Workforce planning and strategy
The state of the UK Pathology Workforce
The pathology workforce is, first and foremost, people who dedicate their lives to pathology and laboratory services to the benefit of patients and healthcare. The amount and complexity of the work that they do are impacted by the expectations and the resources available, including the quality of the environment in which they function.
Workforce planning is essential to the provision of an efficient, high quality pathology service.
The College is committed to addressing the challenges facing our pathology workforce and recognises our role in advocating for the resources needed to ensure the long-term sustainability of pathology services.
The work the team do
To support workforce planning, the College has launched a new Workforce Strategy which is grounded by the following 6 aims:
- Gather and report on intelligence
- Engage and influence stakeholders
- Enable the next generation of pathologists (train)
- Support our established workforce (retain)
- Transform ways of working (reform)
- Prioritise patient care (contingency)
You can read the full strategy here
The College collates workforce data and intelligence through our workforce census, surveys, and research.
This data is then used to enable us to advocate for pathology when influencing key external stakeholders such as national policy makers and when responding to workforce consultations.
