Oxford Health NHS Foundation Trust
Oxford Health NHS Foundation Trust has recruited and trained 180 health and wellbeing champions in the trust since 2012. The organisation worked with its HR department to create a clear job description for health and wellbeing champions. They produced a document outlining the expectations for these champions, such as the importance of being visible within the community.
The trust provides champions with:
- regular support meetings and coffee mornings to check in on how they are doing
- an inbox managed by the health and wellbeing team where they can send any queries
- protected time to ensure that they can fulfill their champion duties.
- They are planning to train and support additional champions to enable all health and wellbeing champions to share and signpost, rather than becoming specific specialists. The organisation’s wellbeing guardian is very supportive of the champions and assures that they are constantly being discussed at board level.
Leicestershire Partnership NHS Trust
Leicestershire Partnership NHS Trust has recruited and trained 280 wellbeing champions in the trust since 2016. The trust has successfully done this by holding a wellbeing day where they handed out flyers to members of staff, encouraging them to join and to raise awareness.
When appointed, the health and wellbeing lead shared the following information with the champion:
- a role descriptor, caveating that every team will be different and that the champion needs to get to know their team for them to be successful
- signs them up to receive a wellbeing Wednesday bulletin, which details all the wellbeing information the champions can signpost their colleagues to
- invites them to the two health and wellbeing champion events they have each year.
To continue recruiting champions in the organisation, each month the trust issues a wellbeing hero award to all staff and encourages the winner to volunteer to be a health and wellbeing champion.
Wrightington, Wigan and Leigh NHS Foundation Trust
Wrightington, Wigan and Leigh NHS Foundation Trust introduced health and wellbeing champions into their organisation in 2019 as a part of their quality improvement project. The trust now has around 150 health and wellbeing champions in post as well as six wellbeing leads.
The trust follows this procedure to recruit health and wellbeing champions:
- They are sent an application form (manager approval is required) and a role descriptor.
- Once that is returned, they are then asked to complete e-learning packages on the process of having supportive conversations and mental health responder, each one takes around 40 minutes. On completion of the training, they then schedule an induction with the wellbeing lead. This is an opportunity to give clarity and expectations, and share what other champions within the network are doing.
- The trust also offers a six-hour diffuser training that they can access if they wish. This was put together by the company that trained the staff in crisis management.
Northumbria Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust
Northumbria Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust has implemented 46 health and wellbeing champions into their organisation since 2019. In December 2019 the organisation sought out what they could do to make their organisation better.
Due to the geographical spread of the trust, the health and wellbeing team targeted localities to ensure that they had a health and wellbeing champion within each speciality. Upon recruitment, champions receive a three-hour training session from Better Health at Work that focuses on regional priorities and how they can support their team members.
The champions are supported by:
- A Facebook group with all the other champions to share good practice,
- Weekly wellbeing emails to signpost options for staff.
The trust is planning to get each champion a hoodie so that they are visible to all staff members and are in the process of training their next cohort of champions.
We would love to hear how you have recruited health and champions in your organisation, please email us.