The challenge:

Wanting to meet its obligations under equality legislation and to develop services for all local communities, an NHS organisation commissioned us to undertake a needs assessment of LGBT communities and an organisational needs assessment that included staff.

Our approach:

As this project involved sensitive and complex issues, a carefully considered and planned range of research approaches was used to fully engage with harder to reach communities. By using a mix of research methods, we were able to better respond to specific local needs.

The methods used included focus groups, paper surveys, one-to-one interviews, electronic surveys, lunchtime engagement sessions and stakeholder interviews. Interviews within the community were held in a variety of community establishments including bars and cafes.
Staff were kept informed of the work and its progress via regular bulletins.

The results:

We produced a final report, executive summary and supported the dissemination and the use of findings through a local learning workshop with 100 stakeholders.

The report contained an evidence review and a benchmark of national guidelines and policy. Recommendations were made to improve organisational efforts across the workplace as well as service planning and delivery and ensuring compliance with legal requirements.
A final learning and dissemination event provided opportunity to share findings with internal and external stakeholders.