Pharmacist personas: A tool to guide learning and career development

Healthcare systems worldwide are grappling with workforce crises, prompting policy interventions that expand the clinical roles of healthcare professionals. This essay examines the challenges associated with the increasing responsibilities of pharmacists, particularly within the context of the UK's policy aimed at achieving a unified "one pharmacy workforce." This policy envisions pharmacists playing expanded roles in patient care, including enhanced clinical services with an increasing level of independent prescribing. However, there is currently a fragmented approach to training, support, and career progression, which varies substantially across hospital, primary care, and community pharmacy settings. This essay highlights the significant disparities in professional development opportunities across these settings, which hinder the realisation of a unified pharmacy workforce. To address this, we argue that the development of "pharmacist personas" can offer a tool to guide pharmacists' learning and career development in their evolving roles. Drawing on Goffman's dramaturgical theory, pharmacist personas can be seen as existing in the space between the "frontstage" (the social mask) and the "backstage" (the true self), becoming deeply embedded within pharmacists' professional identity work. Personas offer pharmacists a tool to visualise their future professional roles and elucidate the learning to attain them. By providing concrete examples of professional trajectories, personas can guide learning and career development. A policy focused solely on expanding the role of pharmacists is insufficient. It needs to be supported with systemic improvements in training and support to ensure a sustainable "one pharmacy workforce" that meets the evolving needs of healthcare systems.