This is how we say thank you round here
On the day the NHS turns 73, our recently-appointed People Engagement Practitioner Amy Harker gives us a quick guide to a new scheme that helps us all say "thank you".
I only started working at LYFPT a mere three months ago and I can tell you I felt incredibly humbled learning about all the wonderful work the trust does each and every day. So when we was asked to write an Award and Recognition strategy I was, firstly feeling slightly out of my depth but most importantly, thrilled to make sure you all knew how valued your contributions are. Not just for the hard work and dedication in our most recent and testing times but for those of you who have made those same contributions for many many years!
Recognising and rewarding the commitment, resilience and unbelievable flexibility of you all feels more important than ever. With the events of recent months in mind, your People Engagement team has developed an Award and Recognition Strategy to ensure everyone feels valued for the work they do and recognised for the contribution they make. Some of the awards and ways we will recognise you going forward remain unchanged but here’s a quick summary of what’s in store in the future…
Big Thank You Event replaces Trust Awards this year
For those who’ve attended in the past, our Trust Awards night has been a night to remember. For some I hear it can be a night that’s quite hard to remember! But nevertheless, very enjoyable.
Last year was a write off but this year, we’re going all out with a much larger Thank You Event to be held at The Royal Armouries in November (we hope)!
The event will focus on saying thank you to ALL staff for their hard work over the past two years. If you aren’t able to attend the event, you’ll still be able to have your own Thank You Party locally as we’ll be allocating funds to each and every team within the trust.
Monthly awards for teams and individuals
Both our team and individual colleague awards will have a bit of a refresh. We’ve changed the financial award brackets so when your team are rewarded, there’s more financial award per colleague and you’ll still receive the coveted Team of the Month trophy! Over the coming months we’ll also be extending the judging panel to increase the equality of scoring and include staff from our Staffside/Diverse Staff Networks to be more inclusive. If you’d like to be involved let me know Amy.harker@nhs.net.
So, get your nominations in for:
Individual STAR Awards to award.lypft@nhs.net
Team of the Month to award.lypft@nhs.net
Saying a simple thank you
We know the importance of saying thank you to a colleague for gestures big and small, so we’re relaunching branding our thank you cards (both electronically and in physical form). The existing light-hearted cards will continue but with the addition of new cards linking your thank you messages to the ‘people promises’ from the NHS People Plan.
Please use them to thank the colleagues that make your day. And… we want to hear about it! We’ll be ordering physical thank you cards to each LYPFT site and confirming details of how you can share these with us or on social media!
Extra Annual Day Leave
You will have hopefully heard about your bonus annual leave day for 2021/22. If you haven’t already taken that day off, get it booked in! Do something for you, whatever helps you recover, recoup, just spend the day making time for you, you absolutely deserve it!
Christmas B-o-n-a-n-z-a!
Tis the season to be jolly…. Over the Christmas period every team in LYFPT will receive a Christmas ‘fuddle’ budget and every staff member will be entered into our Christmas Raffle Bonanza! We’re talking big brands and big prizes (and some medium/small ones too!) raffled off each day on the last two weeks leading up to Christmas. Expect some terrible Christmas cracker jokes….
Length of Service Awards coming soon . . .
We’re still working on a scheme that rewards our long serving members of staff. We’ve not quite ironed this one out yet but watch this space.
What would we like from you!
- It’s nothing too exhausting; we just ask that you celebrate each other! Nominate colleagues for awards and send thank you cards! Share them on social media and send us photos!
- Tell us how you feel with quarterly and annual staff surveys so we know how we can improve your workplace!
- Oh and get your best ‘glad rags’ on for our Big Thank You Event in November!
Finally…
The biggest thank you! Your contributions and commitment to our service users and staff over another testing year are beyond inspiring. These proposals are just the start of all the ways we want to show you how truly amazing you all are!
From everyone in People Engagement, thank you.