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3.3. Human Resources One of the most undervalued resources in

any business is its people 28. Therefore,

there is a need for organisations to build

their competency in the four most relevant

aspects with respect to community

pharmacy staff: recruitment and retention,

training and development, performance

management, and time management.

In addition, further consideration has to

occur on the need to make greater use of

pharmacy support staff and develop their

roles in order to enable pharmacists to take

on extended activities in supporting

patients with their medicines 29. Overall, the

pharmacy team as a whole has to meet the

needs of the patient and healthcare

systems.

Proposed Actions 2,8,20,29

To enact a workforce framework that: o ensures the competence of pharmacy staff through continuing professional

development programmes;

o defines the personnel resources needed to provide services in accordance with the WHO/FIP Guidelines on Good Pharmacy Practice;

National organisations should play a wider role in educating pharmacists and support staff about innovative skill mix practices within the context of the regulatory reforms, and with a

view to community pharmacies providing additional services;

In collaboration with the faculties of pharmacy, achieve consensus about enhanced skills and knowledge for pharmacists within the key sectors of pharmacy practice;

Define and achieve consensus on the roles, responsibilities and competency requirements of pharmacy technicians and other staff members;

Address recruitment, retention and performance management issues associated with traditional and emerging practices;

Promote and evaluate best practices and innovative approaches in drug distribution and workflow to optimize pharmacy human resources and enhance safety;

Leverage Community Pharmacy's access within communities, by diversifying the skill set available within community pharmacy to best cater for all of our community's medicine

related needs, ie medicine supply, information, disease state management services and

delivery of paid professional services, both "in store " and " in community ";

Increase capacity of Community Pharmacy to employ pharmacists in an ever increasing range of professional services delivered through community pharmacy.