The NHS staff survey results released on 20 March 2012 include a number of staff engagement indicators as well as an overall staff engagement score. We have summarised the key findings on this page.
Overall analysis
At time of major upheaval in the service and unprecedented financial challenges the survey shows that staff engagement is under severe pressure. The overall staff engagement index has fallen from 3.63 in 2010 to 3.61 in 2011.
The staff engagement index is made up of scores across the range of questions that look at various aspects of engagement (involvement, communication and motivation and job satisfaction).
There were small falls in almost all of the staff engagement questions. In particular the staff involvement results show that fewer staff felt that they able to make suggestions for improvement in 2011 (69 per cent) than in 2010 (70 per cent). In addition, less than a third (30 per cent) reported that senior managers act on feedback from staff.
There was a also a small fall in staff motivation from 3.81 to 3.80. By contrast though job satisfaction remained high compared to other industries the percentage of those reporting that they looked forward to going to work fell from 52 per cent in 2010 to 51 per cent in 2011.
Variations
There continue to be marked differences between different types of organisation. Overall specialist hospital organisations did particularly well and the newly formed social enterprises also gained high scores. Ambulance services tended to have low scores and commissioning only PCTs had mixed results with some evidence of poor motivation though retained high levels of involvement.
Overall staff engagement index scores ranged from 3.77 in specialist organisations to 3.23 in the ambulance service.
The percentage of staff reporting senior managers encouraged them to develop new ideas ranged from 41 per cent in specialist organisations to 24 per cent in ambulance trusts.
The index of staff motivation ranged from 3.46 in specialist organisations to 3.12 in ambulance trusts.
There was also a small fall in the willingness of staff to act as advocates for their organisation both as a place to work and as a place to be treated.
The results between individual organisations also varied considerably and organisations will have received data which benchmarks their score against comparable other trusts. Equally important is to tract trends over time and a number of trusts have seen significant changes in their score in one year.
Find out more
A detailed breakdown of scores for all trusts can be found on the
NHS staff survey website.