Patient Experience Manager

Patient Experience Manager - Horatio s Garden, Stoke Mandeville

Salary: £36,000 FTE

Location: The National Spinal Injuries Centre, Stoke Mandeville Hospital, Aylesbury

Contract type/ hours: Full time, permanent. 37.5 hours a week, to include 5 hours on one weekend afternoon, every other week

Closing date: Wednesday 30 April, 2025

Start date: End May/beginning June 2025

We are seeking an enthusiastic and experienced manager for a prestigious new role in our garden at the National Spinal Injuries Centre at Stoke Mandeville.

Horatio s Garden is a nationwide charity creating and nurturing beautifully designed gardens in NHS s spinal injury centres. The Patient Experience Manager will be the figure head/ambassador for the garden.

You will be responsible for the smooth running of a thriving, vibrant garden ensuring the patient and their family are appropriately supported throughout their time in Stoke Mandeville.

This role requires you to manage a large established team of volunteers and work closely with the Gardener who maintains the horticultural standard of the garden and delivers therapeutic horticulture sessions.

You will be managed by the national Patient Experience Lead, as well as developing and maintaining relationships with clinical and non-clinical NHS staff, corporate sponsors, funders, the Fundraising team, and the Events Programme Manager.

The fully accessible garden has been beautifully designed and maintained, and the role of the garden needs to reflect an appropriate environment for patients and their families at all stages of their recovery. From the initial welcome, to ensuring the contact and relationship is consistent with activities to suit their needs.

You will be responsible for developing and delivering social activities, supported by the charity s Events Programme Manager and in collaboration with the wider Stoke Mandeville team. These activities will mainly need to be held on a weekend afternoon which is a critical time in the garden when most patients are available and often have friends and family to visit. Currently the Arts programme includes crafts, quizzes, seasonal celebrations with lunches, in addition sessional creative experts also deliver glass fusing workshops, felting, printing, talks, painting, ceramic workshop, live music performances.

This is a fantastic opportunity for a confident, proactive individual who is efficient, well organised and has outstanding communication and relationship building skills. You will need to be adaptable and friendly and confident working with a wide range of people including people with spinal injuries and their families, NHS staff, volunteers and many different teams within the charity.

Key Responsibilities include:

Develop relationships with patients and families to ensure the best experience for them in the garden at every stage of their rehabilitation

Develop and maintain productive and collaborative relationships with NHS clinical teams and voluntary services

Work with the newly appointed Impact Manager to monitor patient experience and the impact of the garden

Manage the team of volunteers to ensure the smooth running of the garden with patient experience at its core

Maintain a consistent social and arts activity programme appropriate for the current patient group, liaising with the Events Programme Manager and managing the volunteers accordingly

Host corporate sponsor events and fundraising opportunities

Work with fundraising managers and volunteers to develop opportunities to generate income in the garden through friends, corporate friends and third-party fundraising

Ensure the garden is managed to allow the correct balance is in place to benefit both patients and external parties (major donors, trusts, corporate groups and other visitors)

Represent the garden and charity at key events and speaking opportunities

Work closely with the communications team to develop and ensure clear messaging in and outside the garden

Ensure all budgeting and administrative tasks associated with the garden are monitored, completed and maintained

Knowledge, Skills and Experience

Essential

• Outstanding interpersonal skills with the ability to successfully develop new working relationships
• Experience of leading and managing teams
• Experience of working with volunteers
• Stakeholder engagement and networking
• Excellent communication skills
• Confident public speaker
• Delivering social events
• Experience in managing budgets and petty cash
• Good IT skills, specifically proficient with Microsoft Office 365: Outlook, Word, Excel, PowerPoint

Desirable

• Experience of working with the NHS or in a health care setting
• Interest and understanding in wellbeing benefits of gardens
• Experience of therapeutic activities
• Digital photography
• Supplier management and ordering

Qualities

• Professional and confident
• Excellent communication and relationship building skills
• Proactive, can-do attitude
• Empathetic and kind
• Calm under pressure
• Ability to prioritise and adapt to changing needs of each working day
• Self-motivated and capable of working with the minimum of direction but understanding the limits of your knowledge and able to seek advice when required

As a Charity we are committed to creating and promoting a culture that protects and preserves the welfare of the vulnerable people in our care. Our safer recruitment practices support this by ensuring that there is a consistent and thorough process of obtaining and evaluating information from and about candidates including criminal record checks, to ensure that all persons appointed are suitable to work for our Charity.

We are an equal opportunity employer and welcome applications from all sectors of society.

NOTE: DBS, medical and reference checks will be conducted as part of the recruitment process.