be given to Skills for Care Regional Office |
| • | Can Data be Accessed by CSCI |
| • | Name of Organisation |
| • | Parent Organisation Name |
| • | Address |
| • | Building, Number, Locality, Post Town, Post Code |
| • | Telephone Number |
| • | Email Address |
| • | Registered with CSCI Yes/No |
| • | Registered Number and Date |
| • | IIP Status |
| • | Name of Person Completing Questionnaire |
| • | Job Title of Person Completing |
| • | Email Address of Person Completing |
| • | Date of Completion |
| • | Nature of Organisation |
| • | Care Services Provided - All |
| • | Care Services – Main |
| • | Types of People Provided for |
| • | Total Service Provision by Service Provided-Capacity/Number of Places |
| • | Total Staff Employed on Completion Date |
| • | Total Staff Employee Breakdown-Permanent-by Job Role |
| • | Total Staff Employee Breakdown-Temp or Casual by Job Role |
| • | Total Staff Employee Breakdown - Started in Past 12 Months by Job Role |
| • | Number of Bank, Agency, Students, Voluntary by Job Role on Completion date |
| • | Total Staff-Left Employment-by Job Role – in preceding 12 Months at Completion Date |
| • | Total Vacancies – by Job Role – at Completion Date |
| • | Leavers in Past 12 months by Reason |
| • | Leavers in Past 12 months by Destination |
NMDS-SC Data Integration Tool
As the information required for the NMDS-SC may be stored in various disparate sources such as spreadsheets, legacy systems, live databases or other documents in your organisation, SDMS offer configuration of an integration tool that will access the existing files, then validate the data and populate it into the SDMS V Staff Development for Windows NMDS data. Where some or all of the data required for the NMDS is not available in any form in the organisation, it may be necessary to begin collection of the data from individual staff . All sources of data can then be brought together to be imported into the SDMS data where it can be validated and exported to the format required by the NMDS.
Bulk Upload Tool
The NMDS-SC Online System incorporates Bulk Upload Tool functionality that allows employers to upload data in bulk directly to the system without the need for extensive manual data entry.
Using the ‘Bulk Upload Tool’ employers will be able to quickly and efficiently provide large amounts of workforce information without the need for manual data entry, thereby giving employers easy access to the range of benefits associated with NMDS-SC Online. The new bulk upload tool functionality is aimed at Local Authorities and large private and voluntary employers who wish to administer their NMDS-SC data on behalf of multiple subsidiary establishments. However, the tool is also available to single-establishment employers who wish to use it. Usage of the new bulk upload functionality requires the employer to be registered with NMDS-SC Online, and to provide two separate Organisation and Worker upload files compliant with a defined technical specification. A further pre-requisite for usage of the tool is that the employer is registered with the system as a ‘bulk upload user’, and as a ‘parent organisation’ if the employer wishes to administer data on behalf of multiple subsidiary establishments.
SDMS V Staff Development and Learning Management for Windows provides a Bulk Export Facility to allow extraction of data into the format required by the Bulk Upload tool. This will allow the process of returning the NMDS-SC data to the Skills for Care Council as simple as running a report. The user would simply select the Organisational Units they want to extract the data for, click a button to start the process and send the file that is produced via the Bulk Upload tool.
SDMS e-NMDS-SC
To complement its existing set of tools and systems to support the collection and dissemination of workforce data SDMS will be releasing e-NMDS-SC a further web module for its e-Training web access product. Employee, Line Manager and Employee Self Serve Access will allow the data to be collected and updated within the organisation for its own use in workforce planning.
Qualifications Framework and Workforce Analysis Tools:
The Types of Qualifications required by Staff in certain roles can be identified, with the differentiation between Required, Recommended, Vocationally Recognised, Professional, Social Work and Management Qualifications. Skill Gaps and proposed Training Activities leading to those Qualifications are automatically listed.
Equivalent Qualifications can be grouped into blocks and Staff can be analysed against Qualification Gained or equivalent.
Staff Qualifications can be analysed by new Achievement Status, to differentiate between To be Achieved Qualifications (from Post Requirements), Achieved (from Training, QCF Enrolment or otherwise) or In Progress.
As part of the Social Services Edition several Work Force Analysis Tools are provided, ranging from:
HR Analysis on Staffing Levels, Turnovers and Forthcoming Retirements aiding in Succession Planning and identifying potential Skill Gaps and Training Requirements for New Starters. All analysis can be down by several indicators like Type of Staff, Location, Equal Opportunities Data.
Volume of Training Analysis - checking how many Staff Have Been Trained, Will Be Training or Needs Training is easier with this matrix, allowing Analysis by Location, Job Role, Equal Opportunities or Training Area.
Qualifications and Competencies Framework and Achievements - how many Staff Have Gained, Need To Gain or Will Gain a Qualification depending on Certificate Type or Job Roles.
The analyses are done in matrix style - with one indicator compared against the other - e.g. Staff Level by Ethnicity and Gender, or on individual breakdowns. All statistical data is presented on screen with drill-down facilities to check where the counts are coming from, or an option to print to Excel™ spreadsheet.
All analysis can be Period Based, or Monthly Breakdowns. Previous counts can be saved and archived to Excel™ to allow year on year comparisons. Where statistical data is not available to be scanned from SDMS Data, it can be entered from the known figures and saved for future reference. Data can be analysed for the whole Organisation, Specific Groups, or Clusters of Groups. Preferred analysis set-ups for each Work Force Analysis Tool can be saved by each user for future runs.
