The 2009 NHS staff survey is now out. The Academy of Medical Royal Colleges did some more analysis of the findings. Having looked at it, my reading of it shows that (Note that though I am using consultant response figures here, broadly similar inferences can be made from all other staff responses as well):
a) Though 50% of consultants agreed that they understand their role and where it fits in' 100% of consultants felt their role made a difference. That says a lot about clinical engagement and culture in the NHS. You don't know what your role is but you assign yourself such a high value that you know it makes a difference. If you did not know what your role was how can you made a difference! And wonder how they knew that they made a difference when only 27% felt they had a well structured appraisal (is the appraisal not trusted?).
b) 74% of consultants but only 50% of trainees felt that can contribute towards improvement.
There are many other interesting inferences that can be made and I am happy to share the analysis if you wanted.
What is very important for successful healthcare is for the people to be very self aware (soft skills) and have the knowledge on how to make improvements (technical skills of improvement). Healthcare is full of absolutely brilliant people with high qualifications and often very scientific minds who think that either they have the people and improvement skills already or such skills are not very relevant to day-to-day clinical practice. That gap needs to be addressed. It is possible to do so.
Find out how your place is doing http://www.cqc.org.uk
