Supporting the wellbeing needs of NHS staff
Lack of access to basic needs, such as hydration and sleep, have been identified as a major concern for NHS staff wellbeing and patient safety.
The ambitions set out in the ten year health plan can only be achieved when employers foster a culture that fulfils the basic needs of our valued workforce. To reduce the NHS’s sickness absence rates, we must ensure the workforce are safe and healthy to provide the highest quality patient care.
This preventative approach allows individuals, line managers and organisations to recognise the need for improvement to health and wellbeing provisions before situations are in a critical state.
Inspired by Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, this NHS staff wellbeing needs poster demonstrates that basic needs are critical and form the foundation for fulfilling the overall health and wellbeing agenda. Together with our poster, this guidance has been created to support NHS health and wellbeing leads, staff experience leads and line managers in ensuring that our staff are safe and healthy at work.
Top tips for supporting the health and wellbeing of your workforce
Identify how your current wellbeing offer meets your staff needs
Use our NHS staff wellbeing needs poster to help you identify the wellbeing needs you cover well or those you need to improve on. Collaborate with your wider multidisciplinary team to make improvements; this could include engagement with infection prevention control, HR, occupational health or estates and facilities. Certain wellbeing needs are dependent on others, so building a holistic picture of your current wellbeing measures can help you identify gaps in meeting staff needs. For example, ensuring toilet facilities are functional and hygienic should ideally be coupled with ensuring staff get enough breaks to use them.
Assess whether you have safe and secure on-call facilities to allow staff to sleep, change and store their belongings such as the sleep pods that Lancashire Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust installed. You can read more on this topic on our sleep, fatigue and the workplace web page.
Involve your staff. Listen to employee feedback on what they feel their most important needs are. A consultative approach can positively impact on engagement and help overall staff experience. Ensure that if you ask for feedback, you follow up on outcomes and show you have implemented suggestions where possible. You should use the data from your local and national annual NHS Staff Survey and People Pulse to gain insight into how staff are feeling and identify key issues for them.
Formulate a plan to bridge gaps in staff needs
Use your evidence/data to formulate an action plan to meet basic needs as a priority. Our eight elements of positive staff experience outlines important considerations and can help you shape your strategy.
Think about how you might address resistance to culture change.
Culture change is a huge part of making a positive change in your organisation, read and listen how other organisations have made impactful changes on our change in action webpage and Do OD webinar series.
Where possible create a sustainable plan. Consider how staff needs may change in the future and how you would approach this. Circumstances are often unpredictable but forecasting and planning can often help you to be proactive when supporting staff.
Get your board on board
- Get your board on board with a wellbeing agenda that prioritises basic staff needs using our guide. Demonstrate to your board how gaps in meeting the basic wellbeing needs are barriers to achieving the overall organisational strategic goals, and impact negatively on patient care. You could use statistics from our back to basics infographic to support you.
- You may also influence your senior leaders through your wellbeing guardian, who sits on the board, to ensure that the health and wellbeing of your staff is considered in all decisions that board members make. You could approach your HR director to ensure your agenda is promoted on the board if you do not have a health and wellbeing guardian.
Evaluate the impact
To understand what is working well and areas where you may need to change your approach, it is important to evaluate the impact of your interventions where you can. It can help you allocate budget towards interventions that are resonating well with your staff and having the most significant positive impact. Use our evaluation guidance to help you.
Implement your plan and engage your staff
- Upskill your managers. They play an important part in enabling staff to engage in initiatives and focus on their personal wellbeing.
- Engage senior leaders in your wellbeing initiatives for top-down influence and encourage a positive culture change. Read our dozen dos of staff engagement to support you.
- Work with your learning and development team to roll out an effective educational programme for managers and employees based on the training needs identified. Read our health and wellbeing top tips for supporting managers web page.
- Read our seven steps to an effective health and wellbeing campaign to support the communication of your plan.
- Warrington and Halton Teaching Hospitals have a vision of making it the best place to work and receive healthcare. To support this vision, they have created a culture plan, so that all staff have a voice. Watch our video about this initiative.
How organisations can fulfil higher level needs
- Gain buy-in from your board and senior leaders to support fulfilling higher level staff needs.
- Ensure you are meeting all basic staff needs first and these are sustainable within your team/department and organisation.
- Encourage a compassionate and inclusive leadership culture where contributions are appreciated. Listen to Cathi Shovlin, chief people officer at University Hospitals Birmingham talk about how they listened to staff to create impactful and lasting cultural change.
- Actively support the personal development of your staff so they are able to work towards achieving their full potential.
- Our top tips for creating a psychologically safe organisation will support individuals to feel valued in the workplace.
