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Job plans help you provide a high-level summary of the work you actually do, not just what鈥檚 in your job description.

They can help make sure that your time, capacity and skills are used appropriately. They can also offer clarity, fairness and a stronger voice in shaping services.

Use this page to understand how job planning works and access helpful resources to help you get started. 

Job planning is a formal process used across health and social care to document and organise clinical and non-clinical activities into a clear, agreed plan. It sets out what work is done, when and where and is signed by the staff member's line manager, after mutual agreement. For many health and social care professions, job planning is routine practice.

A typical job plan includes:

• Direct clinical care (for example, clinics, home visits and ward work)
• Indirect care (for example, care coordination)
• Professional development (for example, CPD, supervision and training)
• Service improvement or leadership activities
• Research, reflective practice and auditing

For specialist nursing roles, job planning is particularly important for articulating complex, multifaceted responsibilities and demonstrating the impact of enhanced, advanced and consultant level practice.

How job planning works

1. You complete a job plan of what your average week or month looks like. You might like to use percentages to demonstrate the time you're spending on each area of work.
2. Your line manager signs it off with your mutual agreement. You may need to agree a level of flexibility.
3. You work in accordance with your job plan. You should check that your job plan aligns with your job description.

Clarity about your role and workload

Nursing often involves hidden or invisible work. Job planning makes your work visible and measurable, ensuring your full contribution is recognised. It also provides a clear schedule of activities and expectations.

Better alignment with patient and service needs

By documenting what you do and how long it takes, job planning helps match nursing capacity to patient demand. This supports safer staffing and more sustainable services.

Evidence for career development and progression

Job plans link directly to professional development frameworks and CPD requirements. Structured frameworks help you plan your career growth, enhance competencies and meet revalidation requirements. Job plans can even be used as evidence in a job evaluation, if you feel you鈥檙e working above and beyond your band or pay grade.

A stronger case for more resource and service improvement

Longer term, job planning helps demonstrate workload pressures and justify changes. It provides evidence when negotiating:

• additional staffing
• protected time for CPD
• administrative support
• service redesign

Improved team coordination   

When job plans are used across a team, they can help:

• reduce duplication
• improve communication
• support fair distribution of duties
• plan services more effectively
• identify uneven distribution of roles and workload, and reduce the risk of burnout

Support for practice across all levels of nursing, especially those working within specialities

For Clinical Nurse Specialists and other enhanced, advanced and consultant level (and above) roles, job planning is essential for showing the breadth of practice across clinical, educational, leadership and service improvement, which can sometimes be overlooked. Many organisations have taken up job planning, especially for those working within specialities.

If your job plan shows that you're consistently working beyond the remit of your job description, you might have grounds for a job evaluation.

Learn more about job evaluation