Shubhra Kamat

A highly driven healthcare professional who is results driven 

My career path has provided extensive clinical and leadership knowledge from acute and private healthcare settings extending to the community specialist centres in the last 18 years.

I have progressed my career clinically and now in the Corporate sector of NHS from multiple levels, experiencing first-hand the changing national infrastructure and having a successful track record of delivering national policy to meet local needs, improving health outcomes in a planned and cost-effective way. I recently achieved my Master's in Business Administration (Leadership) from Kent Business School. I continually strive for excellence and believe in learning and developing. 

According to Myers-Briggs, I am an ESTJ (Extraverted, Observant, Thinking and Judging). This personality type's defining quality is their incredible fortitude, which allows them to passionately abide by their own sound judgement. They frequently act as a calming influence among others, able to provide firm guidance in the face of difficulty. I believe in the virtues of integrity, dedication, dignity, and courage, and I have always appreciated blazing new trails. In bringing people together, I take pride. I stand out because of my values, broad clinical knowledge, and leadership abilities that promote risk analysis, issue forecasting, and problem-solving in combination with close collaborative working.

In order to improve patient care and outcomes, I positively disrupt the status quo.  In my role as the Race Equality Project lead at Maidstone and Tunbridge Wells (MTW) NHS trust, I actively acknowledged various working styles and relied on my strong interpersonal and problem-solving skills to engage others in the journey.

The key aim of enrolling in the MBA programme was to increase self-awareness, knowledge and understanding of the various corporate topics, foster and improve my leadership, teamwork, and cognitive thinking, as well as to increase my knowledge of the fundamentals of business.

My MBA journey, which lasted from September 2021 to September 2022, not only helped me advance my academic abilities but also gave me the chance to develop my leadership, communication, and resilience skills while collaborating with an intelligent and enthusiastic group. This boosted my confidence in completing a variety of consulting projects both locally and internationally. I have most enjoyed networking and being able to connect with stakeholders across different corporate sectors during this programme. 

My career in the NHS commenced in 2006, finding my passion and progressing through various roles in paediatric physiotherapy service ranging from inpatients, outpatients, community and private settings to corporate roles as Race Equality project lead and more recently as Senior Continuous Improvements Practitioner in the Strategy and Transformation team. 

In my current position at Medway NHS Foundation Trust as a Senior Continuous Improvements Practitioner, I collaborate with the private KPMG team to implement a strategic transformative programme across the organisation.

With the launch of our Patient First Improvement Programme, which is at the forefront of strategic transformational change, I play a crucial role in advancing continuous improvement. The execution of ongoing, extensive improvement programmes within the Trust depends on this position. The CI methodology has been applied as an improvement strategy targeted at creating trust-wide initiatives and training to support the system roll-out. I have experience leading challenging workshops with senior stakeholders and coaching other improvement leads.

One of the abilities required in this function is to work in a matrix environment with the distribution of resources and task delegation to other team members as well as expressing concerns, escalations, risk/issues register, mitigating risks and issues, providing leadership and support to team members and meeting deadlines.

I deputise in the absence of the Head of Strategy and the Head of Transformation. I lead the delivery of training and coaching on improvement across the Trust in various work streams of the programme for directors, divisional leaders, clinical directors and nursing and allied health professionals. My role demands good organisational skills, programme management and being a subject matter expert in guiding ongoing improvement and the development of this programme along with the capacity building of the colleagues at work. Along with the other senior CI practitioners, I have boosted our workforce's capability by designing and delivering development programmes, training, and coaching 

My strengths of being friendly, warm, and approachable allow for good coaching and mentoring to the team which includes project managers, and support officers to help embed improvement capability. 

At Maidstone and Tunbridge wells NHS trust ( Mar 2015 – Nov 2021), I have a proven track record of successfully managing the Paediatric Orthopaedic Service, which includes overseeing all aspects of the Service, including RTT Pathways, Operational Efficiency and Streamlining OP Pathways, Business Case for Team Expansion, Reporting Audits, Attending GIRFT National Meetings, Clinical Governance with other MDT Members, Patient Experience and Feedback, Ensuring High Standards of Care are adhered to by Benchmarking Services. With the help of the consultants, matron, and managers, I played a key role in setting up the paediatric physiotherapy service for patients. I worked closely on every aspect of the referral process to discharge planning to ensure a timely flow of patients being admitted from A&E or trauma, as well as elective recovery with close coordination with the community teams.

Through teamwork, decision-making, and ensuring a seamless operational flow informed by change management principles, I have demonstrated great leadership during the Covid-19 pandemic, making sure local and national regulations were taken into mind when implementing these changes. I led the Achilles Tenotomy cost reduction programme, implementing the shift from the operating theatre to the outpatient setting while adhering to risk management, providing good stakeholder engagement, and improving patient satisfaction, staff morale and cost savings. I am well-versed in national and international policies, research and grasp the national and local health service strategy, and actively follow infection control recommendations and health and safety regulations both before and during my employment.

I try to lead by example and serve as an example for many of my department's colleagues. Since my values include being positive, open, polite, caring, thankful, and honest, I have high regard for the NHS's values 

Personal attributes:

My proactive approach to problem-solving encourages key stakeholders' participation in understanding the real issue, asking why, and using data to evaluate novel thoughts and ideas. I consider myself to be a visionary and compassionate leader who inspires people and teams to produce excellent results that improve patient pathways, increase empathy for families, and strengthen the entire service. I have a high level of emotional intelligence due to my openness and empathy, which supports the formation of peaceful, cooperative, and productive teams.

My open, honest, and fruitful relationships with clinical, managerial, and administrative colleagues and partners serve as a testament to my integrity, honesty, and resilience. I strive to be an inspiration to others and take responsibility for the success or failure of my team.

I have a positive attitude and perform well under pressure. I've honed a variety of talents to make sure I can adhere to deadlines and specifications in a demanding and hectic work environment. I have strong interpersonal skills, am a skilled negotiator, being methodical in my approach, and always make time for 1:1 meetings with my direct reports.

I set challenging but achievable individual and team targets and will provide positive feedback to colleagues on success but will equally address poor performance where required. My experience developing and delivering presentations on a wide range of topics to a wide range of audiences is extensive because presentations have always been a crucial component of my work (both in terms of size and level of expertise and seniority).

My leadership abilities have grown with experience, and I ensure that I am a visible presence by often walking the floor and interacting with co-workers to learn about their accomplishments and issues that need to be addressed.

Clinical skills: 

As the first ESP paediatric Orthopaedic physiotherapist employed at Maidstone and Tunbridge Wells NHS Trust, I played a critical role in setting up the paediatric physiotherapy department – both Inpatient and Outpatients Services (MSK and Paediatric Orthopaedic clinics). The specialist clinics were Consultants led, but ESP ran and hence it gave me an opportunity to widen my knowledge, scope and boundaries of expertise in this specialist field of Clubfoot, hip dysplasia and MSK clinics. I kept abreast of the latest developments by attending regular courses, advanced courses, competencies for radiology and basic skills surgical training where I assisted the consultants in minor surgical procedures. 
Throughout my career, I have advocated for and implemented good standards of practice leading to growth and improved quality in the service. Being the tertiary care centre in the South East region, I was responsible for the overall running of the service and escalating issues to make changes when required. My perseverance to achieve my objectives and targets for the clinics has been well appreciated across the Trust but in particular with the wider governance team.

Through my Ponseti (Clubfoot and Paediatric Orthopaedics) Fellowship in America in Iowa Institute in 2014, I was able to connect to global expertise, widen my network internationally and able to influence better patient care and support for my team and complex patients at Maidstone and Tunbridge wells NHS trust. 

I volunteered at the Wadia hospital for a month in August 2021 helping babies and families in the management of clubfeet and training other Orthopaedic surgeons. 

Operational management:

My strong negotiation and interpersonal skills have been employed extensively in initiating operational and service improvement decisions/ implementation within my team and key stakeholders.
I employed a range of skills to ensure the Paediatric Orthopaedic at MTW trust, service was set up both appropriately and successfully including good influencing skills, being flexible, friendly and working collaboratively across professional teams and departments. Key to the success of this service was effective stakeholder engagement and as such worked in partnership with managers, consultants and administrative staff. Identification of areas of improvement i.e. redesigning service pathways, improving capacity planning, skill mix, Audit, and improved use of resources, while supporting innovative methods of cost improvement plans has been some of the successfully delivered outcomes. Besides being involved in recruitment in my area of specialism, I aided in the EDI recruitment process in the organisation.
Performance management and dealing with staff disciplinary issues were some of the areas in which I have experience.

Efficiency and Productivity: 

I have learnt to apply the lean methodology, GIRFT benchmarking, and the development and discovery of efficiencies with an efficiency lens in order to find and reduce waste in a multifaceted and complicated system. This is necessary to guarantee that the position holder considers the risk and quality implications of all efforts. To strengthen our improvement programme, benchmark services utilising Model Hospital ad Get it Right First Time (GIRFT) tools.

 I have streamlined the Orthopaedics- MSK physiotherapy pathways which have helped in cost improvement for the overall department. I developed a business case in collaboration with the managers and consultants and engaged two extra ESPs rather than doctors, which eliminated major cost implications and defined specialisation and paths for the patients. With positive patient feedback, we successfully reduced the waiting list and met our KPI goal of seeing patients within eighteen weeks, which was in line with national standards.

MBA 

Bachelor of Physiotherapy