Purpose
- Reduce health-related workforce exit and absence across Leeds’ health and care system.
- Strengthen workforce wellbeing, retention, and resilience by focusing on prevention and early intervention.
- Contribute to reducing inequalities in health, work, and skills, aligning with the Healthy Leeds Plan.
Strategic Drivers
- Government’s Getting Britain Working White Paper and Trailblazer/Accelerator designation.
- Local priority to tackle health-related economic inactivity and strengthen workforce capacity.
- Leeds Health and Care Academy’s mission to build a skilled, sustainable, and resilient workforce.
- Healthy Leeds Plan ambition to improve population health, narrow inequalities, and create a fairer workforce.
Approach
- Test–Learn–Grow model: adapts delivery based on live evaluation and workforce insights.
- Coaching-led, person-centred support: moving beyond a medicalised model to prevention and empowerment.
- Thrive Hub: single entry point with self or health provider referrals; centralised data collection and evaluation.
- Integrated offers: including mental health fast track and musculoskeletal support
- Cultural change: workplace promise, leadership development, HR training, and equity-focused policy change.
Academy Role
- Coordinating: leading Pillar 1 delivery across Leeds, aligning partners and provision.
- Facilitating: convening system partners, workforce leads, and employers to co-design and deliver interventions.
- Connecting: linking staff, managers, and providers into the right support, bridging organisational boundaries.
- Data & Evaluation: acting as a central collection point for referral and outcome data, enabling health economic evaluation and system-wide learning.
- Scaling: sharing insights across West Yorkshire and nationally, positioning Leeds as an exemplar in workforce health and resilience.
Expected Impact (Aligned to Healthy Leeds Plan)
- For individuals: improved wellbeing, reduced ill health, quicker returns to work, and greater confidence in career sustainability.
- For organisations: higher retention, reduced absence, improved productivity, and stronger culture of wellbeing.
- For the system: shared learning, scalable models, and strengthened collaboration across health, care, and VCSE sectors.
- For Leeds communities: a more resilient, sustainable workforce able to deliver equitable, high-quality care, supporting healthier lives and narrowing inequalities.
For further information, case studies or impact reports aligned to this workforce innovation project please see below:
