Learning from Excellence:

Rewarding excellence in the workplace and boosting morale

L Elliott, A Watson, B Geers, S Knipe, E Gibbs, J Porter, O Rides Royal Devon & Exeter Hospital, Exeter, UK.

Background

The NHS Staff Survey 2022 identified low morale and high levels of burnout amongst NHS staff, with 34.0% feeling burnt out because of their jobs (1). Despite efforts to increase morale and improve wellbeing in recent years, only 42.1% of staff feel satisfied to the extent their organisation values their work (1). In a 2016 survey by the Royal College of Physicians, 50% of junior doctors identified low staff morale as a significant factor negatively impacting patient safety (2).

Learning from Excellence (LfE) is an initiative across Royal Devon University Healthcare Trust to improve morale and recognise excellent practice amongst staff. Staff members nominate others for actions that we can learn from, positively improve the work environment and patient care. Recipients receive a letter detailing their achievement and a thank you card.

Project Aim

We aim to increase the number of Learning from Excellence (LFE) staff nominations by 50% per month in the trust by March 2023 compared to March 2022.

PDSA Cycle 1:

Increase active awareness of LfE through in-person events at the Royal Devon and Exeter Hospital.

- Attendance at hospital ‘transformation hubs’

- Staff canteen stall

- Ward-based interventions

PDSA Cycle 2 (in progress):

Introducing a feedback form on nomination letters to measure the impact on staff morale.

Results

The number of nominations in March 2022 was 13. Following our first intervention (PDSA cycle 1) in early January 2023, nominations increased to 28, 36 and 54 in January, February and March respectively. This constitutes a 415% increase in nominations in March 2023 compared to March 2022.

Nominations increased to 30-60 per month for the first quarter of 2023.

Use posters and attend monthly ‘transformation hubs’ to ensure nominations remained high and to remind staff of the platform.

Conclusions & Future Work

We have collected preliminary ‘ad-hoc’ qualitative feedback from nominees. Responses included:

“It made me feel seen for all my hard work…it made me cry” - ward clerk.

“After a hard weekend on call, receiving a thank you card made me feel valued by my colleagues” - junior doctor.

Our interventions have increased nominations significantly within the trust. Next stages of the project include:

1. Maintain an LfE presence at monthly transformation hubs

2. Ward-based interventions to continue to raise awareness amongst staff

3. Collection of qualitative feedback to measure the effect of increased nominations on morale

4. A patient-facing form, allowing us to directly measure the link between LfE and patient experiences.