Deputy Director of Medicines Optimisation, Chief Pharmacist

Hertfordshire Community NHS Trust

Job summary

The Deputy Director of Medicines Optimisation, Chief Pharmacist is responsible for the provision, management and strategic development of high quality, cost-effective pharmacy services across the Trust. The post holder is also responsible for the provision of expert advice in pharmacy practice and pharmaceutical matters to the organisation, senior managers and prescribers.

Proposed Interview date: 28th July 2026

Main duties of the job

Clinical

  • To act as an autonomous, registered practitioner who is legally and professionally accountable for own unsupervised actions guided by the professional code of conduct and Trust guidelines and protocols.
  • Provide expert clinical, therapeutic, legislative and best practice advice to promote safe, effective and cost-effective use of medicines, including clinical advice in areas where information is lacking and medical or other opinion differs.
  • Liaises with other stakeholders from health and social care across the organisation, locally and nationally to enable the development and delivery of new services involving the administration or supply of medicines, and the development and delivery of training packages for implementation of new and ongoing roles within community services, including new prescriber roles
  • To be responsible, and accountable, for pharmacy service delivery to patients, business partners and clients
  • To ensure the Patient group Directions for the Trust are managed and updated including acting as the Pharmacist signatory on HCT PGDs.
  • To ensure practice is supported by research, evidence based practice, literature and peer review
  • To be responsible for ensuring there are appropriate medicines formularies in place and they adhered to and monitored
  • To act as HCT’s representative in ICS formulary groups

Person Specification

QUALIFICATIONS

Essential

  • Degree in pharmacy Master level in Pharmacy (entry level for pharmacy profession) and one year pre!registration training
  • Registered with GPhC
  • Specialist knowledge acquired at post-degree level or equivalent
  • Evidence of continual professional development

Desirable

  • Other postgraduate qualifications in leadership or business management
  • Supplementary/independent prescriber

KNOWLEDGE & EXPERIENCE

Essential

  • An amount of post registration experience commensurate of the role
  • Experience in community or hospital pharmacy delivery
  • Experience of medicines management activities
  • Successful management of a service and pharmacy team
  • Budget management experience
  • Experience of undertaking prescribing audits / advice

Desirable

  • Experience of more than one sector of practice

SKILLS & ABILITIES

Essential

  • Excellent communicator both with healthcare professionals and patients
  • Can demonstrate understanding of clinical governance and risk management
  • Negotiation and co-operation using highly complex sensitive and contentious information
  • Excellent organisation skills Demonstrates knowledge of the changing NHS environment and vision, and is able to incorporate these into the strategic plan for Medicines Optimisation
  • Ability to prioritise effectively and work on own initiative Understanding of medicines legislation
  • Good IT skills including word processing, spreadsheets
  • Presenting complex issues to large audiences
  • Able to analyse and interpret budgetary data

Desirable

  • In depth specialist knowledge of NHS policy and current issues.
  • In-depth knowledge of prison pharmacy
  • Knowledge of drug therapeutics
  • Able to use System One Experience in provision of training and/or presentations
  • Able to use ePACT systems Extensive portfolio and evidence of experience with identifiable outcomes.
  • Experience of developing pharmacy service outcome indicators.

PERSONAL QUALITIES

Essential

  • Must be flexible and able to cope with unpredictable workload and multi-task
  • Able to lead and motivate a team
  • Able to work under stressful conditions and meet tight deadlines
  • Must be able to interpret and critically appraise reference sources and papers, reading and keeping up to date on professional and clinical issues
  • Ability to work within a team
  • Dynamic and innovative
  • Able to travel to other Trust sites and external venues as required
  • Able to speak and write English language to a high level
  • Self-motivated

OTHER

Essential

  • Willingness to uphold the Trust’s values
  • Eligible to live and work in the UK
  • Hold a full, valid, UK driving licence and have access to a car to use for business purposes (unless you have a disability as defined by the Equality Act 2010)

Disclosure and Barring Service Check

This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act (Exceptions Order) 1975 and as such it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service (formerly known as CRB) to check for any previous criminal convictions.

Certificate of Sponsorship

Applications from job seekers who require current Skilled worker sponsorship to work in the UK are welcome and will be considered alongside all other applications. For further information visit the UK Visas and Immigration website (Opens in a new tab).

From 6 April 2017, skilled worker applicants, applying for entry clearance into the UK, have had to present a criminal record certificate from each country they have resided continuously or cumulatively for 12 months or more in the past 10 years. Adult dependants (over 18 years old) are also subject to this requirement. Guidance can be found here Criminal records checks for overseas applicants (Opens in a new tab).

UK Registration

Applicants must have current UK professional registration. For further information please see
NHS Careers website (opens in a new window).

Closing Date: 17 July 2026

To apply for this job please visit apps.trac.jobs.