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Single Assessment Framework version

All services - change

GO Online: Inspection toolkit

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Shared direction and culture

The culture of your service will need to be shaped around the needs of the people you support and the wider community.

The following film provides a summary of this area of inspection. It can help you and your teams learn about what will be inspected and what is important to demonstrate to deliver good or outstanding care.

Introducing Shared direction and culture

Duration 02 min 18 sec

The CQC Well-led focus will begin by looking at the vision, strategy, and culture of your organisation.

The CQC inspectors will want to know what role your managers and leaders play in setting the culture of the service, ensuring it is open and transparent.

They’ll be expecting that the culture of your service is based on ensuring the care you provide is based on equity, equality and human rights, diversity, and inclusion. Be prepared to share examples and demonstrate how managers lead by example on these matters.

Closed cultures have been a particular concern to the CQC so being able to evidence how you protect people from such will be important.

To meet CQC expectations, you will need to actively engage the people you support in shaping the culture, vision, and values. If you have got these right then both staff and the people you support should be proud of the service and the levels of care it provides.

When looking at the culture, the CQC will also want to know that there is effective team working and collaboration, that all staff are treated fairly, and they are valued and respected.

There may also be some focus on how your service assesses the social impact of the care you provide in the community.

As with other areas of inspection, evidence will be gathered by a combination of data collection, interviews, and review of documentation. Residential services should expect observations of care too.

Inspectors may want to see your strategy and vision, statement and values, associated policies and procedures … and a wide range of other written evidence so ensuring these are ready and available is important.

GO Online brings together resources, practical examples, and recommendations to meet this area of inspection.

Watch the film here: https://vimeo.com/790356798

Recommendations

These recommendations act as a checklist to what the CQC will be looking for. Skills for Care has reviewed hundreds of inspection reports and identified these recommendations as recurring good practice in providers that meet CQC expectations.

The CQC is non-prescriptive, which means they don’t tell you what must be done in order to meet their Quality Statement. These recommendations are not intended to be a definitive list and some recommendations might not be relevant to your service. We hope they help you reflect on what evidence you might wish to share with the CQC.

Shared direction and culture

  • We give people, their family, and friends a strong voice in the shaping of our vision, strategy, and culture. This is built around what is important to them and our local community.
  • We can evidence how our shared vision, strategy and culture enables us to understand the challenges and needs of people and respond to these.
  • We have a clear and clearly communicated Statement of Purpose.
  • Our senior managers and leaders own our vision and values, keeping these under regular review.
  • We have a person-centred culture that puts the people we support at the heart of the service. These are backed up with appropriate policies and procedures.
  • We are committed to delivering transparency, equity, equality and human rights, diversity, and inclusion.
  • Our managers and leaders understand the culture of the service and ensure it meets the needs of the people we support, as well as staff and other stakeholders.
  • We understand the risks of a closed culture and actively work to ensure that this will never be a part of our service.
  • We regularly review any restrictions in place to check they are still proportionate and necessary.
  • We have a well embedded culture of fairness, and support across our service. This way of working extends to our support to others in the local community.
  • Our managers and leaders support our staff team to fully understand and believe in the shared vision, strategy, and culture.
  • We ensure that our managers and staff speak to the people we support, their families and colleagues in a respectful manner and never use degrading terminology.
  • We ensure our shared vision, strategy, and culture are clearly communicated and effectively used in their recruitment, induction, and day-to-day delivery of the service.
  • We monitor our performance against the shared vision, strategy, and culture of the service.
  • Our staff are managed by people who support their health and wellbeing. This is in accordance with NICE Quality Standards.
  • Our teams can contribute to decision-making through staff engagement forums or equivalent. This is in accordance with NICE Quality Standards.
  • We are committed to ensuring all our staff are treated equitably and are valued and respected across the service.
  • We have strong and effective relationships across the entire staff team. We are all proud of the quality of care that the service delivers.
  • Our staff teams work collaboratively with one another and all external partners, agencies, and community contacts they engage with.
  • We mitigate the risk of delivering our strategy by having an action plan that addresses internal and external factors that might impact it being delivered.
  • We strive to deliver our vision and values built upon good or best practice.

Developed in partnership with

Skills for Care Ltd, West Gate, Grace Street, Leeds, LS1 2RP. Registered company no. 3866683. Registered in England charity no. 1079836.
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