About us

Who we are and how we can help you

Skills for Health is your Sector Skills Council, for all health employers; NHS, independent and third sector. Everything we do is driven by your skills and workforce needs.

We can help you in three ways:

• firstly, we offer tested solutions and tools to help you improve productivity and quality
• secondly, we can directly support you and your staff to plan and manage workforce development and change
• thirdly, as the employers’ authoritative voice on skills issues, we represent your views and champion the effective investment in skills that you need.

Influencing policy

As your Sector Skills Council, Skills for Health acts as the voice of healthcare employers in the skills system.

Ensuring government policy reflects the needs of health employers

We influence skills, education and health policy to ensure that it reflects employers’ needs and helps develop a world class healthcare workforce able to meet changing needs and expectations.

We do this by lobbying and working with a range of Government departments, agencies and stakeholders as well as collating and delivering responses to policy consultations.

Helping you deliver on key policy priorities

We identify key policy priorities and provide you with a range of resources to help you deliver against them.

Skills for Health was relicensed in 2009 following a review by the National Audit Office with an ‘outstanding’ contribution to workforce redesign. The UK Commission for Employment and Skills (UKCES) is responsible for the relicensing process for the 25 Sector Skills Councils.

Skills for Health’s strategic plan covers the period 2010-2015.