The Changing NHS

YouGov has just released the results of their latest poll on ‘Whom Do the Public Trust?’

First the good news, NHS hospital managers are more trusted to tell the truth than Estate Agents. Yes, that really was the good news. Now for the bad. Out of 25 professional groups, NHS hospital managers are 18^th in the list, behind Trade Union leaders, Plumbers and Journalists on the Daily Mail. Now the really bad news, NHS hospital managers had a trust rating of 36% in Feb 03 and now it’s down to 17%. A fall of 19% in 4 years.

See the full results here.

What level of trust is it realistic for NHS managers to aspire to achieve, given the magnitude of change occurring in the NHS? Should they accept that, inevitably, it will be low and that’s just the price to be paid for pursuing radical change?

If a CEO wanted to improve their local rating what might they do? Perhaps they need to strike a good balance between focusing on a) building a positive personal profile; b) sharing good news stories about services that need to remain largely as is and c) sharing information about unsafe or unsatisfactory services that really ought to be subject to concerted public pressure to change?

How about a reputation management plan that includes:

1. A weekly column in a valued, widely read local paper
2. A regular online Q&A service, perhaps arranged through local schools and colleges, with the replies uploaded to YouTube so people can put a face to the 'suit' giving the replies. (Have you seen WebCameron and Patricia Hewitt's YouTube appearances?)
3. Open Days, where NHS managers host members of the public, show groups around new facilities and explain how services are changing
4. Public consultation processes that start without any pre-formed ‘options’ being promoted

What other ways might managers seek to rebuild trust or perhaps they shouldn’t bother to try?  Instead managers could accept being untrusted as ‘par for the course’ and rely instead on trying to persuade clinicians to ‘front’ difficult changes. After all, GPs (family doctors) got a 89% trust rating in the YouGov poll. Only down 4% from 4 years ago.

Steve

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professionals

nhs