The Mind Matters Initiative (MMI) has partnered with VetLed and the British Veterinary Nurses Association (BVNA) to launch a campaign to encourage vet teams to feel comfortable suggesting alternative ways of doing things, calling out unacceptable behaviour and talking openly with their colleagues about the challenges they face in the workplace.
Launching on the 2 May, the “Safe to Speak Up” campaign, a collaboration with VetLed, an industry-leading provider of veterinary workplace training and MMI supported by BVNA, will include a two-week social media campaign to raise awareness of psychological safety, a new online “Civility hub” with resources on workplace civility and will culminate in a series of five free workshops that anyone from the veterinary professions, including employers and practice staff, can attend.
Psychological safety is the feeling of being safe to raise concerns, challenge accepted ways of doing things and ask questions of colleagues. When it is introduced in a workplace, it can help people to feel more comfortable sharing ideas, encourage people to talk about issues they face and help develop more collaborative working relationships. This can help improve the whole practice culture by giving people more opportunities to learn from the mistakes of others and in turn, advance quality improvement in the veterinary workplace.
The aim of the “Safe to Speak Up campaign” is to raise awareness of how psychological safety can be incorporated into a veterinary practice and how teams can use the techniques to feel more comfortable speaking up and raising issues with colleagues. From 2 to 16 May, the professions are encouraged to engage with the campaign’s social media and share their thoughts on how they think they could apply psychological safety in their day-to-day work.
The “Safe to Speak Up” workshops will take place on 11 May and will be led by Helen Silver-MacMahon and Dan Tipney, two of the heads of training at VetLed. The sessions are completely free to attend with a maximum of 40 people at each session to ensure that everyone can take part in the sessions’ discussions. The booking for any of the day’s sessions can be done through the Hey Summit platform.
Lisa Quigley, Mind Matters Initiative manager, said: “Everyone should feel safe when they want to talk about times when things haven’t gone quite right at work.
“Psychological safety is a term that many people aren’t familiar with, so we hope this campaign will raise the awareness of the benefits that promoting psychological safety in the workplace can bring and help more vet nurses to feel confident and supported at work.”
More information about the “Safe to Speak Up” campaign and how to book onto the workshops are available on the MMI website.
