The impact of civility in the workplace

This month, I joined nurses and midwives in Belfast for the Northern Ireland Chief Nurse's annual conference. The conference coincided with the launch of Strengthening Our Core. A regional framework for health and social care staff health and wellbeing in the workplace (Department of Health, 2024). Both the conference and the framework acknowledged the context in which health and social care staff are operating, and the recognition of the importance of staff health and wellbeing to achieving high-quality care. The framework recognises the many factors that influence the health and wellbeing of staff, both within and external to the workplace, and considers:

Of course, a key enabler to the delivery of these factors is leadership – which caused me to reflect on the evidence base that I drew upon to share as part of my presentation at the conference.

This started with what I see as the core of workplace wellbeing, which is to enable professionalism. The Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) document Enabling Professionalism (2018a) sets out what professionalism looks like in everyday practice through application of the Code. (NMC, 2018b). This work was led by the four chief nursing and midwifery officers from across the UK and was, in my view, ahead of its time. It recognised that, whatever the practice setting, the environments in which nurses and midwives work are pivotal in supporting professional practice and behaviours, and details the factors that require consideration to achieve this. Wider evidence includes conclusions that professional behaviours are primary determinants of positive patient experience (Adams et al, 2024), whereas: