Maintain pressure on reforms to protect NHS
Roger Rowett
North Wales
Managing Director of Taith Ltd. Previous HMI with Estyn and Inspector and Professional Advisor with CSIW.
Recent activity
Comments (5)
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Comment on: Bedbugs and consultants are both bleeding us dry
Being a consultant myself I can only make the obvious comment - the headline statement is an over simplification! Sadly I think that in many cases the use of consultants is an avoidance of internal managers taking decisions or a reaction to the health and safety paranoia driven by the claims culture. However, in better examples an external consultant can provide a 'fresh' perspective on issues of a specialist technical nature or organisational development. In the latter case this should always totally involve and empower those people working on the front line and other key stakeholders.
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Comment on: Services better at trusts with the happiest nurses
As above - an obvious outcome - but still an important reminder (of the obvious). The key is effectively listening to staff. If management genuinely do this, and respond to what staff are saying (where appropriate and practical), this results in higher levels of engagement and motivation all round. As I have said in response to two other articles - in my experience the Appreciative Inquiry approach is an excellent 'tool' to enable this to happen.
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Comment on: Patient experience is more important than staff satisfaction
Very interesting and 'explosive' debate. From my point of view the two are inextricably intertwined. Whilst it is possible to have one without the other there is no doubt (in my mind) that happy staff contribute to happy patients. One of the problems (across all services) with current management practice is the focus on identifying problems and trying to 'fix' them. If, for example, a patient satisfaction survey was conducted - 20% thought the service was excellent, 60% thought it was good, and 20% thought it was poor - what would 'we' do? Without doubt in most cases managers would focus on the 20% of concerns and attempt to fix them. Now whilst some problems will need fixing, a much more productive and ultimately successful approach is to find out why some people received an excellent service and build on this. One model for doing this is called Appreciative Inquiry - a highly successful and proven approach that results in positive and sustainable change. As long as we keep focusing on the problems all we will get is low moral and a blame culture. What we focus on becomes our reality! Roger Rowett
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Comment on: Desperate times call for inventive measures
Creative approaches are critical to the future of all our public services and the need to 'galvanise the profession' is central to that. We all know that if you cannot take people with you (staff, 'customers' and other stakeholders) there is little chance of stimulating real change and improvement. Having worked in the direct delivery of services, and within inspectorates, I do not think the deficit based approach is the most effective method - i.e. identify the problems and then create an action plan. It can be dis-empowering and create negativity and a blame culture. For the last year I have been working with organisations using an Appreciative Inquiry (AI) approach - identifying excellence (and there is always some within any organisation) and building on this. The AI approach totally engages staff and other key stakeholders. It does not ignore problems but addresses them within a positive framework. Read more about AI and how it can create (to use the jargon) sustainable continuous improvement.
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Comment on: Changing the rules of engagement is inspirational
I have been providing training and organisational development for the past 30 years. Over the past year I have been using an Appreciative Inquiry approach which for me is the most powerful and 'refreshing' approach to stimulating lasting change. See www.taith.co.uk for more details
