Organisational Development Team

NHS Forth Valley's Organisational Development Team

Following the onset of the pandemic, the OD and Learning and Education Team remodelled service provision to meet the needs of the organisation. We transferred all delivery to virtual using MS teams. We are now reviewing our service and providing a blended approach of services; involving virtual and face-to-face sessions.

The OD team provide sessions focussed on supporting staff wellbeing, these include:

Compassion Focussed Resilience

Supported by Consultant Clinical Psychologist Susan Ramsay. These sessions support staff to apply the model to understand ourselves and others under stress.

Reflection and Appreciation Sessions

These tailored team sessions are delivered by the OD team to support teams to reflect on the impact of the pandemic on us as professionals, as individuals and how this has affected our teams and the wider organisation. To show appreciation for each other, exploring experiences, lessons learned and how we move forward as an organisation.

Spaces For Listening

Our OD advisor Fiona Sharples is leading on the coordination and delivery of these sessions, supported by other co-hosts within NHSFV. We are offering these sessions across health and social care and collaborating with several health boards, HSCPs and the SAS to deliver regular sessions every month. This involves a simple, structured process which creates a safe reflective space for participants to share their thoughts and feelings, and to experience an equality of listening without hierarchy. The structure involves listening rounds, held by a host (the host is also an equal participant). Each member has two minutes to use the space and is not interrupted. Participants are invited to speak about how they are and what is on their mind. If any member wishes to pass, they can do so.

Various staff in Forth Valley have been rippling this out with colleagues for more than a year, here is some feedback:

"I didn’t know what to expect and was totally overwhelmed by work and pressure, the time to actually sit down and take time to listen and be listened too is difficult to put into words. There was no judgment, no hierarchy, just people that gave time and space to each other. I loved it”.

“Such a powerful session, I am so glad I was able to be part of it, it is a beautiful way to connect with people”.

” Such a powerful experience that I would recommend to everyone, I felt so heard and so connected”.

Coaching

Demand for coaching has remained high since the onset of the pandemic. Our internal coaching service within NHS Forth Valley is led by Margaret Kerr, Head of Organisational Development. We have a bank of accredited internal coaches who have continued to provide coaching virtually throughout the pandemic; however now offer a blended approach of virtual and face to face sessions. Our staff can also access coaching via the National Wellbeing Hub.

Speak Up Service

NHS Forth Valley launched the Speak up service earlier this year. This initiative was commissioned and supported by our Chief Executive, Cathie Cowan and HRD, Linda Donaldson.

Following the appointment of our Speak Up Ambassadors, Dr Catherine Maclean, Consultant in Acute Medicine and Pauline Donnelly, Person Centred Manager and their team of Speak up Advocates, the service went live. We aim to promote an open, honest and responsible culture where staff are supported to raise concerns. We also work to identify and address barriers that may prevent concerns being raised. The Speak Up Ambassadors also act as confidential contacts for any concerns raised through the formal Whistleblowing procedures which are in place in all NHS Boards across Scotland.

Pauline Donnelly              Dr Catherine Maclean

Mediation

Following the launch of the Mediation Service in June 2022, we are providing a Mediation service across NHS Forth Valley. During the pandemic, we trained 8 internal mediators who successfully obtained formal accreditation. We are also providing awareness sessions for managers on mediation, having courageous conversations and managing conflict.

Employee On boarding

NHS Forth Valley launched our new employee on boarding process on 21st June 2021. The project was led successfully by our OD advisor, Karen Gormal. This work was supported by our Chief Executive and HRD. The aim was to revisit a face-to-face approach however the due to the pandemic and subsequent national guidance around minimising physical contact, we required to explore alternative options. The first task was to carry out a scoping exercise to identify what platforms we could use to host the information.

Phase 1 involved the introduction of an employee portal that was hosted on the staff intranet site which could be accessed on and off site and involved a 6-step process.

The 6 steps included:

• Organisational Welcome - Opening address from our Chief Executive and videos introducing our Senior Leadership Team.
• Department Orientation - Checklist that both employee and their line managers could use to shape and tailor their welcome within their team, department & service.
• Essential Learning - Covering all topics considered to be either statutory and or mandatory to the organisation regardless of role or location.
• Role Specific Learning - Broken down by job family covering topics that is relevant to their role and or responsibilities.
• Health Care Support Work – Induction Standards & Code of Conduct - Applicable to anyone not covered by a recognised professional body with a view to enhance their knowledge of working in the healthcare environment.
• Sign off

Phase 2 – Introduction of a new Learner Management System (LMS)

NHS Forth Valley previously used LearnPro which was an external system which Boards incurred costs for licence fees. The team at NES developed their own platform and offered individual boards the opportunity to join them and were able to offer a  range of functionality which offered new options in digital learning.

The project to move from LearnPro to Learn was agreed by NHS Forth Valley Board in May 2022. We went live with TURAS Learn on 30th June 2022.

This piece of work oversaw the transfer of 9000 employee records to a single platform, a review of what the board deemed essential learning, over 190 eLearning modules either removed, updated  or replaced with national content and provided line managers with access to their teams’ immediate completion data along with their compliance of personal development plans.

Both phase one and two concluded successfully. NHS Forth Valley now have a much more in-depth approach to employee induction that is robust and meets the needs of our service for either a virtual or face to face approach.

Margaret Kerr

Head of Organisational Development, Learning and Education

NHS Forth Valley