Lead Pharmacy Technician Governance & Medicines Safety
The closing date is 03 June 2026
An exciting opportunity for an enthusiastic and motivated Pharmacy Technician to join the Medicines Governance & Safety Team within the Pharmacy Department.
The successful post holder will support the development and delivery of medicines safety initiatives within pharmacy and across the Trust, helping to ensure safe, effective, and high‑quality use of medicines for patients.
Responsibilities
* Support the delivery of safe, effective and high‑quality services by supporting and co‑ordinating governance and risk management activities within the department.
* Assist in the investigation and reporting of medication incidents and near misses.
* Analyse trends from incident reporting systems and identify areas for improvement.
* Participate in medicines safety audits and quality improvement projects.
* Monitor compliance with medicines management policies and national guidance.
* Support the implementation of medicines‑related alert actions.
* Assist in the development and review of SOPs and medicines policies.
* Promote safe and secure handling of medicines across clinical areas.
* Deliver medicines safety training and education to pharmacy and ward staff.
* Work collaboratively with multidisciplinary teams to improve patient outcomes.
* Support controlled drug governance activities where required.
* Maintain accurate governance documentation and audit records.
* Produce routine and ad hoc reports for reporting within pharmacy, to the Trust and for external organisations such as CQC.
* Support the Principal Pharmacist for Governance and Medicines Safety Officer with identifying and managing risks and ensuring the risk register is maintained and presented to quality boards.
* Work with pharmacy department risk owners and assessors to develop appropriate actions to mitigate risk and ensure completion in a timely manner.
* Actively contribute to departmental audits, develop action plans and ensure completion of actions.
* Ensure completion of statutory audits and reviews for pharmacy and action outcomes.
* Support Health and Safety within the department including fire, first aid, equipment use and Control of Substances Hazardous to Health (COSHH).
* Ensure mandatory reporting on Health and Safety is completed timely and reported to pharmacy quality teams and the Trust.
* Compile reports on all aspects of pharmacy governance and medicines management.
* Coordinate production and review of pharmacy SOPs and policies, writing any related to risk management and governance that may impact the trust; maintain departmental SOP register.
* Support pharmacy department governance SOPs.
* Advise and act upon actions on temperature control monitoring systems across the department and wards; liaise with pharmacy informatics, pharmacy staff and nursing staff.
* Investigate and respond to patient complaints.
* Collect and enter data for the Controlled Drugs Local Intelligence Network and quarterly Controlled Drugs reports.
* Deputise for Principal Pharmacist for Governance and Medicines Safety Officer or Deputy Medicines Safety Officer for the Trust, managing reported incidents, following up and presenting data on KPIs and trending patterns, including duty of candour assessments.
* Produce routine and ad hoc reports for reporting to pharmacy, divisional teams, Trust wide or for external visits such as CQC or MHRA, ensuring data quality.
* Promote all staff to improve reporting and learning from medication‑related incidents and errors.
* Recommend actions to be taken for improvements following incidents, including training and education delivered to multidisciplinary groups for patient safety.
* Support implementation of changes in practice and processes regarding the safe use of medicines based on national benchmarking and learning.
* Communicate and advise on up‑to‑date information from external bodies such as MHRA and NHS England on best practices on safe usage of medicines, ensuring documentation.
* Carry out medicines‑related audits as required and support development of action plans.
* Support the management of drug recalls and alerts, ensuring all actions are completed and documented.
* Work closely with all healthcare professionals including medical and nursing staff groups and pharmacy staff to ensure the highest standards for medication safety across the organisation.
* Support technical team leaders in managing efficient operation by supporting staff rotas.
* Undertake accuracy checking and final release of dispensed items.
* Deliver ward‑based pharmacy service.
* Receive, interpret, validate, dispense and issue prescriptions.
* Participate in rotas for weekends, late weekdays and bank, statutory holidays and on‑call if required.
* Work at all times to the Trust values, policies and procedures and the GPhC code of conduct.
* Work flexibly across the department to meet service needs.
* Responsible for recruitment, induction and development of accountable staff and ensuring appraisals as required.
* Ensure all staff within area are adequately trained for their roles and maintain training records.
* Address any concerns regarding performance of staff within area of responsibility, working with trust policy for dealing with concerns.
* Assist in supervision and participation in delivery of training programme for foundation year trainee pharmacists, pre‑registration trainee pharmacy technicians and other department trainees.
* Undertake Continuing Professional Development as required by the GPhC.
* Identify own training needs and discuss with line manager.
* Perform other reasonable requests and duties as required, consistent with responsibilities and development agreed.
Experience
* Experience of providing operational pharmacy services in an acute hospital trust setting.
* Significant recent experience of successfully supervising the technical services for a section of a large pharmacy department or a smaller team.
* Experience of organising and managing in a busy and potentially stressful environment.
* Proven experience of successfully supervising staff (including dealing with simple HR issues such as sickness, personal development reviews), implementing service improvements or change.
* Experience of working with healthcare IT systems and automation. E.g. EDS, DMS, automated ward medicine storage.
* Experience in writing papers, reports, departmental SOPs and undertaking audits.
* Experience in identifying and managing risk.
* Recent experience of delivering a pharmacy technical service to wards.
* Experience in providing training to pre‑registration pharmacists and technicians, qualified pharmacists and technicians.
* Experience at representing pharmacy or a pharmacy team at Trust meetings/forums.
* Experience in conducting audit.
Qualifications
* NVQ Level 3 and BTEC in pharmaceutical science or equivalent.
* Registered with the GPhC.
* Current in-date accreditation as a Checking Technician.
* Meeting GPhC requirements for CPD.
* Has undertaken a mentoring/coaching course.
* Has undertaken leadership training.
* Has undertaken other relevant training related to clinical governance and/or medicines safety.
Knowledge and Skills
* Skilled at using Microsoft Office to produce documents e.g. SOPs (MS Word), compile reports and plan work schedules (MS Excel, Access, Lists), and prepare and deliver training presentations (MS Powerpoint).
* Skilled at using online information sources.
* Excellent communication and organisational skills.
* Knowledge and training in quality improvement.
* Considerable knowledge of hospital pharmacy and other NHS departments.
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.
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