Applications will be welcomed for NHS England funded places from all staff, clinical or non-clinical working in, the NHS or Social Care in England. Clinical colleagues must be registered or post FY2 if medical and all applicants must be working in a role where they have the ability to focus on a digital transformation or innovation project for 0.2-0.4 wte of their week.

We are piloting the inclusion of social care colleagues in Cohort 5 as we recognise the huge value in including them and opening up the learning that is gained through the Topol Digital Fellowship network. A limited number of sponsored places will also be available to applicants throughout the UK, such as those sponsored by the British Association of Dermatologists.

The Topol Digital Fellowship recruitment process is a non-competitive process in that there is no preference given to any individual organisation, if the fellow meets the inclusion criteria (which is reviewed annually) they are eligible to apply for the programme.

Applications for Cohort 5 of the Topol Digital Fellowship go live on Monday 23rd October 2023.

If your application is successful, before you begin the programme you will need to supply details of a project sponsor who will champion and support you within the organisation. They should be able to advise and support you to navigate local governance structures as well as support you to deliver your project.

If your application is shortlisted, you will be invited to an online interview. You will then be notified of the outcome of your interview shortly afterwards.

The application dates for Cohort 5 are as follows:

• 23 October: Applications open
• 22 November: Applications close
• 27 November – 15 December: Shortlisting and invitations to interview
• January: Interviews for shortlisted applicants
• April: Programme begins

Once offers have been made, the programme team will contact your organisation regarding the commitment required to the fellowship and the process for accepting the bursary. Each successful applicant’s employer will receive up to £15,000 to support the successful delivery of the project which will be paid directly to your organisation and must be ringfenced to support the delivery of the project. This payment will be made once a service agreement has been confirmed. If you have any questions about this please contact the Programme Team.

If you are intending to complete the Fellowship as part of a clinical training programme you must ensure that you have Training Programme Director approval and, if necessary, agreement for Less Than Full-Time training to facilitate the required protected time. For medical trainees, the process to apply for LTFT training can take up to 12 weeks.

To achieve diversity across cohorts, we actively promote the fellowship opportunity right across the spectrum of health and social care colleagues, both clinical and non-clinical.

To address the possibility of bias in the selection process, everyone involved in the shortlisting and interviewing process will receive guidance and training about bias before they undertake their selection tasks.

Applications are assessed blindly during the shortlisting stage, no personal, role or organisation information is available to those shortlisting.