About Somerset Partnership NHS Foundation Trust
The Foundation Trust was authorised on 1 May 2008; its predecessor organisation was formed in 1999 and was the first integrated health and social care partnership Trust in England.
The Partnership brought together the Avalon NHS Trust – which was the mental health service provider for most of the county of Somerset – with some of the mental health services formerly provided in north-east Somerset by the Bath and Wiltshire NHS Trust and also some social care services provided by Somerset County Council. Where social care services are provided by the Partnership Trust, County Council staff are attached to the Trust within an integrated management structure and remain employees of Somerset County Council. The Trust employs 1200 (1050 wte) staff.
It provides a wide range of specialist mental health and learning disability health and social care services to over 550,000 people across Somerset, including mental health and social care services for older people, for adults, community and inpatient child and adolescent mental health services and community based specialist health services to adults with learning disabilities. In addition services are provided to support people with other specialist needs, including Aspergers syndrome, eating disorders, personality disorders and countywide substance misuse services to young people under the age of 18. Orchard Lodge, a young people’s ward provides beds for Dorset, Devon and Cornwall, as well as Somerset.
Contents
Background and what we did
Working in partnership
Impressive results
The future
Top tips
Contacts
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Following staff concerns raised about the slow progress towards quality staff appraisals for all the Trust’s staff that that was evidenced in the 2007 NHS staff survey results, management and staff side at Somerset Partnership NHS Foundation Trust have worked in partnership to greatly improve performance in this area, as identified in the 2008 NHS staff survey results, and helped the Trust work towards NHS Staff Pledge2:
'to provide all staff with personal development, access to appropriate training for their jobs and line management support to succeed'
Staff side representatives had raised concern that poor results from the staff survey had reflected their experience at grassroots. The concerns had been expressed primarily at the formal joint management and staff side consultative committee (JMS CC) and resulted in an Executive Board focus on the appraisal process.
An action plan was created involving staff side and the Staff Experience group. The Staff Experience group is a governance sub-group of the Audit committee, which involves staff from all areas of the organisation, including staff side, and provides assurance to the Board that the experience of staff at work is consistently improving. An Executive Directive focused on the importance of appraisals and all managers were given specific targets to achieve. The appraisal process timeframe was changed to a three-month period from March to May.
A key priority was to establish at the end of the process all the training and development needs to inform the learning and development strategy to ensure all appraisals were delivered at the highest levels of quality.
A constant theme of the work during 2008 was partnership – management and staff side were fully involved in both analysing the results from the survey and defining the action plan necessary. There were a number of challenges that had to be faced, primarily around the time necessary to deliver the appraisals and the need to ensure that the KSF was utilised within the appraisal process to further improve the conversations by including more structured dialogue around competences.
In early 2009 the Trust appointed a new Director of Human Resources who introduced the business partnering model of HR. The HR team are increasingly working in partnership with managers and staff side and the importance of this change is already showing in terms of stronger more productive working relationships enabling a real focus on performance and development.
The development of the action plan, in partnership, has led to some impressive results from Somerset Partnership Trust:
KEY FINDING 13 - Percentage of staff appraised in last 12 months
87% of staff at the Trust said that they had received an appraisal, performance development review, Knowledge and Skills Framework (KSF) development review or other such review in the last 12 months, compared with 2007 (i.e. a better score than in 2007), when the Trust scored 55%. The Trust's score of 87% was in the highest (best) 20% of mental health/learning disability Trusts in England.
KEY FINDING 14 - Percentage of staff having well structured appraisals in last 12 months
39% of staff at the Trust said that they had received an appraisal or performance development review in the last 12 months, in which they had agreed clear objectives for their work, which they had found useful in helping them improve how they do their job, and which had left them feeling that their work is valued by their employer. The Trust's score of 39% was in the highest (best) 20% of mental health/learning disability Trusts in England and is also a statistically significant increase since 2007 (i.e. a better score than in 2007), when the Trust scored 21%.
KEY FINDING 15 - Percentage of staff appraised with personal development plans in last 12 months
78% of staff at the Trust said that they had agreed a personal development plan as part of their appraisal or performance development review in the last 12 months, compared with 2007 (i.e. a better score than in 2007), when the Trust scored 42%. The Trust's score of 78% was in the highest (best) 20% of mental health/learning disability Trusts in England. In a wider context, staff felt supported by their immediate managers in their work.
KEY FINDING 16 - Support from immediate managers
Staff were asked questions to assess the extent to which they feel that their immediate manager provides them with support, guidance and feedback on their work, and takes into account their opinions before making decisions that affect their work. The Trust's score of 3.91 (possible scores range from 1 to 5, with 1 representing very unsupportive managers, and 5 representing highly supportive managers) was in the highest (best) 20% of mental health/learning disability Trusts in England and was an increase on 2007, when the Trust scored 3.81.
Also, the improvement in appraisals and PDP’s will have contributed to the increased job satisfaction at the Trust (where the Trust was in the top 20% of mental health/learning disability Trusts in England and improved scores since 2007) and reduced numbers of staff considering leaving their jobs. (again, where the Trust was in the top 20% of mental health/learning disability Trusts in England and improved scores since 2007).
Although the 2008 Survey produced very good results, the work on appraisals and personal development at the Trust has not stopped. In partnership, the 2009/2010 staff survey action plan included a focus on stress at work even though the 2008 survey showed improvements from the 2007 survey. It was agreed that further improvements in the quality of supervision and appraisal would contribute on the pro–active management of stress at work and work towards long-term sustainable improvements. There is also ongoing work to promote positive attitudes towards both giving and receiving appraisals.
Additional investment in the third quarter of 2009 has seen nearly half of all managers benefit from supervision and appraisal workshops commissioned from an external expert in this area. Initial feedback has been excellent and the Trust is looking at ways to offer this learning and development opportunity for all managers in the future in order that the quality of structured appraisals continues to improve and is sustainable in the longer term. The Trust recognise this is of critical importance as the whole workforce will need to be engaged in achieving the improvements in productivity and quality in the future.
- Always allow sufficient time for appraisals to be completed. The benefits of a real focus and volume of appraisals completed can be outweighed by the affect on quality.
- Don't try and get it all right at once! The Knowledge and Skills Framework (KSF) can be complicated but it is a sound competency model. Incremental change to success is sometimes more sustainable, so first concentrate on getting the volume of appraisals completed, then focus on the quality, and finally introduce the KSF.
- Create a policy in partnership with staff side which provides guidance for staff and managers and promotes the positive outcomes of the investment in time.
- Provide training for managers to deliver quality appraisals which recognise it as a skill that needs to be learnt.
- Provide refresher training.
- Create tailor made training (including visual aids e.g. video) for the managers/supervisors because there is limited bespoke good quality products to buy-in.
For further information regarding the partnership work on staff appraisals at Somerset Partnership NHS Foundation Trust contact:
Staff Side
Terry Roth
Terry.Roth@sompar.nhs.uk
Tracey Deacon Butler
Tracey.Deacon@sompar.nhs.uk
Management
Andre Frullo, Director of Human Resources
Andre.Frullo@sompar.nhs.uk