Band 7 NHS interview - SLT

[CuteAsDuck]

Looking for some advice please!

I have a band 7 speech and language therapist interview coming up. I have very limited interview experience as have been in the same role a number of years.

Anyone (but particularly SLTs!) able to share advice as to the types of questions likely to come up. I've pored the job description and expect there will be a focus on leadership/management as well as the clinical stuff but would be interested to hear anyones recent experience of Band 7 interviews?

Thank you.

*pored over

Which clinical area?

I believe It's a speech and language therapy interview. Considering it’s band 7, please expect some questions around management and policies. People management, like around supervision, is like "How will you manage a poor-performing band of 5 or 6?"

You must be prepared to answer ice-breaker questions like, "Why did you apply for this post?"

What can you offer?

Read about trusting your vision before hand.

You should be well aware of the Nice guidelines that are relevant to your area.

Good Luck !!

• Trust Vision

I had one in 2021. I had to do a presentation and the questions were around the specialism and service delivery management. I think there were the obligatory safeguarding, dealing with conflict etc questions

@flawless29

Clinical as in adult, learning disabilities, paeds.

Really should have though to include that! Paeds - primarily a DLD caseload.

Thank you that's really helpful. I am so nervous in interviews and forget everything I want to say so trying to be as prepared as possible!

Thank you that's really useful. I imagine service delivery management will be a big one as there are some significant changes afoot in the service provision.

Most Trusts have moved over to values based interviews following the Mid Staffordshire NHS Trust inquiry. So know your Trust values and how you would apply them in your role.

Managing conflict
Mistakes you have made and how you managed this.
Have an example of safeguarding up your sleeve.
Have examples of how you have supported with educating and/or clinical supervision of staff staff, managing change, evidence based practice or use of current research/ new guidelines in clinical practice.
Understanding of the audit cycle/governance
Your passions/visions for change.

Have at least 6 recent complex cases in mind you can use as evidence to demonstrate you are capable of working at band 7 level.

At band 7 level the questions will be less about ‘clinical situation x, what would you do?’ and more about giving you opportunities to showcase that you have the clinical reasoning skills, clinical mileage, maturity and understanding of wider issues involved in complex patient care.
That and all the education, research and leadership skills that the role should be asking of you.

Thanks I will make sure I'm up to date on core values.

Thanks for both your posts. Really valuable insight.