There’s a lot of attention in the media at the moment around wellbeing of healthcare professionals and I want to write about a development programme for matrons that we’re starting across The Royal Wolverhampton NHS Trust and Walsall Healthcare NHS Trust.
I’m a firm believer in developing staff through education and development. Our senior members of staff can benefit from this as much as anyone else. So I asked Liz Thiebe, who has previously put together senior development programmes for nurses and was director of leadership programmes at The King’s Fund in London, to develop this across both Trusts, starting at Walsall.
This is a programme designed with input from the participants, meeting their development needs. Staff were asked for a list of potential topics via survey monkey of what they needed and Liz held many virtual meetings with colleagues. A total of 91 staff have signed up – 33 at Walsall and 46 from RWT, plus heads of divisions – who will be divided into four groups to ensure they are as inter active as possible.
The principles for the programme design are:
- To build on past education and development
- To include sessions with local expertise as appropriate
- To underpin with appreciative inquiry approach (learning about what works well)
- To make use of validated tools
- To use the patient voice when possible
- Action learning
The sessions, which will be held off site to avoid distraction and staff being diverted back to work, run for one full day a month over nine months, with actions to be completed between each session.
Each day will focus on a different topic, which are:- leadership style and application to different situations, leading teams, wellness, the role of the senior nurse leader, the ‘big picture’ – health care in England (direction of travel for the short to medium term), our nursing strategy, implementing change, business case/negotiating skills and finally resilience – how has my leadership style adapted over the past year? Visiting guest lecturers will take certain sessions to enhance colleagues’ experience.
The intended programme outcomes are to strengthen the individual, strengthen connections through the organisations and to develop common ways of working.
I’m sure you will join me in wishing the participants all the best on the development programme and we look forward to them passing on their increased knowledge.
Take care,
Ann-Marie