Leave Manager

04/09/2020 Leave Manager Meeting- Before I left at 11:30

Karolina Wlodowska
Gerard O'Reily
Andrew Petherbridge
Mike Richardson
Jo Stevens
Karina George
Adrian Ashley
Sebastian Kwok
Alistair Pringle
James Harris
Ade Adekoya

Wessex - Used more simplicist version- Accent manager was used with few issues. If asked to move to accent there might be some revolt - Not comfortable to let go back to it with trust. There is issue of resource?
Gerard- LM+ they have few resource to manage system - they work with trust colleagues in the approval chain with leave manager plus. Trainee apply through interpid - Rota coordinator equivalent and also on payment through trust only generate monthly report. Leave manager plus takes off the approval chain - one advantage and put the responsibility back to the school as regards their specialties. Leave manager was difficult to use with loads of traffics which needs contacting the educators and Leave manager plus takes this problem off

Key Differences between LM and LM+

Standard and Exception request: LM+ has a dropdown list of approved courses based upon programme and grade (thus removing the approval chain and potential hold ups). If the trainee’s activity is not on the list at all, they are able to complete an exception request (requires an educator approver like a Head of School or TPD). LM does not have courses that are already whitelisted - they are all exceptions.
Internal and External Leave: LM+ distinguishes between internal and external leave. Internal leave is for activities provided by the school, training programme or HEE (e.g. leader and management programme, local teaching etc.) and is part of a pre-approved list. Anything not on the list is classified as external leave. Trainees generally have more internal than external leave (e.g. 20 to 10) but as they progresses in seniority this may shift (e.g. 15 to 15) to reflect the trainee’s more specialised interest. There is the ability to transfer internal and external days at TPD’s discretion (if part of PDP for example). LM does not have the concept of internal or external leave.
Entitlement: Trusts can set up entitlements and budgets which are used up as trainees apply over the year. LM trainees can submit requests even if there is no budget or entitlement left, creating the possibility of unnecessary administrative work in declining these redundant applications. LM+ will not allow submissions if there is no budget or entitlement remaining.
Reporting: LM+ enables user to generate a spreadsheet to send to the trusts containing their reimbursements (i.e. not reliant on the trusts). LM users are reliant on the trust in providing a manual spreadsheet of what they should be reimbursed.

South - No dedicated team to manage LM - but only manage access and issues not the daily flow activities , more time managing intrepid issues more that TIS issue by the team (4 people).

Summary
LM+ is the desirable model for the immediate future which the South is happy to move to.
South (Wessex) did raise concerns with the timescale and did not want to become trapped in a cycle of testing with no usable product, which happened previously.
East Midlands will assist South with the transition by providing their resources/documents for the South to adapt.

An overview of the LM+ application process in the East Midlands