This informal CPD article, ‘The Safety of People Receiving Care and Change Management Through the Lens of Workforce Wellbeing’, was provided by Hilda Campbell at COPE Scotland, experts in network weaving who offer tools and resources to support mental wellbeing and endurance to life stressors - for individuals, communities, and organisations.
The safety of those receiving care is core to health and social care. However, ensuring the safety of those receiving care is linked to the wellbeing of the healthcare workforce. Staff and those receiving care can often find the landscape of health and social care changes. Finding strategies to support and manage that change which includes a focus on workforce wellbeing, can significantly enhance the safety outcomes of those receiving care.
This piece explores the interconnection between safety of health and care service users, change management, and the wellbeing of healthcare professionals. It is important to recognise the wellbeing of the workforce matters for individual team members as well as overall organisational aims and objectives. Health and social care are human systems, with humans receiving and offering care and recognising the human factors matter.
Safety for those receiving care
Safety refers to the prevention of errors and adverse effects to people receiving care associated with the care being offered. It is a fundamental principle of healthcare quality and a critical component of effective healthcare delivery.
Importance of Workforce Wellbeing and safety
Workforce wellbeing encompasses the physical, emotional, and psychological health of healthcare professionals. When staff report feelings of burnout and compassion fatigue it is important this is recognised and steps taken to address this. Working within a health and social care setting is a stressful working environment, however, ways to help manage and reduce this stress need to be found to prevent distress, which can impact on staff and those receiving care, including sickness absence, recruitment, safety issues and staff turnover.
Importance of Effective Change Management
We live in an ever-changing world, with new challenges and new opportunities presenting themselves daily. Often this requires changes at a systems level, where a structured approach is needed to help in transitioning individuals, teams, and organisations from a current state to a desired future state. In healthcare, this often includes the adoption of new technologies, processes, or policies aimed at improving outcomes for those using services. It can also be used when there are resource changes either in terms of increasing demand on resources, or a reduction in resources, or both.
Implementing change in healthcare can be challenging due to resistance from staff, the complexity of healthcare systems, and the high stakes involved in providing care.
Strategies for Effective Change Management
- Visioning and ownership: Those providing care and those receiving care have a unique perspective on what is and is not working. Tap into that wisdom to help create the vision of where the change is moving to and why. When people feel engaged and part of the change this can help move forwards together.
- Engage and Communicate: Ensuring transparent and ongoing communication with staff can alleviate fears and promote acceptance of change. Take time to explain what is happening and why.
- Provide Training and Support: Equipping healthcare workers with the necessary skills and resources can ease the transition and improve adaptation. Time is also needed for staff to apply that learning and the necessary support, resources and mentoring to be able to practice it until confidence in the new systems have been achieved.
- Monitor and Evaluate: Continuously assessing the impact of changes allows for timely adjustments and improvements and this needs to be with the staff team and those using services, so people see the value of this, and it is not seen as another paper exercise.
Making the wellbeing of the workforce the norm
Organisations should cultivate a culture that prioritises the mental and physical health of their workforce. This includes providing access to mental health resources, promoting work-life balance, and recognising the contributions of staff. It can be as simple as letting people know they are valued, ensuring uninterrupted breaks, not expecting people to be contacted when on leave and being realistic about the number of emails and documents people can assimilate in a day, as well as doing the day job.
Create healthy safe spaces for teams to meet and share ideas and concerns, encouraging a culture of mutual responsibility to finding solutions. This includes inviting ideas from the workforce around what would support their wellbeing.
We hope this article was helpful. For more information from COPE Scotland, please visit their CPD Member Directory page. Alternatively, you can go to the CPD Industry Hubs for more articles, courses and events relevant to your Continuing Professional Development requirements.
