Using the strategy development toolkit: staff and patient involvement
How Sussex Partnership NHS Foundation Trust used Monitor's strategy development toolkit to engage with its stakeholders.
Sussex Partnership NHS Foundation Trust was refreshing its strategy and wanted engagement with patients, governors, staff and the public to play a crucial role.
Ideas for stakeholder engagement
The toolkit’s 7-stage strategy process, and the ideas for engaging staff and patients included within it, enabled the trust to plan the right level of engagement with different groups of stakeholders at each stage of strategy development.
As part of the process, the trust’s strategy team facilitated joint board and council of governor workshops which preceded board strategy sessions and meant that governors were able to contribute meaningfully to the on-going strategic discussions. They also set up public events for patients, carers, the public, staff, partner organisations and governors across the 3 counties the trust serves.
This was a new approach to engagement for the trust but they found it worked well in bringing local and organisational discussions around the future shape of services together.
The results
A number of themes came out of the engagement, for example improving access to services, which were then incorporated into the strategy.
Most importantly, this process meant the board was able to reconnect with staff and local communities to create a common purpose across the organisation and the communities the trust serves.
Drafts of the strategy were shared with each person who participated in the engagement sessions and comments gratefully received.
The trust have now committed to continue to engage staff and the public as they implement the strategy, and are planning to join up with other local organisations as they do so, so that feedback and ideas cover the local health and care systems across the geography they serve.
Find out more
The engagement framework shown above can be found on page 27 of the toolkit.