Using Quality Improvement to deliver a systematic organisational approach to enjoying work in healthcare

Abstract

Staff wellbeing is increasingly linked to good outcomes for service users in healthcare.
Therefore, it is important for organisations to find ways to focus on wellbeing and staff
experience at work. This article shares learning from 5 years of using the Institute for
Healthcare Improvement’s joy in work framework, coupled with quality improvement
methods to enhance staff experience and wellbeing. This demonstrates how teams were
brought together in a collaborative learning system to apply quality improvement to
enhance joy in work. Key steps are shared for other organisations wanting to undertake
this work, including the application of improvement methods to empower teams locally to
develop, design and test change ideas, and measure their impact. The design of systems
and structures required to meaningfully bring teams together and the type of leadership
that enhances this work are also considered. Key learning points for other organisations
include the need for improvement principles to iterate the organisational approach, make
measurement simple, encourage a bias to action and make the work fun.