Stockport NHS Foundation Trust

Assistant Chief Nurse

The closing date is 27 March 2026

Job summary

Job Summary:

The post holder is a key member of the Corporate Nursing Directorate supporting senior nurses and midwives in developing practice. The post holder will have specific responsibility for supporting the Chief Nurse and Deputy Chief Nurse tothe effectively deliver the corporate nursing agenda, and provide professional and managerial leadership for the multidisciplinary team within their areas of responsibility

Main duties of the job

Main Duties and Responsibilities

Provide professional leadership for all nurses

Provide professional advice on a range of highly complex nursing care and delivery issues.

Advise and appraise the Chief Nurse and Deputy Chief Nurse of professional issues as necessary

Ensure consistent delivery of the highest quality and professional nursing care across areas of responsibility.

Interpret and disseminate national policy and guidelines within sphere of responsibility ensuring the adoption of best practice and improvement.

Support the Divisional Directors of Nursing to ensure that nursing staff are fully engaged in plans and developments in line with Trust strategy.

Deputise for the Deputy Chief Nurse as required.

Support the Divisional Nurse Directors by being proactive in identifying and assisting to resolve specific and recurrent issues.

Attend divisional and corporate meetings as appropriate

Participate in the Senior Professional Nurse rota.

Be the nursing contact for advice and support for any issues relating to Trust IT strategy/ development work.

Work closely with the Trust CCIO on collaboration and engagement with Nursing Leadership around digital strategy delivery.

Support the development and introduction of the ACP workforce Lead

Adherence to the NMC code of Practice

About us

We hold a unique position in the Stockport community as the provider of healthcare and we are one of its largest employers.

We believe that the best organisations are those that reflect the communities they serve. We are therefore seeking to improve the diversity of our workforce to make it truly representative of our local population.

We actively encourage applications irrespective of race, age, disability, sex, gender reassignment, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, religion or belief, marriage & civil partnership, or pregnancy or maternity. Recognising those communities that are underrepresented within our workforce, we would particularly welcome applications from you.

If you require support with your application please contact a member of the recruitment team, who can discuss alternative application methods.

We recognise that flexible working is important. We take requests for flexible working seriously, consider any request we receive and try to work with you, so we can explore if your request may fit with the needs of the service.

Benefits we offer to you:

  • Between 27-33 days of annual leave plus bank holidays
  • NHS pension scheme membership
  • Salary sacrifice schemes for lease cars, home electronics and more, to make your salary go further
  • NHS Staff discounts
  • Cycle to work scheme
  • Salary finance - for loans, savings, budget planning and tips on managing debt
  • Stockport Credit Union- for local financial advice

Details

Date posted

13 March 2026

Pay scheme

Agenda for change

Band

Band 8c

Salary

£76,965 to £88,682 a year per annum

Contract

Secondment

Working pattern

Full-time

Reference number

362-NAM8CNUR-02-26

Job locations

Stockport Foundation Trust

stockport

SK2 7JE


Job description

Job responsibilities

Communications

Demonstrate excellent interpersonal and communication skills and develop effective relationships with particular focus for the Divisional Nurse Directors, Matrons and the multidisciplinary team.

Provide, analyse and receive highly complex and sensitive information as appropriate.

Where necessary communicate nursing issues to a wider audience e.g. The Board of Directors, and system partners

Cascade digital communications to the wider nursing groups and ensure stakeholders are up to date.

Support the Trusts staff counselling work as necessary

Responsibility for Patient Care

Advise and appraise the Chief Nurse and Deputy Chief Nurse and Chief Nurse on professional / quality issues.

Support the Chief Nurse and the Deputy Chief Nurse, work with the senior nursing team and other senior clinical staff and managers to ensure the successful delivery of the Trust's Quality Strategy.

Support the Deputy Director of Quality Governance to ensure compliance with the CQC standards.

Provide line management responsibility for the Corporate Quality Team and ensure the STARs accreditation reviews of wards and departments are undertaken in a timely, effective and efficient manner and any resulting action plans are in place and agreed by the Divisional Nursing Director(s).

Be responsible for the professional and operational delivery of high quality clinical care standards to support care delivery, ensuring that patients are always treated with dignity and respect.

Be clinically accountable and ensure the delivery of harm free patient care strategies.

Accountable for excellent patient experience, actively support the divisions in the provision of high quality, modern, dynamic patient centred services.

Provide care, compassion and support to patients and their relatives/ carers.

Provide professional leadership for other Nurses/ Clinical staff within the clinical IT team

Planning and organising

Contribute to the strategic direction of the Trust through membership of corporate meetings, taking the lead as directed.

Lead on trust wide changes to practice, ensuring clear implementation, training requirements and deadlines for trust wide compliance.

Maintain and improve the profile of nursing in line with national and local priorities.

Active member of the Digital Design Authority and IT Development Panel to prioritise requests made to the internal development team, including clinical applications used across the Trust.

Responsibilities for Physical and / or Financial Resources

Contribute to budget setting and business planning decisions within the department ensuring that nursing budgets are effectively managed contributing to the achievement of financial balance in the directorate.

Ensure systems are in place for assessing and prioritising the purchasing of medical devices / equipment.

Work with staff in education and training to promote compliance.

Responsibility for Policy and Service Development and Implementation

To ensure the implementation of national, local and Trust standards of best practice to patients

To develop and lead initiatives and programmes to deliver the strategic aims of the Trust.

Work with Divisional Nurse Directors to identify, monitor and manage risk.

Promote a culture where clinical staff and other staff actively involved in the decisions on how digital systems are services are provided, governed and delivered.

Contribute to the development of new models of care by working collaboratively with internal and external stakeholders as appropriate.

To participate in the development of trust wide polices, ensuring dissemination and implementation across the organisation.

Be accountable for the development, implementation and performance of identified KPIs and metrics.

Actively support the Trusts Quality strategy, taking responsibility for identified key areas.

Support the development of and contribute to programs of learning to deliver the Trusts strategic aims.

Responsibilities for Human Resources and Leadership

Provide day to day visible, accessible and professional leadership in clinical areas.

Contribute to and promote a culture that embodies the Trust values, recognising and acknowledging achievement and success whilst positively addressing poor performance, succession planning and talent management.

Support and empower senior nurses, matrons and clinical leads to develop and utilise clinical leadership skills ensuring appropriate levels of authority and accountability to undertake their roles effectively.

Provide line management and support to staff within the corporate nursing team and to other senior / specialist nurses as required.

Work with senior nurses and staff from Human Resources in establishing a nursing workforce which is competent and flexible and able to meet the changing demands of healthcare considering new roles in line with service developments.

Responsibility for appraisal, training and development of corporate nursing team staff.

Provide professional accountability for staff as required e.g. Matron for Estates and Facilities, Senior Nurse Clinical Research Nurse and Senior Healthcare Nurse in Public Health.

Support the Divisional Nurse Directors to ensure the planning and delivery of safe staffing.

Act as nursing advisory lead on disciplinary panels as required.

Lead or commission investigations into nursing practice following serious incidents and complaints, ensuring that any organisational learning is disseminated.

Responsibilities for Teaching and Training

Work with the Education and Training team to support leadership and coaching

development for clinical staff across the Trust.

Provide professional Nursing advice and support the development and delivery of staff training programmes as required.

Responsibilities for data and information resources

Understand and use all performance reports and dashboards, track the progress of quality and nursing metrics.

Understand and use effectively all data relating to nurse staffing

To undertake formal investigations in relation to complaints and incidents through root cause analysis, reporting back within agreed time limits and ensuring lessons are learnt, action plans are implemented, and progress is monitored and reported appropriately.

Utilise clinical metrics for process, performance and patient experience data to improve clinical care and ensure that nursing teams act on this information, action plans are implemented, and progress is monitored and reported appropriately.

Research, Development and Audit

To ensure that results of audits are incorporated into clinical practice across the Trust and that improvement is monitored by timely re-audit.

Undertake and be involved in audit and research activity in line with service need, departmental requests and local and national requirements.

Be responsible for facilitating a culture of Research and Innovation within the Nursing and Allied Health Professions and participating in the Trust Research and Innovation forum representing nursing

Physical Skills and Effort

To safely use both clinical and non-clinical equipment in order to carry out the role.

Use of physical effort to carry out the demands of the job (e.g., pushing and pulling trolleys/ support to manoeuvre patients).

To undertake the necessary training to ensure safe use of the medical devices and equipment.

Job description

Job responsibilities

Communications

Demonstrate excellent interpersonal and communication skills and develop effective relationships with particular focus for the Divisional Nurse Directors, Matrons and the multidisciplinary team.

Provide, analyse and receive highly complex and sensitive information as appropriate.

Where necessary communicate nursing issues to a wider audience e.g. The Board of Directors, and system partners

Cascade digital communications to the wider nursing groups and ensure stakeholders are up to date.

Support the Trusts staff counselling work as necessary

Responsibility for Patient Care

Advise and appraise the Chief Nurse and Deputy Chief Nurse and Chief Nurse on professional / quality issues.

Support the Chief Nurse and the Deputy Chief Nurse, work with the senior nursing team and other senior clinical staff and managers to ensure the successful delivery of the Trust's Quality Strategy.

Support the Deputy Director of Quality Governance to ensure compliance with the CQC standards.

Provide line management responsibility for the Corporate Quality Team and ensure the STARs accreditation reviews of wards and departments are undertaken in a timely, effective and efficient manner and any resulting action plans are in place and agreed by the Divisional Nursing Director(s).

Be responsible for the professional and operational delivery of high quality clinical care standards to support care delivery, ensuring that patients are always treated with dignity and respect.

Be clinically accountable and ensure the delivery of harm free patient care strategies.

Accountable for excellent patient experience, actively support the divisions in the provision of high quality, modern, dynamic patient centred services.

Provide care, compassion and support to patients and their relatives/ carers.

Provide professional leadership for other Nurses/ Clinical staff within the clinical IT team

Planning and organising

Contribute to the strategic direction of the Trust through membership of corporate meetings, taking the lead as directed.

Lead on trust wide changes to practice, ensuring clear implementation, training requirements and deadlines for trust wide compliance.

Maintain and improve the profile of nursing in line with national and local priorities.

Active member of the Digital Design Authority and IT Development Panel to prioritise requests made to the internal development team, including clinical applications used across the Trust.

Responsibilities for Physical and / or Financial Resources

Contribute to budget setting and business planning decisions within the department ensuring that nursing budgets are effectively managed contributing to the achievement of financial balance in the directorate.

Ensure systems are in place for assessing and prioritising the purchasing of medical devices / equipment.

Work with staff in education and training to promote compliance.

Responsibility for Policy and Service Development and Implementation

To ensure the implementation of national, local and Trust standards of best practice to patients

To develop and lead initiatives and programmes to deliver the strategic aims of the Trust.

Work with Divisional Nurse Directors to identify, monitor and manage risk.

Promote a culture where clinical staff and other staff actively involved in the decisions on how digital systems are services are provided, governed and delivered.

Contribute to the development of new models of care by working collaboratively with internal and external stakeholders as appropriate.

To participate in the development of trust wide polices, ensuring dissemination and implementation across the organisation.

Be accountable for the development, implementation and performance of identified KPIs and metrics.

Actively support the Trusts Quality strategy, taking responsibility for identified key areas.

Support the development of and contribute to programs of learning to deliver the Trusts strategic aims.

Responsibilities for Human Resources and Leadership

Provide day to day visible, accessible and professional leadership in clinical areas.

Contribute to and promote a culture that embodies the Trust values, recognising and acknowledging achievement and success whilst positively addressing poor performance, succession planning and talent management.

Support and empower senior nurses, matrons and clinical leads to develop and utilise clinical leadership skills ensuring appropriate levels of authority and accountability to undertake their roles effectively.

Provide line management and support to staff within the corporate nursing team and to other senior / specialist nurses as required.

Work with senior nurses and staff from Human Resources in establishing a nursing workforce which is competent and flexible and able to meet the changing demands of healthcare considering new roles in line with service developments.

Responsibility for appraisal, training and development of corporate nursing team staff.

Provide professional accountability for staff as required e.g. Matron for Estates and Facilities, Senior Nurse Clinical Research Nurse and Senior Healthcare Nurse in Public Health.

Support the Divisional Nurse Directors to ensure the planning and delivery of safe staffing.

Act as nursing advisory lead on disciplinary panels as required.

Lead or commission investigations into nursing practice following serious incidents and complaints, ensuring that any organisational learning is disseminated.

Responsibilities for Teaching and Training

Work with the Education and Training team to support leadership and coaching

development for clinical staff across the Trust.

Provide professional Nursing advice and support the development and delivery of staff training programmes as required.

Responsibilities for data and information resources

Understand and use all performance reports and dashboards, track the progress of quality and nursing metrics.

Understand and use effectively all data relating to nurse staffing

To undertake formal investigations in relation to complaints and incidents through root cause analysis, reporting back within agreed time limits and ensuring lessons are learnt, action plans are implemented, and progress is monitored and reported appropriately.

Utilise clinical metrics for process, performance and patient experience data to improve clinical care and ensure that nursing teams act on this information, action plans are implemented, and progress is monitored and reported appropriately.

Research, Development and Audit

To ensure that results of audits are incorporated into clinical practice across the Trust and that improvement is monitored by timely re-audit.

Undertake and be involved in audit and research activity in line with service need, departmental requests and local and national requirements.

Be responsible for facilitating a culture of Research and Innovation within the Nursing and Allied Health Professions and participating in the Trust Research and Innovation forum representing nursing

Physical Skills and Effort

To safely use both clinical and non-clinical equipment in order to carry out the role.

Use of physical effort to carry out the demands of the job (e.g., pushing and pulling trolleys/ support to manoeuvre patients).

To undertake the necessary training to ensure safe use of the medical devices and equipment.

Person Specification

Application form

Essential

  • Registered Nurse

Application form

Essential

  • Management/Leadership qualification

Application form

Essential

  • First degree or equivilant

Application form

Essential

  • Masters degree or equivalent
Person Specification

Application form

Essential

  • Registered Nurse

Application form

Essential

  • Management/Leadership qualification

Application form

Essential

  • First degree or equivilant

Application form

Essential

  • Masters degree or equivalent

Disclosure and Barring Service Check

This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act (Exceptions Order) 1975 and as such it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service (formerly known as CRB) to check for any previous criminal convictions.

Certificate of Sponsorship

Applications from job seekers who require current Skilled worker sponsorship to work in the UK are welcome and will be considered alongside all other applications. For further information visit the UK Visas and Immigration website (Opens in a new tab).

From 6 April 2017, skilled worker applicants, applying for entry clearance into the UK, have had to present a criminal record certificate from each country they have resided continuously or cumulatively for 12 months or more in the past 10 years. Adult dependants (over 18 years old) are also subject to this requirement. Guidance can be found here Criminal records checks for overseas applicants (Opens in a new tab).

UK Registration

Applicants must have current UK professional registration. For further information please see NHS Careers website (opens in a new window).

Additional information

Disclosure and Barring Service Check

This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act (Exceptions Order) 1975 and as such it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service (formerly known as CRB) to check for any previous criminal convictions.

Certificate of Sponsorship

Applications from job seekers who require current Skilled worker sponsorship to work in the UK are welcome and will be considered alongside all other applications. For further information visit the UK Visas and Immigration website (Opens in a new tab).

From 6 April 2017, skilled worker applicants, applying for entry clearance into the UK, have had to present a criminal record certificate from each country they have resided continuously or cumulatively for 12 months or more in the past 10 years. Adult dependants (over 18 years old) are also subject to this requirement. Guidance can be found here Criminal records checks for overseas applicants (Opens in a new tab).

UK Registration

Applicants must have current UK professional registration. For further information please see NHS Careers website (opens in a new window).

Employer details

Employer name

Stockport NHS Foundation Trust

Address

Stockport Foundation Trust

stockport

SK2 7JE


Employer's website

http://www.stockport.nhs.uk/ (Opens in a new tab)

Employer details

Employer name

Stockport NHS Foundation Trust

Address

Stockport Foundation Trust

stockport

SK2 7JE


Employer's website

http://www.stockport.nhs.uk/ (Opens in a new tab)

Employer contact details

For questions about the job, contact:

Deputy Chief Nurse

Helen Howard

Helen.howard@stockport.nhs.uk

01614195014

Details

Date posted

13 March 2026

Pay scheme

Agenda for change

Band

Band 8c

Salary

£76,965 to £88,682 a year per annum

Contract

Secondment

Working pattern

Full-time

Reference number

362-NAM8CNUR-02-26

Job locations

Stockport Foundation Trust

stockport

SK2 7JE


Supporting documents

Privacy notice

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