Culture is Key

CQC expects a good or outstanding care provider to review the culture of their organisation regularly. This ensures it continues to meet the needs of the service and is facilitating improvement effectively.

The Provider Quality's PROSPER team can support you to meet this by facilitating Culture is Key sessions with your staff.

The purpose of the Culture is Key tool is for staff to feel they are in a safe environment to raise any niggles or issues they have within the work place environment and to think of a constructive solution that will solve the issue.

It is a good tool for managers to get an insight into their staffs culture and to become aware of solutions to issues they may not have thought of. It is also about giving the control to the staff to think about why they feel the way they do and how they can change it, often by them thinking of the solution they are more willing to accept a change. 

Aim: To highlight the homes strengths and weaknesses and collectively consider the following;

• Where are we now
• Where do we want to get to?
• How do we get there?
• Who needs to be involved to make it happen?
• What next?

It can be used to

• To help a team recognise that resident safety is very complex involving lots of people
• To stimulate discussion about the strengths, weaknesses and differences of the resident safety culture in a team, between staff groups or in an organisation
• To help evaluate any specific intervention to change the safety culture of your organisation and/or team

The Culture is Key tool has been adapted from the Manchester Patient Safety Framework (MaPSaF) which has been widely used in Healthcare settings.

A paper has been pulbished in the British Medical Journal (BMJ) about the Culture is Key BMJ: Assessing the Safety Culture of Care Homes

If you are interested in having a Culture is Key session or would like further information about the session please contact the Prosper team at Prosper@essex.gov.uk