Technical Expertise / Workforce Development

Quality health care services rely on education and training systems that develop health workers’ clinical skills and knowledge in alignment with national health priorities. The Capacity Project aimed to achieve the following results within the area of workforce development:

1. Prepare more providers to meet priority national health needs with a particular emphasis on family planning/reproductive health
2. Strengthen pre-service education institutions, tutors and systems
3. Strengthen professional associations to support national workforce development and service delivery
4. Improve linkages among national plans and policies, education/training systems and strong professional associations.

The most significant results involved applying the Project's Learning for Performance (LFP) approach as well strengthening pre-service education and professional associations.

Lessons learned:

1. The LFP approach represents a useful instructional design tool and can play an important role in key strategies to address human resources for health issues, including task shifting, developing new cadres, accelerating training and deployment of emergency hires and aligning pre-service education and in-service training with national goals.
2. The highly participatory nature of LFP contributes to the approach’s success. Applying LFP fosters teamwork and improves collaboration and communication among managers, teachers, trainers, preceptors and supervisors, which in turn improves student/trainee learning and performance. The benefits of involving stakeholders must take into consideration the time that participatory activities require.
3. A comprehensive approach to pre-service education strengthening can be accomplished in just three to four years.
4. Because many donors and countries alike continue to view pre-service education as expensive, long-term and difficult to evaluate, there is a need to generate more compelling evidence that this is a fruitful area for investment.
5. Professional associations are an important entry point for developing and strengthening health worker leadership skills, especially among cadres that are primarily female.
6. Access to smart phones and other information technologies is rapidly changing the options for expanding and strengthening curriculum development.
7. Establishing education programs closer to rural areas can improve deployment of health cadres to those areas (e.g., Gao Nursing School in Mali).

Learn more about the Project’s workforce development results.

Related resources:

• "A New Era": Health Information Resource Centers in Southern Sudan
• Applying the Learning for Performance Approach
• Better Service for the Client and the Community": Strengthening HIV Training in Belize
• Building Capacity to Save Women’s Lives in Mali
• Building Stronger Human Resources for Health through Licensure, Certification and Accreditation
• Continuing Professional Development Accreditation System for Uganda
• Developing the Health Workforce: Training Future Nurses and Midwives in Rwanda
• Final Feasibility Evaluation for No-Scalpel Vasectomy in Rwanda
• Gender-Based Violence Training Modules
• Guidelines and Standards for Accreditation of Continuing Professional Development for Health Workers
• Health Worker Education and Training
• Implementation of the Learning for Performance Approach at the Gao Nursing School in Mali: Final Report
• Implementation of the Learning for Performance Approach in Rwanda: Final Report
• Integrating Gender in HRH Projects
• It Takes a Workforce: Improving Global Health Services
• IUD Guidelines for Family Planning Service Programs: Course Handbook for Participants
• IUD Guidelines for Family Planning Service Programs: Course Notebook for Trainers
• IUD Guidelines for Family Planning Service Programs: A Problem-Solving Reference Manual
• Learning for Performance: A Guide and Toolkit for Health Worker Training and Education Programs
• Performance-Based Learning: Applying a New Approach at a Nursing School in Mali
• Promising Practices
• Repositioning Family Planning: Rwanda’s No-Scalpel Vasectomy Program
• The Role of Health Systems Strengthening in Effectively Updating and Disseminating Family Planning/Reproductive Health Guidelines
• Starting with the Classroom: Updating Family Planning Knowledge in East Africa
• Strengthening Health Professional Associations
• Strengthening Professional Associations for Health Workers
• Supporting Existing Health Cadres in Learning New Skills
• Training Health Workers in Africa: Documenting Faith-Based Organizations’ Contributions
• Updating and Disseminating Guidelines for Family Planning and Reproductive Health: The Role of Health Systems Strengthening

See other areas in Technical Expertise: Workforce Planning and Leadership; Performance Support; Knowledge Management