“Ellen’s study has benefitted herself, her family, her work colleagues, patients being admitted into hospital and the organisation that employs her.”
Ellen’s reasons for enrolment, ‘I’ve completed the Level 3 course and found it so useful within our organisation. I would like to complete Level 4 business to help my work colleagues and to use proper channels to be an effective leader.’
Ellen’s goal was to show the 63 clerical staff working in ED of Middlemore Hospital that it was possible to register each ambulance patient in under 10 minutes, a KPI that had been set by management. There was resistance to the new registration process and Ellen ‘wanted to show, using structures and outcomes that it was a workable task and that it could be done.’
Many of her clerical colleagues saw themselves as ‘data-entry’ people, but Ellen convinced them that they needed to ‘step up and be a bit more mindful’. She encouraged them through doing short surveys, holding one-on-one and group meetings, and having short conversations in corridors. She sent out emails, as necessary and created a list of medical abbreviations to assist understanding and speed up registration. Ellen convinced her workmates that the changes in process were beneficial in so many ways from their own personal safety to patient care, to hospital funding.
Some of her colleagues were a little sceptical at first but they were happy to take part in Ellen’s project and in the end the results spoke for themselves. ‘The confidence in the clerical staff grew and they’re all willing to work in that area now. They’re a lot more helpful towards others. There’s more compassion in the workplace and towards the public.’
Ellen has grown in confidence through the opportunities that study has brought her. Prior to the Level 3 course, she hadn’t done any study. Now, she sees herself in a team leadership role and knows that management also believe in her.
As a mother of seven, Ellen said it was good to show the younger children what study achieves. ‘Often, they were working at one end of the kitchen table while I was studying at the other.’ Her older children have left home now, but ‘all the children were great throughout the learning and when the certificate arrived, we all got together under one roof, and we had a nice big dinner’.