Future-Proof Your Workforce with Florence’s Flexible Staffing Solutions

There are more than 1.5 million people working within the UK’s social care sector, even more than the NHS. This figure has risen by 2.2% from the previous year and, as more individuals join the workforce, care providers are finding it increasingly difficult to streamline their operations and practice effective workforce management. Today, we sat down with Dr. Charles Armitage, Co-Founder and CEO of Florence, a leading platform reshaping the world of workforce management within the health and care sector. Dr. Charles gave us more information, as Florence is named in the Technology Excellence Awards 2026.

“Florence is building the technology to power the social care workforce.”

The story of Florence began with Dr. Charles Armitage, an NHS veteran who had witnessed first-hand how difficult it was to fill staffing gaps in hospitals. He found that the process was slow and inefficient, whilst agencies overwhelmed nurses and carers with constant calls and emails. At the same time, these agencies were not able to approve timesheets or pay wages on time.

Believing that there had to be a better way, Dr. Charles joined forces with social care expert Dan Blake. They built a team of health, care, and technology specialists, united by a desire to develop the tools that would heal the sector’s pain points and make flexible staffing simpler, faster, and more effective. Together, they created Florence.

Since its inception in 2016, Florence has been on a mission to make the healthcare industry simpler and fairer for everyone in the UK and beyond. The platform’s end-to-end workforce technology enables healthcare providers to manage all their workforce requirements within one place. From hiring, compliance, training, and HR through to rostering, T&A, payroll, and agency management, this all-in-one solution has been instrumental in helping healthcare providers run an efficient, compliant, and cost-effective workforce.

“Everything we do is driven by our core values: care about what you do, ask another question, build a positive team, put yourself in their shoes, and embrace the adventure!”

In a competitive market, Florence stands out as the only end-to-end workforce platform built specifically for social care. “For us, the user is at the heart of everything we do,” said Dr. Charles, “and ‘putting yourself in the shoes’ of our users is fundamental to everything we build. Everyone at Florence is encouraged to spend time on the frontline and gain an understanding of how the work they do impacts the people that use our products.”

Designed to support employers and employees alike, Florence makes delivering care simple and stress-free. Florence Rota is loved by both managers and frontline staff, ensuring that everyone knows exactly where each staff member should be and when. Managers can easily organise leave and training for all employees, and even save time with its AI-Native Rota Generator.

Through Florence HR and Payroll, employers can manage multiple sites and roles through customisable setups that can build organisations from individual units up to multiple sites, regions, and companies. The easy-to-use employee database allows for centralised, streamlined management of employee HR records, as well as centralised document storage and automated renewal schedules.

Florence Agency Manager offers a Neutral Vendor Agency Manager tool that gives organisations complete control over their agency workforce costs. A part of the flexible-workforce management platform, it helps users to fill health and care shifts with speed and ease, reduce temporary staffing costs, and keep compliance under control. It is often reported by clients to be the easiest-to-use neutral vendor solution on the market, playing a key role in saving significant time and money on contingent staffing.

Organisations can quickly fill rota gaps through Florence Bank Manager, prioritising cost-effective quality care from their own bank or perm staff. By simply sending a shift notification and reviewing responses, managers can fill open gaps within seconds whilst mitigating the endless phone calls and texts messages typically circulated amongst their bank staff. When used in conjunction with Agency Manager, any unfilled shifts will automatically cascade to the organisation’s chosen agencies.

Florence Temporary Staffing is an invaluable resource for organisations across the country, offering a carefully sourced selection of over 100,000 quality health and care workers for temporary gap filling. Florence combines cutting-edge technology with expert checks to verify that each applicant is a fully compliant and accredited professional possessing specialist skills, from first aid to frailty. Every engagement is supported by Florence’s governance team, who are prepared to step in if an issue ever arises.

The platform is complete with Florence Academy, a flexible online option to attaining a world-class education. Replacing the often expensive route of face-to-face training, Florence Academy gives organisations complete control over their staff’s learning, with the ability to add custom courses and assign training in a click. With full training oversight, managers can keep track of compliance, generate reports, and gain meaningful insights.

Florence Academy offers more than 100 CPD-accredited and CSTF-aligned training courses which, when combined with its customisation features, enables team leaders to create comprehensive, high-quality training programmes for their team. Organisations can maximise its staff’s time and cover all 15 Care Certificate standards online, propelled by bite-size courses, automatically-scored tests, online workbooks, and email reminders that help learners stay on track.

Together, these individual tools combine to deliver a powerful platform that provides organisations with complete control over their care workforce costs. To date, more than 2,000 health and care organisations have placed their trust in Florence, spanning residential care homes, nursing homes, mental health services, private hospitals, NHS hospitals and trusts, children’s services, supported living environments, and domiciliary care providers. More than 100,000 health and care professionals utilise Florence every day, with 95% of clients reporting a positive experience with the platform. 

The Operations Manager of Mariposa Care, a network of elderly care and nursing homes across the UK, shared: “Florence gives us the visibility we need across our entire group. Since implementing the platform, we have seen our agency spend decrease significantly while our staffing compliance rates have never been higher.”

While Angela Boxall, CEO of luxury care provider Majesticare, commented: “What I love most about working with Florence is the honesty, transparency, and communication, which has been there from the start.”

Striving to reshape the sector for good, the team behind Florence is continuously looking for new ways to improve the platform. It recently integrated an AI-driven scheduling tool to help automate complex rota patterns, allowing managers to fill gaps instantly and ensure safer staffing levels are met. Over the last year, the team has also worked hard to develop a selection of tools that help employers and employees navigate the new employment rights changes introduced in the Employment Rights Act 2025.

With this in mind, the team upholds an ongoing commitment to placing people at the heart of its operations. “While we are a technology-first company, our goal is to give time back to our customers,” Dr. Charles told us. “We want to emphasise that tech is not just about efficiency; it is about allowing organisations to restore the human element of care.”

Looking to the future, Florence will continue to grow and develop within the field of social care in the UK. With more than 1.5 million people working in this sector, there is significant opportunity for future growth. At the same time, the industry’s fast-paced nature demands that the team evolves alongside funding challenges and regulatory changes. By maintaining close relationships with its clients and listening to their complex needs, however, Florence remains confident that its team will continue to deliver a service it can be proud of, to the same standards that earned Florence its status as the UK’s Best Health Workforce Management Platform 2026. 

“To us, success is helping over 2,000 organisations gain better control over their workforce and compliance, allowing them to focus on what really matters: care.”

Contact Details

Contact: Charles Armitage

Company: Florence

Web Address: www.florence.co.uk