The Only National Awards For Non-Medical / Non-Clinical NHS Staff & Volunteers

Nomination

Award Category:

Corporate Services

Individual or Team Nomination?

Individual

Nominators Answer

Nominee's story :

Issue: Audit of management referral content shows at least 50% of referrals received are inappropriate and indicate line manager lack of understanding and/or inexperience in supporting employees effectively. The so what of this is a clearly identified need to a bespoke experiential training programme for referring authors with a complimentary aide memoire to be facilitated by OH SME’s. This operational scenario focussed training will perfectly compliment the person centred wellbeing leadership programme that focusses on the signposting of people to wellbeing services. Rationale: All non-clinical NHS managers are supported to look after their own health and wellbeing and are empowered to pass this wellbeing on to their teams implicit in this is the need for effective management and support through compassionate leadership to meet the needs of the business and of the individual. The role is to provide meaningful advice that will assist the line manager in their effective support to employee with a health condition that may be impacting their ability to fulfil their contractual obligations. The use of reasonable adjustments can support an employee to remain in effective employment whilst the employer meets their statutory requirements and most importantly places value on looking after their people. This bespoke training programme led by our Corporate Well Being Lead upskills non clinical managers to support their employees more effectively. Timings: In view of the direction of travel with regards to effective attendance management the need to produce a meaningful aide memoire that will support and upskill the line manager to make effective decisions and action without the need to gain approval from OH. This then means that the referrals received are then appropriate and can be expediently responded to due to the fact that the inappropriate referrals have not congested the workflow in need of OH intervention. We must have a mechanism by which line managers can be equipped with requisite skills and knowledge but most importantly, the confidence to implement low level reasonable adjustments that are both commensurate with both the needs of the individual and the operational needs of the service. Background: We know that a workforce that feels supported and listened to will deliver outstanding care. In the period following the pandemic and in light of current NHS pressures we recognise that our workforce resilience has been negatively impacted by these enduring pressures. If occupational health is to be able to effectively benefit its host organisation it must be able to be responsive and proactive to its service users. In providing the knowledge skills and experience to line managers this will in turn support the cultural shift towards effective and compassionate leadership. Next steps: There is the opportunity to operationalise this proposed experiential training programme for the benefit of referring authors (line managers, HR colleagues, service leads). Concurrent to this the production of a complimentary aide memoire will serve as a handrail to non-clinical referring authors in determining potential interventions that may be deployed in supporting an employee to either return to work or remain in work.