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Equality, diversity and inclusion strategy

Engagement – our #allofus conversation

We carried out extensive engagement as part of our #allofus conversation to develop our Trust strategy and our equality diversity and inclusion strategy. The collective effort of those who took the time to share with us their voice, views, opinions, and insights means we have genuinely been able to put the person first and in the centre.

The engagement approach was extensive. We wanted to ensure the strategy refresh belonged to everyone, adequately reflecting the voice, views and experiences of our colleagues, governors, members, service users, carers, families, partners, and stakeholders. Our priority was to hear the voice of the people we serve.

Before starting our approach, we identified existing insight from a range of internal and external sources to identify what people had already told us. This information came from the work we have done over many years of engaging people, partners, and the wider system. We truly value when people share their views freely. We wanted to honour this voice and make sure we did not lose anything that had already been shared with us.

This information already created a rich picture of our services, progress, and what matters to people. We found key areas of excellence, themes for improvement, as well as challenges. This information gave us in-depth knowledge and a solid place to start.

To hear a broad range of voices, our approach was to go to where people live and meet to have conversations. By supporting those already connected to others, we were able to use forums, spaces, and places to talk, listen and share ideas that we would not otherwise have been able to. This means we are able to include the voices that often are not heard.

During our involvement we heard from colleagues, who valued the time to talk about our organisation, engaged partners in conversations, and used our community assets through ‘connecting people.’ It is a testament to our strong relationship with the voluntary and community sector, that we were able to engage extensively with our communities. The result was a reflective response of the workforce and population we serve. Each voice giving us a unique perspective. We heard from over 1,500 people from our communities, and almost a quarter of our workforce, and all our partners were involved.

This is who we heard from:

An infographic summarising an online survey of 1,283 participants. It shows three groups: 410 workforce members, 805 local people, and 68 stakeholders, plus over 65 face‑to‑face conversations. A map highlights where local respondents live: 18% Wakefield, 52% Kirklees, 6% Barnsley, and 23% Calderdale. Demographic icons display key findings: 36.9% identify as carers, 20.5% report a mental health condition, and 69% are female. Sexual orientation data shows 4% gay or lesbian. Ethnicity data shows 54% white, 6% mixed heritage, 35% Asian, and 4.5% Black. Religion data shows 25.5% Christian, 38% Muslim, 1% Jewish, 1% Sikh, and 1.7% Hindu. The layout uses bright colours, people icons, and simple graphics to present the statistics clearly.

From individual experiences, day-to-day encounters, survey feedback, community conversations and informal chats, each unique voice has helped us to understand what really matters to people and therefore provided valuable information which was used to shape this strategy.

Here is what people told us:

  • Access to services, specifically when in crisis, and in young people services can be challenging
  • Continued support following discharge or signpost to places where people can wait well is important
  • Cost of living and digital accessibility are still barriers that some people struggle with
  • Person centred care that is trauma informed, delivered by a kind and compassionate workforce built on trust and good relationships where people feel safe is critical
  • Waiting for services is difficult and increased community support would improve this as well as our experience of services. Its better when we work with all the system, including voluntary sector & primary care working in a joined-up way
  • More shared decision making in the design and delivery of health and care is needed. It was felt we sometimes overlook the role of families, carers and loved ones
  • Most people value being treated with dignity and respect. This includes culturally and spiritually appropriate care and environments
  • Workforce colleagues would like to feel more valued within design and delivery and be able to make improvements
  • There are some blockages in the system around communication and sharing of information
  • There is sometimes a lack of capacity within our workforce
  • A diverse workforce that is reflective of the population but also types of roles is yet to be achieved consistently
  • Narrowing the gap and addressing health inequalities needs more work
  • Holding people to account to do their job in a compassionate way is needed to ‘close the loop’
  • Demystifying what we do is needed as it is confusing

As an organisation, we value voice and wanted everyone to feel included, from our colleagues to the people we serve. Everyone’s voice has counted in the development of this strategy. The ideas, views, ambitions, and passion for our organisation has been evident.

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