East of England’s OD Support for Integrated Care

The Challenge

In 2022, Tricordant worked in partnership with the East of England Leadership Academy and local OD colleagues, to reignite an Organisation Development Community of Practice (CoP). With the formation of Integrated Care Boards and Partnerships imminent, six Integrated Care Systems (ICS) faced the need to evolve into statutory entities. The challenge lay in preparing these systems for the shift, while addressing their unique OD challenges.

Our Approach

Recognising the evolving landscape, Tricordant undertook a diagnostic review involving volunteers from the six ICS to identify prevalent OD challenges. Our focus was on fostering a systemic mindset and developing a shared understanding of OD, beyond job titles, but encompassing individuals involved in change and transformation within social care, health, and VCSE sectors.

To address these challenges, we organised a series of impactful interventions:

• EoE OD Community of Practice Workshops: Two workshops were conducted, engaging 129 participants. Topics included building a culture of collaboration, understanding OD challenges, and introducing assessment tools.
• Virtual Bitesize Sessions: We ran a series of one-hour sessions, drawing in 663 individuals. These sessions delved into crucial OD concepts, including systems-level thinking, empowered change agency, and collaborative working.
• Action Learning Sets: Sets were facilitated from September to January 2023, designed to encourage self- facilitation among participants. These sets aimed to support and embed learning in participants’ specific context.

The Results

The participants who attended our CoP sessions were asked to complete an evaluation. Participant evaluations reflected high confidence in applying learnings to job roles (100% agreed, or strongly agreed), achieving development objectives (100% agreed or strongly agreed), and enhancing leadership abilities (92% agreed or strongly agreed).

Tricordant, in collaboration with the East of England Leadership Academy, played a pivotal role in cultivating a community focused on advancing OD practices across the 6 ICS areas, ultimately contributing to the evolution of these systems for a brighter future.

The aim was to enhance participants’ capability and confidence to think and act as leaders within systems. The programme was designed to explore what partnership working looks like, the current challenges and opportunities, and what this means for leaders operating in that context. Participant feedback indicated the significant influence the programme had, prompting them to;

– Reflect on their leadership style,
– work to influence others to be more collaborative and less directive,
– be curious about the transformative power of communities
– and lean into discomfort and ask the question, ‘What can I do that helps someone else?’

These reflections are indicative of the shifts in mindset, skills and behaviours needed to develop the systems culture that will support innovative and challenging organisation development and transformation to deliver improved outcomes for service users.

Jacky Dixon, NHS England Leadership Academy

If you would like to learn more about this case study please contact sarah.amies@tricordant.com