Friday Message from Lesley Writtle: Friday 1 November
November 1, 2024
As we are in the midst of moves into Midland Met, I wanted to again share thanks from me and my Board colleagues, for all the hard work and commitment that has been shown in making this move happen and the continued work that is ongoing to for the Maternity, Neonates and Gyane move on 6 November and the rest of the City site to move on 10 November. The new hospital is certainly glowing and working well, but we must remember that we have these next moves happening so need to keep the momentum!
Recently, I met with some of the new leadership team for Integration, Community, and Primary Care this week , Lisa Maxfield, Associate Chief Integration Officer and Steve Phillips, Deputy Chief Integration Officer, with Sian Thomas who will be joining us next week as Chief Integration Officer. Sian is currently Deputy COO at The Royal Wolverhampton NHS Trust, where she leads on all GP and community services, as well as being the lead for the Wolverhampton Place Partnership.
With this new focus, its feels like an invigorating and exciting time, as we refresh our work plan particularly focusing on our joint working at place and increased work with our primary care teams. Sian will be the executive lead for all primary care and community service provision at SWB, as well as the lead director for the Sandwell Health and Care Partnership. Sian will also assume this lead director role for the West Birmingham Locality Partnership. I look to seeing the work of Sian’s wider team develop.
Within my message I wanted to acknowledge and recognise the impact and ongoing delivery and support by our many PCCT who have worked tirelessly to enable the safe implementation of MMUH, by ensuring our patients are cared for within the community and closer to home. We recognise that a lot of attention has been on the delivery of a new hospital and the staff who have been moving over to MMUH. he delivery of the new hospital wouldn’t have been possible without the continued support of the community and primary care teams.
This week’s message is about recognising the unsung heroes of our workforce, who are working behind the scenes, connecting with our patients and maintaining care in the community along with partners. In the forth coming weeks, we will be focussing on the Health Campuses at City and Sandwell, and ensure we engage and listen to staff who remain on those sites going forward. .
As I alluded to earlier in my message, the next set of moves are imminent into MMUH, and I was delighted to have the opportunity to talk with Helen Hurst, Director of Midwifery this week about how important this move is to staff and service users. Staff are really welcoming the fact that delivery suites, neonatal unit, midwifery led unit, and our regional gynaecological centre will be moving to state-of-the-art facilities which have been long awaited. We know that these facilities will support excellent patient care and will make a huge difference to our working practices. Again, tremendous thought has been put into moving our youngest patients and women in labour, thank you to you to all the teams involved in this. With their birthing boxes at the ready and staff clear about their roles we are ready to go on Wednesday next week! The enthusiasm and proactive thinking of the teams ensuring safety from the moment we open has been paramount. And of course, we also must thank our health partners in the system for their mutual aid support.
We are now into the second month of the NHS Staff Survey, and our response rate is just over 20 per cent – whilst we are making good progress, we are still sitting below the national average. We need a concerted effort to increase the response rate so please ensure that this is one of your priorities over the coming weeks. Now more than ever it is important that we hear from as many colleagues as possible as we continue to settle into Midland Met. The survey has been sent to you via email and will have come from Staff Survey 2024 – picker_surveys@picker.org.
Learning and development as SWB is vital to improve as an organisation. We all have preferences when it comes to learning skills. There are many opportunities across the Trust to support this. This could be from personal reflection, weLearn activities, conversations with colleagues and peers, attending a course or webinar, projects, self-directed learning, shadowing others or having a coach or mentor. Your Performance Development Review (PDR) is a perfect opportunity to explore this further and agree a plan over the coming year. Consider examples of the learning and organisational development opportunities to you that are showcased in our new brochure which can be accessed by clicking here. In fact, this new brochure and a focus on learning, is a direct result of your feedback in the staff survey – so it is worth filling it in, as we do listen and take your feedback on board.
Speaking of PDRs, being able to have great one to one discussion is a big part of any PDR. With this in mind, we have launched our new guide for holding great one to one discussions. This guide provides you with an overview of best practice to consider and enact when planning, holding, and concluding one-to-one conversations. SWB is committed to a culture of compassion and views ongoing one to one discussion as a key enabler of this. Consider your on-going learning and development needs that can be explored during your next one to one discussion. There is a whole range of learning opportunities available to you which can also be found in the new brochure.
Finally, City Hospital and its legacy remains a huge part of staff, patients, and the local community. This week we wanted to honour our past, and as part of what we are doing to say goodbye to City, we hosted a farewell gathering today in the dining room at the Postgraduate Centre. This was a chance to explore some memorabilia and historic items we’ve collected over the years the perfect opportunity to reconnect with our past before we step into the future at Midland Met.