Are there workforce implications with neighbourhood working?

The UK government’s newly launched 10-Year Health Plan marks a transformative shift in how healthcare is delivered, moving away from hospital-centric models towards more community-based, neighbourhood-focussed services. This approach aims to make care more accessible, personalised and preventative, addressing the wider factors that influence people’s health and wellbeing.

Neighbourhood working is a key enabler of this shift. It’s a collaborative model that brings together statutory-led services (e.g. NHS Trusts or Integrated Care Boards), local government (such as councils managing housing or social care), and community-led groups (including charities, faith groups, and peer-led support networks) to design and deliver services tailored to the specific health and wellbeing needs of local populations.

Unlike traditional standard care pathways, which often follow rigid, centralised processes focussed on treating illness in clinical settings; neighbourhood working fosters a holistic view of people’s needs, tackling wider determinants like housing, employment, and social connection alongside health needs.

By integrating services, across health, social care, and the voluntary sector, neighbourhood working aims to build stronger, healthier communities. In person-centred, place-based approach allows services to be shaped by those who use and deliver them, grounded in the realities of smaller, local geographies.

As services are reorganised to move towards this more integrated, localised model, a crucial question emerges: what are the implications for the health and care workforce? In short, delivering neighbourhood working at scale will require a transformation, shaping new roles and competencies, integrating flexible workforce planning as well as increasing workforce capacity and rethinking career pathways.

New roles and competencies

As neighbourhood working becomes more widespread, staff will need to take on new roles and develop broader competencies. This approach demands professionals who are not only clinically skilled, but also adaptable, collaborative, and deeply connected to the communities they serve.

Why? Because in neighbourhood working, care isn’t delivered in isolation. It’s shaped by the wider social, economic, and environmental factors that influence health, things like housing insecurity, loneliness, or job loss. Supporting people effectively in this context means understanding the full picture of their lives, not just their clinical symptoms.

The workforce will therefore need to draw on more than just clinical knowledge. Skills such as active listening, relationship-building, community engagement, and trauma-informed care are just as important. A solid understanding of the social determinants of health helps staff offer support that genuinely fits the individual.

Neighbourhood working also places greater emphasis on asset-based approaches, treating individuals and communities as active partners in their care, not passive recipients. This shift transforms professional relationships. It’s no longer about “fixing” problems from a distance but about working alongside people to build on their strengths.

Integrated and flexible workforce planning

To make neighbourhood working a reality, workforce planning must move beyond traditional silos. This means taking a whole-system view, across health, social care, mental health, and the voluntary sector, to identify where skills already exist and how they can be better aligned. It’s not just about filling roles; it’s about shaping a workforce that reflects local needs and can respond to them with flexibility.

This kind of planning opens the door to creative workforce models. For example, a dental therapist could work within a neighbourhood team, supporting community-wide oral health initiatives. Bringing together professionals from different backgrounds enables more holistic, preventative care, catching issues early and supporting people in a more coordinated way. It reduces duplication, closes gaps between services, and makes the system easier for individuals to navigate.

To deliver this, systems leadership is essential. Leaders must be able to work across organisational boundaries, be less focussed on managing within their own service, and more focussed on co-designing with others. Community needs rarely fall neatly within one team or institution, so building multi-agency teams allows care to wrap around individuals, not the other way around.

Workforce capacity and career pathways

To support the shift towards neighbourhood working, workforce capacity needs to be built in the parts of the system closest to people’s everyday lives. That means investing in community-based roles such as district nurses, physiotherapists, occupational therapists, and community matrons; professionals who provide vital care outside of hospital settings.

These roles help reduce reliance on secondary care and specialist treatment provided in hospitals or by consultants, allowing issues to be managed earlier and more holistically, preventing escalation and keeping people well at home for longer.

But increasing capacity isn’t just about recruitment, it’s about retention and progression too. If neighbourhood teams are to thrive, staff need clear, fulfilling career pathways that reflect the complexity and value of their work. This might mean developing advanced community practitioner roles, enhanced pathways for allied health professionals, or leadership opportunities that allow staff to stay in neighbourhood settings without needing to move into hospital-based or managerial posts to progress.

So, are there workforce implications with neighbourhood working? Absolutely.

To succeed, neighbourhood working relies on a workforce that is not only clinically skilled, but also confident working across boundaries, building trust with communities, and responding to the wider social factors that shape health. It demands new roles, broader competencies, and a more collaborative, asset-based approach to care.

Equally, it requires flexible, integrated workforce planning that joins up sectors and supports people to work in different ways, often within teams and settings that haven’t traditionally worked together.

Crucially, this model won’t work without growing capacity in the right places. That means serious investment in community-based roles and the creation of meaningful, supported career pathways so that people can build long-term, fulfilling careers in neighbourhoods, rather than needing to leave for progression.

Neighbourhood working is ambitious. But if backed with the right workforce support, it offers a more connected, and person-centred way of working that can strengthen communities.

How we can help

At Skills for Health, we’re here to support the workforce at the heart of neighbourhood working. we can help you build the skills, roles, and careers needed for more connected, community-based care by getting in touch today.