Need to know
For #TeamEEAST Last updated: 03 May 2024 at 23:29
Our first Fit for the Future podcast is now available.
Each episode, we will talk to a workstream lead from the Fit for the Future improvement plan to demonstrate what achievements have taken place and how this will help to develop our Trust for the future.
This episode, Julie Hollings, Director of Communications and Engagement, and Sean Bennet, Accessibility Officer and podcast facilitator, meet with Emma De-Carteret, our Director of Corporate Affairs and Performance.
This first podcast introduces you to the Fit for the Future programme and we hope you will be able to learn more about our large scale improvement plan and the Demonstrating Impact workstream in a quick and accessible format.
As well as the podcast, we also have a monthly Fit for the Future update from Tom Abell. If you missed the first of Tom's blogs, which provided an overview of the Fit for the Future programme, you can read it here.
You can listen to the podcast below. We hope you enjoy.
Transcript details
00.00-00.43
Emma De-Carteret
Hi everybody, my name is Emma De-Carteret and I'm the director of corporate affairs and performance in the organisation. I'm here today to talk to you about fit for the future and specifically demonstrating impact as one of the five workstreams underpinning the long term improvement program. And it's the first in a series, so each of the exec directors that are owning the workstreams within the program will undertake podcast to give just a different way for all of you to engage in the program. This will help to better understand the work that the organization is doing in terms of the improvement journey that we’re under. I’ve got Julie Hollings with me in terms of communications and engagement director and Sean, who will be helping drive the questions and answers for you today.
00.43-00.54
Sean Bennett
Excellent, thank you very much Emma. And so I suppose setting the scene, the first question is - What is fit for future? How would you describe the scheme?
00.54-02.23
Emma De-Carteret
Thanks Sean. Fit for the future for me is the long term program that we've put in place as an organization as a result of a number of different things. CQC inspection in 2020 highlighted a number of issues and areas that we need to work on and improve. But it's not just about the CQC and what they've told us. Over the last 12 months, it's very much been around us listening to staff and trying to understand the extent of issues and the challenges that our workforce are facing be they frontline staff or volunteers or staff in the wider directorates across the organization.
We did a big piece of work around looking at what everybody was telling us both internally and externally, and fit for the future is basically the sum of all of the feedback that we received. So, within fit for the future is five workstreams to focus the organizations improvement on from a well led perspective. The five workstreams are – culture; workforce development; capacity and capability, and within that it is focused on organizational development, leadership and career progression; System partnership, so how we work in a really complex and changing and challenging healthcare system and how we work with other organizations and providers to give the best care for patients and to give the best opportunities for our staff; and then the final workstream so demonstrating impact, which is mine and we'll be talking about that a little bit more later on.
02.23-02.34
Sean Bennett
You mentioned to us which stream is yours. Do you want to talk to us a bit more about your stream and what you're hoping to achieve with it?
02.34-04.08
Emma De-Carteret
Yeah, thanks Sean. So, demonstrating impact for me is an absolutely core enabler, if you like, to how we move to being an organization that is successful in achieving its objectives and everything it sets out to achieve. But to make that sound really real I think for me it's about making sure that we use the information that we've got to basically deliver things like really high quality care to our patients. Things like moving to the point where we're an organization, that staff are consistently proud to work for, and that actually people want to come and work for to be an exemplar and that's around how we set ourselves up to look at what all of our information is telling us so that we make the right improvements and the right changes to make a tangible difference to our patients and staff.
When you listen to feedback from staff, consistently, the feedback that we get is ‘We've told you all of our problems. We've told you the areas that we need to work on, and we're waiting to hear and to feel how things are different.’ And this demonstrating impact workstream is very much around how we set ourselves up as an organization to make sure that we take what we hear and take what we see and then move into delivering that change so that it feels different and feels better for the organization.
04.08-04.16
Julie Hollings
So can I ask you, Emma, what do you think will look and feel different for frontline staff if this workstream is successful?
04.16-06.44
Emma De-Carteret
Thanks, Julie. For me there's a couple of different things. First and foremost, by doing things like making sure that the right information’s available, by doing things like making sure that managers, leaders, and staff across the organisation have the right training and understanding of what data looks like, what it can be used for, what it should be used for, there should be different conversations to be had around our objectives - What we're aiming to achieve, how we're going to get there, more detailed conversations around the ‘why’ we're doing stuff, because we've got the information there that allows us to explain why we're doing things, and also why we're not, because there will be things that the data says ‘actually it's not a priority right now.’
The other component around demonstrating impact is how we use the information to drive change, and I think the biggest thing for me that should feel different as we move through this two to three year program will be as we as we strengthen how we make sure we deliver on what the data is telling us. I.e. We've got a problem, we build a plan, but actually having the right process and infrastructure to enable us to deliver that plan. There's so many various examples, but if we if we talk about delivering the CQC action plan, for example. Let's take that because I've been involved in that from the outset. Within there there's all sorts of actions around shifting the dial and allowing staff to be more comfortable with speaking up, but not only that to actually drive improvements and to take the feedback that staff are giving us around the issues that they're raising, and to make the changes. The framework and the process for making sure those changes occur and that they happen and that we've got evidence that proves that they're making a difference. So, long story short, what the Workstream will deliver is an approach that allows that, if there's an issue that needs resolving, it is dealt with, and that it therefore feels differently for staff, and it could be about anything.
06.44-07.11
Sean Bennett
Excellent. You mentioned there the sort of timescale that we're looking at. So you said it's a project for about two to three years, this is not a short term fix. What kind of results are you hoping to see in increments, both in in for Fit For futures, the whole scheme, but also for your stream in itself. So what are you hoping to achieve in six months, in the first year, and then overall?
07.11-09.29
Emma De-Carteret
Thanks Sean, so from a demonstrating impact perspective, the first piece that we're focusing on, there's two tracks. Number one is what we call the integrated performance report and what that effectively is a kind of top line, Trust level oversight of the key performance measures. Now that's not just operational performance. That's clinical, it’s workforce, it's finance. It's the whole list of key things. Moving that from what it is at present to utilizing data in a statistically relevant way so that we're not bogged down in looking at everything and kind of lost in a sea of information and data noise so that we can get to the point where we go – ‘Right, out of all of these 50 areas, these four are the four that we need to deal now because they're a big issue to our staff and our patients.’ That work is underway and the target is for the integrated performance report to be finalized in April, which will then begin to shift the way in which we have conversations and discuss areas for improvement.
The second track that's being dealt with in the next couple of months is that first level training on how we analyse that data and how we use that data. Because I'll be the first to admit, data is not my strong point, but actually it's absolutely critical to how we do our jobs. So rather than me looking at spreadsheets of information or charts and me having a personal view that's based on just my experience in my various roles, having had the training that is standardised training across all of the different leaders across the organization so that we can actually look at the data consistently and go, definitively, ‘this isn't an issue right now, it's O’K or ‘this is what the data is telling us and that we need to go about’ so it should start to feel different in terms of the level of conversations that we're having, but also in terms of focusing us on the areas of real concern rather than everything.
09.29-09.38
Julie Hollings
And I'd like to ask another question, Emma, how can people get involved with fit for the future?
09.38-11.14
Emma De-Carteret
Thanks, Julie. So, there's a number of different ways. So, many people may well have been aware that we've been running workshop sessions since September via evolve. We've paused those at present and we had really good uptake, over 170 people attended those and the feedback of that has fed into the program, overall. Where we're now beginning in January to formalize the engagement and the communication process, the podcast being one example, each of the workstreams are run by an exec director, and each of those workstreams have a clear requirement on them to undertake engagement and communication within their workstreams. Now, that won't will happen in January because dependent on the timings on some of the actions and the programs within those workstreams that will phase in and out. But engagement has already begun and what we'll see is more through that.
So, what we should have is information cascade through directorates from directors down through line management, reporting that allows you to see and give opportunities to engage. There will be more engagement sessions through evolve over the coming months as the workstreams evolve. And similarly if you're not sure, ask your line manager and get in touch because we can plug people into the areas that they're most interested in.
11.14-11.27
Sean Bennett
So obviously there's a lot of work going on already in the background. What training is there already available for trust colleagues to access and to get started and get stuck in?
11.27-12.34
Emma De-Carteret
Thanks Sean, really good question. So, I think the main opening training that we've got in place is referred to as ‘making data count’. There's a number of modules that have been opened up and made available to all staff on evolve, so all you have to do is log onto your evolve system and search for ‘making data count’ and the modules appear. Now, it's not a mandatory program, but for anyone who's interested in understanding data a little bit better, kind of beginning to get to grips with how things will change for the organisation then please feel free. They're literally hour long sessions where you listen to the presentation and it will walk you through a number of different areas. I will caveat that with, obviously, if you do the training ahead of everybody else in the organisation, it will stage in terms of when things come online but the training is available now and I’d urge anyone who's got an interest in how we're using data and how we're making decisions to undertake them.
12.34-12.54
Sean Bennett
Thank you. Well I'm sure that this podcast going out will help entice people to start their training journey with fit for future, but thank you very much for coming to record this with us and hopefully we will speak to again later down the line.
12.54-12.56
Emma De-Carteret
No problem, thanks both.
Published 27th January 2022