Staff Well-Being and Retention: Management Perspectives and Blueprints for Change in County Mental Health Systems

Staff well-being and retention (SWR) issues are major societal concerns in both public and private sectors. While much attention is paid to these factors daily, an empirical evidence base that helps to effectively deal with these issues in the public sector is limited.

This presentation discusses a key informant interview project (19 interviews/20 county mental health managers) that was designed to help fill this gap. The project's goals were to:

1) Better understand and describe the “what” [definitions, issues] and “how” [current activities, working/best practices, facilitators/barriers, future practice and policies (e.g., priority setting, ratings of areas/activities that should be addressed] of SWR;

2) Explore, document and assess the language and frameworks associated with SWR that are used:

3) Explore similarities, differences and themes among managers' perspectives on SWR; 4) Use the data to plan further activities (e.g., stakeholder meeting process, staff SWR Surveys, using media/technology to support training) and create blueprints for change.

Content and thematic data analysis techniques were used to analyze the “what” and “how” of SWR. This presentation will discuss result highlights, and a blueprint for change to improve SWR that may be helpful to public sector, mental health and other human service organizations forging strategic management and collaborative changes processes.