What Makes A Good Workplace

A good workplace is one where staff feel respected, supported and psychologically safe. In healthcare, compassionate leadership, effective teamwork and a culture of learning rather than blame can help prevent bullying and undermining, improve staff wellbeing and support better patient outcomes

Given the size and scale of workplace bullying in the NHS, the NHS Health and Wellbeing Framework sets out the standards for what NHS organisations need to do to support staff feeling well, healthy, and happy at work.

These include targeted support for those that are, or have experienced incivility, disrespect, bullying, or harassment as well as the creation of a 'just and restorative" workplace cultures.

According to West & Chowla (2017), leaders can only leaders understand and support their employees when they pay attention to staff and ‘listen with fascination’, develop a shared understanding of what employees face, empathy and "taking intelligent action to serve or help." Such "compassionate leadership" is essential in creating psychologically safe workplaces where staff are more likely to listen and support each other resulting in less bullying and better patient outcomes.

Compassionate leadership also requires individuals to display self-compassion, practising kindness and compassion and using mindfulness to understand the ‘here and now. Self-kindness and looking after yourself can positively impact your health and wellbeing, so all leaders should be able to practise self-compassion and support their employees to do the same.

Organisations also need to think about those elements that are potentially causing inappropriate behaviours, such as unmanageable workloads, whether staff have sufficient resources to do their role effectively, working patterns and whether there is a focus on learning from mistakes or apportioning blame.

Positive workplaces acknowledge these issues through organisational learning and work collectively to address them. Schippers, West and Dawson (2015) suggest that the learning potential of an organisation is improved by ‘reflexivity and team learning’ – that is, teams are more productive, effective, and innovative when they routinely take time out to reflect on their objectives, strategies, processes, and environments and make changes accordingly.

Schwartz Rounds from the Point of Care Foundation, provide such a structured forum where all staff, clinical and non-clinical, come together regularly to discuss the emotional and social aspects of working in healthcare. Evidence shows that staff who attend Schwartz Rounds feel less stressed and isolated, with increased insight and appreciation for each other’s roles.

Do I Have A Good Workplace?

NHS England's "Supporting Our Staff A Toolkit To Promote Cultures Of Civility And Respect" suggests the following are indicative of a Trust or Health Boards willingness to understand and improve their workplace cultures.

• Staff surveys on workplace behaviours, civility, and bullying.

• Listening events and staff support, such as Schwartz Rounds and staff focus groups.

• Shared team objectives.

• Team development and team reflection opportunities.

• Personal reflection logs.

• Behavioural Self-Assessments.

• Internal activity to promote civility and respect, compassion, and inclusion.

• "Values Ambassadors" who implement a just and learning culture.

• Peer support arrangements.

• Coaching.

• Support for managers and employees to have difficult conversations about acceptable behaviour in the workplace.

• Facilitated training workshops on subjects such as Respect and Support, Unconscious bias, resilience, leadership, courageous conversations, organisational values, and interpersonal behaviours.

• Employee assistance programme, Occupational health service, Wellbeing activities.

• Counselling and Mediation services, Respect and Support helpline.

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