The last 12 months has been a great journey for the Human Resources function which I lead.
One of the main priorities for the workforce has been to increase health and wellbeing awareness across the Springhill Care Group, as it is proven to have a positive impact on productivity, morale and engagement.
I feel that we are now in a stronger position to continue to raise awareness of the importance of keeping fit and healthy, through the various initiatives we are running. These include:
- Educating the workforce on eating nutritious meals
- Encouraging staff to attend Health Check days
- Advising the workforce on being appropriately hydrated
- Providing the workforce with access to 24-hour free external counselling services
- Implementation of an attendance bonus
- Issuing pedometers
- Ensuring availability of fresh fruit in every staff room
- Allowing staff to express their suggestions through the Employee Voice.
As a result of these initiatives we have seen a huge increase in employee engagement which has reached 100 per cent in some of our homes together with increased employee attendance in work. This all contributes to Springhill Care achieving one of its corporative objectives of being recognised as an Employer of Excellence in the communities we serve.
Achieving the revised ‘sixth generation’ Investors in People Standard has also been a great achievement for the organisation particularly as it outperformed the health care sector on every level when assessed against the rigorous new version 6 criteria, but it doesn’t stop there.
Continuous improvement is core to the organisation’s continued success and the IiP Steering Group will reconvene to embark on a new journey to achieving the IiP Platinum standard within the next year or so. The IiP Steering Group will also be identifying ways in which it can assist and offer advice to other health care services within the sector by aiming to be a champion organisation in this field.
An ambitious agenda has been set for organisational development in conjunction with Donna Briggs, our Managing Director, to introduce a new competency behavioural stretching framework which will be aligned to the business objectives of the organisation.
We will also be introducing mental health workshops and ambassadors to each of our homes and services to support people who are experiencing mental health problems as well as to improve mental wellbeing in our workforce. Work will also continue on staff retention, employee engagement and investing in our workforce by offering further opportunities for learning and development.
These are just a few examples of what we will be offering staff over coming months, so do check back to find out more as we can announce it.
By Virginia Perkins
Head of Human Resources
Springhill Care Group
