Employee Consultation Survey
Royal Surrey County Hospital NHS Trust -
Case Study
Royal Surrey County Hospital NHS Trust (RSCH) is a leading General Hospital serving a local population of 320,000. Providing emergency and general hospital services, it is also the lead specialist centre for cancer patients in Surrey, West Sussex and Hampshire; serving a population of 1.2 million. The Hospital is structured around 13 'Specialty Business Units' (SBU) and has 527 beds and 14 operating theatres. It sees around 215,000 outpatients a year, 58,000 patients are admitted for treatment, around 72,000 patients attend the A&E department and more than 3,200 babies are delivered
The Business Requirement
The Trust has an annual income of £199 million and it employs approximately 3,000 staff. The current financial environment had placed, on the Trust, an obligation to cut operating-costs and a number of options for cost-saving had been determined. Management gathered feedback from staff at meetings and briefing-sessions but it was decided that a formal, hospital-wide, survey was required in order to obtain a comprehensive understanding of staff views and preferences to the options for cost-saving.
It was decided that the most effective approach was to undertake an employee consultation survey delivered by an external agency. As well as offering good value for money it would provide anonymity and confidentiality for respondents and give staff the freedom to express their views and feelings in a non-attributable way.
After researching the market RSCH selected Sigmer Technologies as their preferred survey supplier; the selection being based on Sigmer's skills, capabilities, experience and survey technology which provided a high-quality service at a very competitive cost.
The Sigmer Solution
Sigmer survey experts worked with the RSCH Project Team to develop the on-line questionnaire. RSCH believed that approximately 1,100 staff (33% of total) would be unable to access an on-line survey and a paper questionnaire and survey pack were therefore developed for this cohort.
Following rigorous testing and QA the survey was launched to staff and was supported by an internal communications activity conducted by RSCH Managers. Each member of staff received a personal e-mail inviting them to the on-line survey or a paper survey pack which was mailed to their home address.
Staff were invited to place completed paper questionnaires in the special return envelope (provided in the survey pack) and post it in the Trust's internal mail system where it was collected and secured prior to delivery to Sigmer's Data Reception Centre. Sigmer data-entry staff processed the paper questionnaires which were then sent for confidential recycling.
Sigmer provided the RSCH Project Team with an on-line survey report portal which allowed them, at any time during and after the survey, to view a dynamically-created report of responses. The on-line survey report showed, in real-time, the number of responses by department and it allowed the project team to alert specific directors and managers to any shortfall of responses from their department or business unit.
Once sufficient responses had been received to avoid the risk of derivation of respondents, the report portal was extended to provide RSCH with a graphical and statistical report of the responses to each question.
Once completed the survey was analysed by a leading academic in the field and a final report provided to the Trust.
The Result
The survey received a very high response-rate and it has been a considerable success for RSCH. Much useful feedback has been obtained and a detailed analysis of the response data has provided clear indicators as to the preferences of staff with regard to the options for cost-saving.
visit the RSCH website: www.royalsurrey.nhs.uk
Contact us NOW
To find out more about asking the right questions in the right way.
Call 01273 669 710 or e-mail surveys@sigmer.com
