How to Boost Your CQC Rating Through Better HR

Just how much attention does the Care Quality Commission (CQC) pay to HR practices when it carries out inspections on healthcare service providers?

We all know that CQC inspectors base their judgements on five key criteria - safety, effectiveness, responsiveness, leadership and how caring services are. There’s a lot of ground to cover - can HR really be front and centre of the inspectors’ thoughts when they are assessing a service on how safe and effective it is?

Based on an in-depth review of more than 250 inspection reports, we believe that yes,   the way healthcare providers manage and utilise their people is something the CQC is very much focused on when it carries out inspections. Moreover, it is our conclusion that, by making improvements to their HR practices, service providers can greatly increase their chances of achieving a good or outstanding CQC rating.

In this paper, we will use examples from a range of reports to show how CQC inspectors time and time again focus on four key areas of HR practice - Recruitment & Staffing, Documentation, Communication and Professional Development.

We will draw comparisons between examples from providers rated outstanding, good and requires improvement and make suggestions about what providers can do to improve their HR procedures and protocols ahead of their next inspection.