2008 NHS national staff survey

More than 250,000 NHS staff are being asked their views on working in the NHS through the NHS staff survey, which should have been distributed in all NHS trusts at the start of October. This year, all trusts are required to conduct the survey. Staff in all sectors and roles in the NHS are being encouraged to give their views.

The survey provides the most reliable source of national and local data on how staff feel about working in the NHS and what staff experience in their working lives. It is an invaluable tool for NHS employers to leverage improvements in staff engagement, working conditions and practices at a local level.

Employers are encouraged to read the information and guidance available on the National NHS Staff Survey Advice Centre website. This includes what your trust needs to do to conduct the survey, changes made since the 2007 National NHS Staff Survey, and also how data from the survey can be used for the Annual Health Check, monitoring progress against the Improving Working Lives standards, and to identify areas of concern in the management of work-related stress.

• Questions for the 2008 staff survey
• Further information and supporting documents

Questions for the 2008 staff survey

The 2008 survey remains largely unchanged; all 26 key scores are still included, providing consistency and the benefit of historic data. To support the delivery of the Next Stage Review (NSR) agenda, questions from the What Matters to Staff research will be included in the 2008 survey. The What Matters to Staff study informed the Next Stage Review and the development of the draft NHS Constitution, including the staff pledges.

As in the 2007 survey, there are different versions of the Core questionnaire to cover the four main sectors:

• Acute
• Ambulance
• Mental Health & Learning Disability
• Primary Care

A number of optional Bank questions are also available. The different versions of the Core questionnaire and the optional Bank questions are available on the survey documents page on the Advice Centre website.

Questionnaires will be generated using the Questionnaire Compilation Tool on the Advice Centre website. The tool enables trusts to tailor the questionnaire to include any additional optional Bank or locally developed questions. It is important that you liaise with your external survey contract to discuss your specific requirements.

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Further information and supporting documents

The National NHS Staff Survey Advice Centre website contains useful guidance notes, which include:

• detailed information about what trusts need to do to conduct the survey
• changes made since the 2007 national NHS staff survey, including the introduction of new questions drawn from the 'What Matters to Staff' research
• how data from the survey can be used, for example, for annual health check declarations.

There are also a number of other useful documents, including:

• communication materials (posters, team briefing notes and press releases to communicate the forthcoming staff survey)
• a guide to the content of the questionnaire, explaining why each question has been included, and how the results can be used
• a document which outlines a number of ways in which trusts can help to maximise their response rates.

If you have any queries, please contact the Advice Centre on 0121 2043131 from 9.30am to 4.30pm, Monday to Friday or email the advice centre at enquiries@nhsstaffsurveys.com