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Title:
National Health Service National Staff Survey, 2003
(NHS National Staff Survey, 2003)

Subject Categories:
General - Employment and labour
Health services and medical care - Health
Use and provision of specific social services - Social welfare policy and systems

Depositor(s):
Healthcare Commission

Principal Investigator(s):
Healthcare Commission
Aston University. Aston Business School

Sponsor(s):
Healthcare Commission

Abstract:
The Commission for Health Improvement (CHI) (now the Healthcare Commission (HC)), in conjunction with the Department of Health (DH), appointed Aston University to develop and pilot a new national National Health Service (NHS) staff survey, commencing in 2003, and to establish an advice centre and web site to support that process. Researchers at Aston University were responsible for the initial development of the survey questionnaire instrument, and for the setting up of the NHS National Staff Survey Advice Centre.

All organisations concerned worked in partnership to consult widely with NHS staff about the content of the new national survey. The work was conducted under the guidance of a stakeholder group, which contained representatives from the staff side, HC, DH, human resources directors, Strategic Health Authorities and the NHS workforce.

The purpose of the new annual NHS staff survey is to collect staff views about working in their local NHS trust. The new survey has been designed to replace trusts' own annual staff surveys, the DH '10 core questions', and the HC 'Clinical Governance Review' staff surveys. It is intended that this one new annual survey will cover the needs of HC, DH and trusts. Thus, it will provide information for deriving national performance measures (including star ratings) and to help the NHS, at national and local level, work towards the 'Improving Working Lives' standard. The design also incorporates questions relating to the 'Positively Diverse Programme'. Trusts will be able to use the findings to identify how their policies are working in practice. The survey will enable organisations, for the first time, to benchmark themselves against other similar NHS organisations and the NHS as a whole, on a range of measures of staff satisfaction and opinion. It became obligatory for all NHS trusts and primary care trusts (PCTs) in England to implement this new survey with a sample of their staff at the end of October 2003.

The collection of data (i.e. the survey fieldwork) is conducted by a number of independent survey contractors. For example, in 2003 these were: Maritz, Mori, NHS Partners Research and Information; Picker Institute Europe; Quality Health; RBA Research, and Taylor Nelson Sofres. The individual contractors are appointed directly by each NHS trust in England. The contractors are required to follow a set of detailed guidance notes supplied by the Advice Centre (see web site link above), which covers the methodology required for the survey. For example, this includes details on how to draw the random sample, the requirements for printing of questionnaires, letters to be sent to respondents, data entry and submission. At the end of the fieldwork, the data are then sent to the Advice Centre. From the data submitted, each participating NHS trust in England receives a benchmarked 'Feedback Report' from the Advice Centre, which also produces (on behalf of HC) a series of detailed spreadsheets which report details of each question covered in the survey for each participating trust in England, and also a 'Key Findings' summary report covering the survey findings at national level.

Further information about the survey series and related publications are available from the Advice Centre web site (see link above) and the Healthcare Commission Surveys of NHS Staff web pages.

Main Topics:
Topics covered in the survey include: work-life balance; appraisal; training, learning and development; team working; health and safety; errors and incidents witnessed; job characteristics and arrangements; management and supervision; perceptions of organisation worked for; harassment, bullying and violence; and respondents' demographic characteristics.

Coverage:
Dates of Fieldwork: October 2003-December 2003
Country: England
Spatial Units: No spatial unit
Observation Units: Individuals
Kind of Data: Numeric data; Individual (micro) level

Universe Sampled:
Location of Units of Observation:National
Population:Staff at the 572 NHS trusts in England.

Methodology:
Time Dimensions: Repeated cross-sectional study
Sampling Procedures: Quota sample
See documentation for further details.
Number of Units: 203,911 cases
Method of Data Collection: Postal survey; Self-completion
Weighting: No weighting used.

Language(s) of Written Materials:
Study Description: English
Study Documentation: English

Access:
Access Conditions: The depositor has specified that registration is required and standard conditions of use apply. The depositor may be informed about usage. See terms and conditions for further information.
Availability: ESDS Access and Preservation, UK Data Archive
Contact: Help desk: help@esds.ac.uk

Date of Release:
First Edition: 15 October 2007

Copyright:
Copyright Healthcare Commission

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