Agenda item

To endorse Haringey’s Workforce Health and Wellbeing Strategy and to champion workforce health and wellbeing at the senior and strategic level in order to embed the Strategy across the Council and in parallel with the Workforce Plan.

The Committee considered the report on the Workforce Health and Wellbeing Strategy, as presented by Tamara Djuretic, Assistant Director of Public Health. The report set out the three main priorities supporting the strategy, the outcomes associated with these and progress in implementing the strategy so far.

The Committee asked about the training that had been delivered for staff and managers on mental health awareness and it was reported that this was a three hour session which covered specific mental health issues as well as the broader impacts of organisational change on wellbeing and behaviour. Dr Djuretic advised that a follow up session had also been commissioned for those who may have been uncomfortable discussing these issues in a formal training setting.

The Committee welcomed the report and the work taking place around delivery of the strategy, but suggested that some of the measures of success relating to the outcomes needed further development in order to be more meaningful. Dr Djuretic agreed that finding appropriate measures of success had been a challenge and that further work would be undertaken to improve these.

In response to a question from the Committee regarding how this work was being communicated to staff, Dr Djuretic advised that this was via the ‘Healthy Haringey’ webpage, and that specific messages were promoted via pop ups on the home intranet page. In addition to online communications, messages were disseminated by the Health and Wellbeing Champions throughout the organisation, and via the Corporate Health, Safety and Wellbeing Board. A health and wellbeing event specifically for Haringey staff was also planned for September 2015. It was noted that efforts would need to be made to sustain the momentum around this work.

In response to a question from the Committee regarding the target for reducing staff sickness, Ms McGeachie advised that there was a corporate target of reducing the number of sickness absence days to 6 per employee, but that it would be difficult to assess how much of any reduction in sickness absence could be directly attributable to the work around the health and wellbeing strategy.

The Committee mentioned the approach being adopted by some companies of discouraging the use of email outside of normal office hours, or over specific periods, for example Christmas and New Year. Dr Djuretic advised that this was among the various approaches that the Council was looking into.

Looking again at the measures of success, the Committee noted that the Council needed to think about how ambitious it wanted to be in respect of corporate health and wellbeing. It was felt that more information was needed in order to make decisions on reasonable targets, and it was agreed that Dr Djuretic would undertake some work around this and bring proposals back to the September meeting of the Committee. It was also noted that it was important to recognise that there would be variation between services in respect of the levels of sickness absence and injuries, due to the nature of the roles within them.

RESOLVED

That the Committee endorse Haringey’s Workforce Health and Wellbeing Strategy and champion workforce health and wellbeing at the senior and strategic level in order to embed the Strategy across the Council and in parallel with the Workforce Plan.