Helping you get the most out of NOE CPC: An Overview of our Customer Engagement team
Welcome to latest update in our #TeamTalk series, where we put a spotlight on the teams that make up NOE CPC.
This month we’re focusing on the Customer Engagement team, who work closely with our colleagues at both our member organisations and the wider NHS and public sector, providing support and answering queries.
Helen Pendlebury, Head of Customer Engagement, gives us an overview of her team’s work.
“I joined NOE CPC in December, having previously worked for a workforce supplier to the NHS for many years. The role I'm doing now is not too different to my previous role. I was responsible for the account management and Business Development team along with framework relationships, and the majority of our customers were NHS or public sector. A lot of processes I am adopting now are processes I adopted in my previous role, such as utilising our Customer Relationship Management system, Microsoft Dynamics, to ensure we get the most out of it for both ourselves as an organisation and our customers. You can read more about that in my blog post on how we are using it as a system.
“My team helps to connect our procurement team with colleagues in the NHS and wider public sector, both members and non-members – whether it’s answering queries, arranging procurement support, providing management information or updating them on new frameworks.
Our team
“Our Customer Relationship Managers – Ian Coward, Gregg Welburn and Shafiq Rehman – work closely with our members, holding review meetings and ensuring our member organisations are getting everything they need out of NOE CPC. This includes support with routes to market, providing options for frameworks to use and updates on new frameworks and member rebates. And as more organisations work together as ICS groups, we also consider strategic opportunities for collaboration, and whether organisations can use their collective buying power to achieve savings.
“Lisa Broster, our Business Development Manager, works with non-members from across the UK, supporting them to access our frameworks, and also works closely with colleagues at NHS London Procurement Partnership, looking at shared opportunities and promoting their frameworks.
“Within NOE CPC, we work closely with a number of teams, including our procurement category teams, to keep them updated on our customers’ priorities and workplans.
“We are a growing organisation, and we see our new framework launches as big opportunities for growth, alongside working with new organisations across the UK, both within the NHS and the wider public sector.
“We work closely with our member ICS’s, analysing their data on contracts and spend to see how they might realise savings and efficiencies. This work involves looking at their existing contracts, which suppliers they are using, and whether there are opportunities to aggregate spend to increase discounts and support their aim for working more collaboratively across the ICS.
New members
“We have recently welcomed six new members. This means we now have all the provider trusts in the East Midlands – acute, mental health and community. Achieving full provider trust coverage across this region is a significant milestone for us. It reflects the strength of our member community and opens exciting opportunities to expand collaboration, share best practice, and deliver even greater benefits.
“We have also expanded in the North East, with North East Ambulance Service and City Hospitals Independent Commercial Enterprises Ltd (CHoICE), which is a wholly owned subsidiary of South Tyneside and Sunderland NHS Foundation Trust.
Customer Survey
“We will soon be launching our annual customer survey, and we are looking to increase the amount of feedback we capture this year by simplifying the questions and optimising the length of the survey. We have also made the questions more relevant to today’s challenges in the market.
“We also now have a mini-survey, which can be accessed via the email signature of everyone in the Customer Engagement team. This allows customers to give us an instant rating and includes a free text box so they can, if they wish, provide any feedback they may have about their experience with us.
Members Forum
“We have given our Members Forum a refresh, and rebranded it as CPC Connect. We know that the time customers invest in attending our events is previous, and we need to ensure it is a valuable, useful and relevant event, and gives customers an opportunity to network. So we have put a huge amount of thought into the agenda, and we hope it will be an engaging event.
“It is also a good opportunity for my team to connect with customers, in addition to the meetings we have with them on a regular basis. It’s nice to check in, answer any questions they have, and understand what their challenges are and how we can help.”