The Service Summary is just a place where you can collect all your service information, data and evidence in a succinct way.
The service summary came about after many discussions with Directors or Nursing and General Managers. It contains the key pieces of information that they felt were often lacking about the contribution of the role. Used in conjunction with a job plan it can go a long way toward showing the complexity of your role to others. It also allows you to articulate what would happen if you were not in post.
It’s important to remember that the service summary is mostly about your service not you. This means a lot of the “heat” and personal feeling is put to one side leaving you with a clear and objective document.
It should ideally stretch to no more than two sides – it’s a shop window for your service and its benefits.
The service summary is also the place where you can start to look at gaps in a logical way. It contains a gap analysis section (what could you do if you had some more resources?) and a Strengths Weakness Opportunities Threats (SWOT) analysis.
It’s pretty straightforward and a template and real life example are given here.
Please download the Blank Template to your computer before you make any changes, otherwise your changes will not be saved.