NHS Trusts are part of the NHS. Each NHS Trust is responsible for providing some of your local health services. For example, some NHS Trusts run hospitals, whilst others provide ambulance services. Recruiting capable and committed staff to work in these organisations is vital. So with a big drive on, to recruit Healthcare Assistants, The Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital NHS Trust turned to Positive Advertising for a fresh perspective. With some clients we don’t receive enough information. Others can throw an entire library at us. Fortunately the Trust has the balance right – enough for us to swim, but not enough for us to drown.
For the campaign, the Trust wanted radio advertising, posters/banners for recruitment events and a leaflet for people interested in becoming Healthcare Assistants. The brief and campaign theme, ‘Making a Difference’, were clear and the target demographic accurately defined.
That sounds easy enough then. But organizations, like the Trust, are very inclusive – which is good when it comes to defining best practice on the wards, but can be problematic when it comes to simplifying the communication process. Unless, as in this case, the Trust had a firm hand on the tiller. It’s in the nature of large organizations to invite comment and contribution – which means that a 30 second radio ad can easily balloon to 5 minutes, once every possible angle, piece of information and policy sub-clause has been added. That’s why they say that a giraffe is a horse designed by a committee and an elephant is a mouse built to government specifications. Fortunately, we had a good client side expert who was able to filter and refine, in order to avoid swamping us with information bloat.
As we saw it, our task was to strip away any extraneous detail, and avoid mixed messages, to get to the heart of the problem – what creative solution would persuade the right people to apply to become Healthcare Assistants, or visit the open days to learn more.
Our solution was to build a sense of worth into the campaign. To establish that Healthcare Assistants are a vital part of the NHS team; a caring profession, with prospects to go on to full nurse training. We would then contrast and compare with home life, or any dead-end jobs that candidates may find frustrating and unfulfilling. The benefits and duties were pared back to a minimum, as we felt that information overload would be counterproductive at this stage. The campaign was designed to spark interest and have a clear and simple call for action. All the detail would be made available at the next step. The most important elements were visual impact and tone of voice – sincere, simply phased, but not condescending.
The printed materials had to work in tandem with the PCT’s Annual Report and Website. Timescales were of the ‘can we have it last week’ variety as the road shows were already booked and the budget tight – which is why our designer, Christina, relaunched her modelling career.
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