The DNA of Care: the importance of listening to staff stories Presented by Dr Karen Deeny, Staff Experience Programme Lead at NHS England (@karendeeny1), and Dr Pip Hardy (@PilgrimPip), Co-founder of the Patient Voices Programme (@PatientVoicesUK). The intertwined relationship between patient care and staff well-being has been likened to the double helix. And so the stories we tell each other are like the DNA of care, transmitting information and shaping cultures, offering learning opportunities and, sometimes, healing.

1. ‘The DNA of Care’: the importance of
listening to staff stories
Karen Deeny and Pip Hardy
Improving care for everyone through reflective digital stories 3rd March 2017

2. ‘The DNA of Care’: the importance of
listening to staff stories
Karen Deeny and Pip Hardy
Improving care for everyone through reflective digital stories 3rd March 2017
www.patientvoices.org.uk/dnaoc.htm www.england.nhs.uk
Welcome and introductions
Dr Karen Deeny
Head of Staff Experience
NHS England
@KarenDeeny1
Dr Pip Hardy
Co-founder
Patient Voices Programme
@PilgrimPip

3. ‘The DNA of Care’: the importance of
listening to staff stories
Karen Deeny and Pip Hardy
Improving care for everyone through reflective digital stories 3rd March 2017
www.patientvoices.org.uk/dnaoc.htm www.england.nhs.uk
Why are we here?
• to give you some background about The
DNA of Care project
• to talk about the potential of digital
stories to reveal important truths about
the staff experience
• to share some stories with you
• to hear from some storytellers
• to inspire you to share your own stories

4. ‘The DNA of Care’: the importance of
listening to staff stories
Karen Deeny and Pip Hardy
Improving care for everyone through reflective digital stories 3rd March 2017
www.patientvoices.org.uk/dnaoc.htm www.england.nhs.uk
#Exp4all #DNAofCare
Staff experience drives patient experience.
Focusing on this relationship could be the most
important move for the healthcare system to
make.

5. ‘The DNA of Care’: the importance of
listening to staff stories
Karen Deeny and Pip Hardy
Improving care for everyone through reflective digital stories 3rd March 2017
www.patientvoices.org.uk/dnaoc.htm www.england.nhs.uk
Engaging staff
‘Employee engagement emerges as the best
predictor of NHS trust outcomes. No combination
of key scores or single scale is as effective in
predicting trust performance on a range of
outcomes measures as is the scale measure of
employee engagement.’
Professor Michael West

6. ‘The DNA of Care’: the importance of
listening to staff stories
Karen Deeny and Pip Hardy
Improving care for everyone through reflective digital stories 3rd March 2017
www.patientvoices.org.uk/dnaoc.htm www.england.nhs.uk
Put simply….two sides, one coin

7. ‘The DNA of Care’: the importance of
listening to staff stories
Karen Deeny and Pip Hardy
Improving care for everyone through reflective digital stories 3rd March 2017
www.patientvoices.org.uk/dnaoc.htm www.england.nhs.uk
……even more simply
‘Both staff and patients
need care, compassion
and respect.’
Professor Michael West 2014

8. ‘The DNA of Care’: the importance of
listening to staff stories
Karen Deeny and Pip Hardy
Improving care for everyone through reflective digital stories 3rd March 2017
www.patientvoices.org.uk/dnaoc.htm www.england.nhs.uk
The importance of kindness
‘I cannot emphasise enough how
meaningful it was to me when care-
givers revealed something about
themselves that made a personal
connection to my plight. The rule
books, I’m sure, frown on such
intimate engagement between care-
giver and patient. But maybe it’s
time to rewrite them.’
Kenneth Schwartz 2012

9. ‘The DNA of Care’: the importance of
listening to staff stories
Karen Deeny and Pip Hardy
Improving care for everyone through reflective digital stories 3rd March 2017
www.patientvoices.org.uk/dnaoc.htm www.england.nhs.uk
A good story….
‘A good story is so much
more than simply a
good story - it’s a
precious opportunity for
learning, for reflection
and for transformation.’

10. ‘The DNA of Care’: the importance of
listening to staff stories
Karen Deeny and Pip Hardy
Improving care for everyone through reflective digital stories 3rd March 2017
www.patientvoices.org.uk/dnaoc.htm www.england.nhs.uk
Speaking to people’s feelings
‘Our main finding, put simply, is
that the central issue is never
strategy, culture or systems.
All those elements and others are
important. But the core of the
matter is always about changing
the behaviour of people, and
behaviour change happens in
highly successful situations mostly
by speaking to people’s feelings.’
Kotter, J P and Cohen, D S (2000)

11. ‘The DNA of Care’: the importance of
listening to staff stories
Karen Deeny and Pip Hardy
Improving care for everyone through reflective digital stories 3rd March 2017
www.patientvoices.org.uk/dnaoc.htm www.england.nhs.uk
Stories make us human

12. ‘The DNA of Care’: the importance of
listening to staff stories
Karen Deeny and Pip Hardy
Improving care for everyone through reflective digital stories 3rd March 2017
www.patientvoices.org.uk/dnaoc.htm www.england.nhs.uk
Whose experience?
‘Statistics tell us the system’s
experience of the individual,
whereas stories tell us the
individual’s experience of the
system…’
Sumner, 2009

13. ‘The DNA of Care’: the importance of
listening to staff stories
Karen Deeny and Pip Hardy
Improving care for everyone through reflective digital stories 3rd March 2017
www.patientvoices.org.uk/dnaoc.htm www.england.nhs.uk
Finding a voice
‘One of the hardest
things in life is having
words in your heart
that you can't utter.’
James Earl Jones

14. ‘The DNA of Care’: the importance of
listening to staff stories
Karen Deeny and Pip Hardy
Improving care for everyone through reflective digital stories 3rd March 2017
www.patientvoices.org.uk/dnaoc.htm www.england.nhs.uk
Patient Voices
patience, noun. calm
endurance of pain or
any provocation;
perseverance
patient, adj. having or
showing patience
voice, verb. give
utterance to, express
Concise Oxford Dictionary, 1964

15. ‘The DNA of Care’: the importance of
listening to staff stories
Karen Deeny and Pip Hardy
Improving care for everyone through reflective digital stories 3rd March 2017
www.patientvoices.org.uk/dnaoc.htm www.england.nhs.uk
The DNA of Care
‘The intertwined relationship
between patient care and staff well-
being has been likened to the double
helix. And so the stories we tell each
other are like the DNA of care,
transmitting information and shaping
cultures, offering learning
opportunities and, sometimes,
healing.’ Hardy and Sumner 2015

16. ‘The DNA of Care’: the importance of
listening to staff stories
Karen Deeny and Pip Hardy
Improving care for everyone through reflective digital stories 3rd March 2017
www.patientvoices.org.uk/dnaoc.htm www.england.nhs.uk
What happened?
• Five workshops
• 33 storytellers
• 34 stories
• Reflection
• Insight
• Connection
• Healing

17. ‘The DNA of Care’: the importance of
listening to staff stories
Karen Deeny and Pip Hardy
Improving care for everyone through reflective digital stories 3rd March 2017
www.patientvoices.org.uk/dnaoc.htm www.england.nhs.uk
The workshops….

18. ‘The DNA of Care’: the importance of
listening to staff stories
Karen Deeny and Pip Hardy
Improving care for everyone through reflective digital stories 3rd March 2017
www.patientvoices.org.uk/dnaoc.htm www.england.nhs.uk
The words in their hearts…

19. ‘The DNA of Care’: the importance of
listening to staff stories
Karen Deeny and Pip Hardy
Improving care for everyone through reflective digital stories 3rd March 2017
www.patientvoices.org.uk/dnaoc.htm www.england.nhs.uk
Impermanence
Natasha Curran, 2016http://patientvoices.org.uk/flv/1028pv384.htm

20. ‘The DNA of Care’: the importance of
listening to staff stories
Karen Deeny and Pip Hardy
Improving care for everyone through reflective digital stories 3rd March 2017
www.patientvoices.org.uk/dnaoc.htm www.england.nhs.uk
Introducing Natasha Curran

21. ‘The DNA of Care’: the importance of
listening to staff stories
Karen Deeny and Pip Hardy
Improving care for everyone through reflective digital stories 3rd March 2017
www.patientvoices.org.uk/dnaoc.htm www.england.nhs.uk
Your thoughts and reflections

22. ‘The DNA of Care’: the importance of
listening to staff stories
Karen Deeny and Pip Hardy
Improving care for everyone through reflective digital stories 3rd March 2017
www.patientvoices.org.uk/dnaoc.htm www.england.nhs.uk
Sharing and communication
‘It’s taken a lot of guts to
share this deeply, and not
hide behind our
professional selves. It’s
important for our
colleagues and policy
makers to know that it’s
ok to share. This should
help us all communicate
better in the future.’

23. ‘The DNA of Care’: the importance of
listening to staff stories
Karen Deeny and Pip Hardy
Improving care for everyone through reflective digital stories 3rd March 2017
www.patientvoices.org.uk/dnaoc.htm www.england.nhs.uk
Introducing Damon Kamming

24. ‘The DNA of Care’: the importance of
listening to staff stories
Karen Deeny and Pip Hardy
Improving care for everyone through reflective digital stories 3rd March 2017
www.patientvoices.org.uk/dnaoc.htm www.england.nhs.uk
Touch
Damon Kamming, 2016http://patientvoices.org.uk/flv/1006pv384.htm

25. ‘The DNA of Care’: the importance of
listening to staff stories
Karen Deeny and Pip Hardy
Improving care for everyone through reflective digital stories 3rd March 2017
www.patientvoices.org.uk/dnaoc.htm www.england.nhs.uk
Your thoughts and reflections

26. ‘The DNA of Care’: the importance of
listening to staff stories
Karen Deeny and Pip Hardy
Improving care for everyone through reflective digital stories 3rd March 2017
www.patientvoices.org.uk/dnaoc.htm www.england.nhs.uk
Introducing Rachel Scanlan

27. ‘The DNA of Care’: the importance of
listening to staff stories
Karen Deeny and Pip Hardy
Improving care for everyone through reflective digital stories 3rd March 2017
www.patientvoices.org.uk/dnaoc.htm www.england.nhs.uk
Stay
Rachel Scanlan, 2016http://patientvoices.org.uk/flv/1019pv384.htm

28. ‘The DNA of Care’: the importance of
listening to staff stories
Karen Deeny and Pip Hardy
Improving care for everyone through reflective digital stories 3rd March 2017
www.patientvoices.org.uk/dnaoc.htm www.england.nhs.uk
Your thoughts and reflections

29. ‘The DNA of Care’: the importance of
listening to staff stories
Karen Deeny and Pip Hardy
Improving care for everyone through reflective digital stories 3rd March 2017
www.patientvoices.org.uk/dnaoc.htm www.england.nhs.uk
Connection and reconnection
‘It’s rare for me to feel I’ve
made as much connection
with as many people as I have
this weekend.’
‘If we can connect with each
other then there’s hope for
the NHS.’
‘For me, it’s been so
important to reconnect with
why I came into healthcare.’

30. ‘The DNA of Care’: the importance of
listening to staff stories
Karen Deeny and Pip Hardy
Improving care for everyone through reflective digital stories 3rd March 2017
www.patientvoices.org.uk/dnaoc.htm www.england.nhs.uk
What storytellers said
‘It restores my faith to meet people working in a
vast range of settings who all share the same
values and need for change, whether it be top
down, bottom up, or just one contact at a time.
It’s encouraging to think we are just one cohort
among many going out into the world of the NHS
that little bit better in every way for our shared
experience, and both willing and able to share
that improvement with others.’

31. ‘The DNA of Care’: the importance of
listening to staff stories
Karen Deeny and Pip Hardy
Improving care for everyone through reflective digital stories 3rd March 2017
www.patientvoices.org.uk/dnaoc.htm www.england.nhs.uk
Transformation
‘People reach greater
maturity as they find the
freedom to be
themselves and to claim,
accept and love their
own personal story, with
all its brokenness and its
beauty.’
Vanier 2004

32. ‘The DNA of Care’: the importance of
listening to staff stories
Karen Deeny and Pip Hardy
Improving care for everyone through reflective digital stories 3rd March 2017
www.patientvoices.org.uk/dnaoc.htm www.england.nhs.uk
What next?
Experience of Care week
20th – 24th March 2017 #ExpofCare
Digital stories webinar
March 2017 2.00pm – 3.30pm #ExpofCare

33. ‘The DNA of Care’: the importance of
listening to staff stories
Karen Deeny and Pip Hardy
Improving care for everyone through reflective digital stories 3rd March 2017
www.patientvoices.org.uk/dnaoc.htm www.england.nhs.uk
Thank you
pip@pilgrimprojects.co.uk @PilgrimPip
karendeeny@nhs.net @karendeeny1
www.patientvoices.org.uk
#PtExp
@PatientVoicesUK
#DNAofCare
www.patientvoices.org.uk/dnaoc.htm