POSITION DESCRIPTION

Role Title: Application Specialist

Reports To:Imaging Systems Manager

Directorate:Information Services

Supervises:Nil

Location:Southland/Otago

Role of the District Health Board
Our Vision:
  • Better Health, Better Lives, Whanau Ora.
Our Mission:
  • We work in partnership with people and communities to achieve their optimum health and wellbeing.
  • We seek excellence through a culture of learning, enquiry, service and caring.
Our Values:
Kind
Manaakitanga / Looking after our people: we respect and support each other. Our hospitality and kindness foster better care.
Open
Pono / Being sincere: we listen, hear and communicate openly and honestly. Treat people how they would like to be treated.
Positive
Whaiwhakaaro / Best action: we are thoughtful, bring a positive attitude and are always looking to do things better.
Community
Whanaungatanga / As family: we are genuine, nurture and maintain relationships to promote and build on all the strengths in our community.
Our Statutory Purpose:
  • To improve, promote and protect the health of our population.
  • Promote the integration of health services across primary and secondary care services.
  • Seek the optimum arrangement for the most effective and efficient delivery of health services.
  • Promote effective care or support for those in need of personal health or disability support services.
  • Promote the inclusion and participation in society and the independence of people with disabilities.
  • Reduce health disparities by improving health outcomes for Maori and other population groups.
  • Foster community participation in health improvement, and in planning for the provision of, and changes to the provision of services.
  • Uphold the ethical and quality standards expected of us and to exhibit a sense of social and environmental responsibility.

Purpose of the Role
As an integral member of the team, the Imaging Systems Application Specialist is responsible for maintaining current applications, supporting the IT needs of Clinical services and leading project work streams across the Southern District Health Board.
The Application Specialist will draw upon a broad range of IT skills, their knowledge of clinical services and their proven track record within the IT and/or the Healthcare sector to troubleshoot issues with desktops, servers and specialist software applications delivering prompt and successful resolutions that ensure effective continuation of clinical services.
Combining their knowledge of clinical operations and IT, the Application specialist will identify areas for service improvement and collaborate with others. Using a formal project approach, the Application Specialist will assist the implementation of new solutions that will lead to improvements in patient care.
This role is forward facing and customer focused. The Application Specialist will forge strong working relationships with those throughout clinical services as well as our third-party and in-house collaborators.
Organisational Competencies (Lominger)
Customer Focus / Is dedicated to meeting the expectations and requirements of internal and external customers; gets first hand customer information and uses it for improvements in products and services; acts with customers in mind; establishes and maintains effective relationships with customers and gains their trust and respect.
Integrity and Trust / Is widely trusted; is seen as a direct, truthful individual; can present the unvarnished truth in an appropriate and helpful manner; keeps confidences; admits mistakes; doesn’t misrepresent him/herself for personal gain.
Drive For Results / Can be counted on to exceed goals successfully; Is constantly and consistently one of the top performers; very bottom line oriented; steadfastly pushes self and others for results.
Managing Diversity / Manages all kinds and classes of people equitably; deals effectively with all races, nationalities, cultures, disabilities, ages and both sexes; hires variety and diversity without regard to class; supports equal and fair treatment and opportunity for all.
Role Specific Competencies (Lominger)
Problem Solving / Uses rigorous logic and methods to solve difficult problems with effective solutions; probes all fruitful sources for answers; can see hidden problems; is excellent at honest analysis; looks beyond the obvious and doesn’t stop at the first answers
Process Management / Good at figuring out the processes necessary to get things done; knows how to organize people and activities; understands how to separate and combine tasks into efficient work flow; knows what to measure and how to measure it; can see opportunities for synergy and integration where others can't; can simplify complex processes
Learning on the Fly / Learns quickly when facing new problems; a relentless and versatile learner; open to change; analyses both successes and failures for clues to improvement; experiments and will try anything to find solutions; enjoys the challenge of unfamiliar tasks; quickly grasps the essence and the underlying structure of anything.
Key Relationships
Internal
Information Services Team
Imaging Systems
End users
Clinical services
Key stake holders within the SDHB. / External
Ministry of Health,
Application vendors.
Knowledge, Experience and Skills required
Essential Criteria
  • Degree in Computer Science/ Information Science or related field is preferable. Equivalent combination of experience, education and training will be considered.
  • Working Knowledge of clinical services and the Healthcare sector hugely desirable
Alternatively
  • A qualified and registered Radiographer/Imaging technician who can demonstrate a strong aptitude for IT
Experience/Knowledge
  • 3+ years’ experience delivering IT support within a large organisation or 3+ years’ experience as a Radiographer/Imaging technician
  • Excellent knowledge of Windows, Office and Outlook
  • Experience with Active Directory, remote desktop, physical and virtual servers is desirable
  • General desktop and server maintenance skills
  • Some knowledge of network fundamentals
  • Excellent interpersonal ( verbal and written) communication skills are required
  • Experience working in project environments that includes internal, external and customer teams
  • Requires strong analytical, conceptual and problem-solving abilities
  • Ability to manage multiple priorities, and assess and adjust quickly to changing priorities
  • Initiative, can find ways to meet a solution or objective
Fitness
A reasonable level of fitness is required to cope with the physical requirements of the job. The following denote the key physical requirements for the position:
Standing, walking, bending, sitting, stairs, simple grasping, fine manipulation, operating machinery / equipment, lifting, overhead reaching, carrying, pushing / pulling, twisting, climbing / balancing, crouching / squatting.
KEY ACCOUNTABILITIES / DELIVERABLES / EXAMPLE MEASURES
Self-Management /
  • Plan and manage own work to achieve desired results on time, within budget and to required standard.
  • Maintain own professional development; attend Southern District Health Board and other development opportunities.
/
  • Act as a role model for the SDHB organisational values.

Receive, log and resolve issues within an appropriate timeframe /
  • Resolution of faults leading to resumedoperations
  • Documented description of fault and resolution providing a knowledgebase for the future.
/
  • Functional records logged within Service desk software
  • The resumption of unimpaired clinical services

Provide routine maintenance, monitoring, and housekeeping of all imaging desktops, servers and applications /
  • Correction and removal of imported or poorly entered clinical information
  • Monitoring of disk backup and application logs
  • Pro-active mitigation of unplanned outages and errors
  • Assist and test software and hardware upgrades
  • Deployment of new and replacement hardware and applications
/
  • Removal of flagged items in work lists
  • Backup and application logs present and correct
  • Less than 0.1% system downtime.
  • High quality data

Assist distribution of the clinical record /
  • Maintain Inter-application integration
  • Assist with transfer of images and diagnostic reports to other clinical providers
/
  • Checking receipt of information in peripheral systems
  • Confirming receipt or delivery of records with other providers

Be flexible to working hours. /
  • Participate inthe out of hours’ on-call roster
  • Respond and assist urgent, unanticipated incidents.
  • Be available for scheduled out-of-hours’ work such as upgrades
/
  • Receive and resolve user issues and request inside and outside normal working hours.
  • Perform major work while minimising service disruption

Provide training to fellow staff and the end-user base /
  • Ad-hoc teachings
  • Assessing training requirements
  • Scheduled training sessions
  • Development of teaching programs and documents
/
  • Distribution of knowledge throughout the team
  • Positive feedback from trainees
  • Improved user efficiency and fewer errors.

Liaise with collaborating departments and third party vendors /
  • Identify the correct skillsets outside the department required to resolve issues and collaborate to deliver fault resolution and service improvement.
/
  • Interactions, resolutions and timeframes are well documented.
  • Confirmation of successful deployment or resolution from stakeholders.

Manage project work packages customer specifications. /
  • Manage sections of project work, co-ordinating with collaborators and project stakeholders.
  • Be accountable for key-deliverables within a defined timeframe
/
  • Deliver highlight reports illustrating progress against project plan
  • Identifying and documenting risks and issues specifying impact and mitigating actions.

Identify areas for service improvement. /
  • Evaluate existing processes, highlight shortcomings and engineer and implement improvements.
  • Communicate issues to management and key stakeholders
/
  • Improved flow of information
  • Reduced clinical risk
  • Greater user-system ergonomics

Ensure quality /
  • Test your work, follow up fault resolutions, evaluate service improvements and adopt lessons learned
  • Follow the change control process – mitigate the risks associated with the change before change takes place
/
  • Pro-active reduction in faults and service impact.
  • Evaluate the consequence of your working going wrong – have a fall back plan

Self-improvement /
  • Attend mandatory training
  • Learn new software, technologies and best practices
/
  • Maximise benefits derived from new technologies and implementations.

Travel /
  • Occasional travel required
/
  • Support users across SDHB’s geography.
  • Visit third parties and other care providers

Participate in and contribute to the internal management and functioning of the team /
  • Actively engage with and support colleagues, taking personal responsibility for ensuring effective working relationships with all team members.
  • Contribute to team communication and learning activities.
  • Can deal comfortably with Managers at all levels and work productively as a business partner.
  • Participate in peer review of own and others work.
  • Promote and adhere to the philosophy and values of the DHB mission and values.
  • Foster and support commitment to achieving the highest level of health and safety, including identification and reporting of all hazards, assistance in resolving issues that may cause harm to staff, and working safely at all times.
  • Continue personal development by identifying and engaging in formal and informalpersonal development opportunities.
/
  • Active participation in the team.
  • Collegial support and strong working relationships evident with other team members.
  • Engagement with the values and expectations of the role and the Information Systems function.

Develop and maintain up to date documentation on each PACS/RIS module /
  • Documentation updated as changes in processes take place
  • Policy, procedure and system documents are updated as required
  • Documentation of all supported applications (e.g. application support procedures, users guides, policies and procedures etc) is kept up to date.
  • Documentation is maintained to SDHB standards.
  • Documentation must be easily accessible.
  • Regular reviews of documentation are conducted to ensure completeness, accuracy and appropriateness.
/
  • A historical record of performed tasks, incident and risks
  • A knowledge base for all who need it

Note: The above example measures are provided as a guide only. The precise performance measures for this position will require further discussion between the job holder and manager.

I have read and understand the above job description:

Name: ______(Please Print)

Signed: ______

Date: ______

Page 1 of 6