Shropshire health trust manager honoured with award for work during Covid outbreak
A staffing manager at a Shropshire health trust has been presented with an award after receiving multiple nominations for her work.
Dannii Watkins, who works for Shropshire Community Health Trust (Shropcom), was given the unenviable task of co-ordinating staff redeployment during the initial wave of the Covid-19 pandemic.
Teams across Shropcom and other trusts were moved into key service areas such as staff and community swabbing.
Despite this being a new and high-pressure role, Dannii’s skills and enthusiasm impressed others so much that she received not one but two nominations for a chair’s award.
The chair’s award is presented to an individual or team that has gone the extra mile in supporting patients, carers or their colleagues in a way that truly reflects Shropcom's values and stands out as remarkable action that deserves to be celebrated.
Sharon Simkin, clinical lead for quality, said: "Dannii has been the key to co-ordinating staff redeployment throughout this period, she has gained a real insight into the needs of teams to maintain services and the challenges and opportunities this has brought for some staff.
"She has built relationships across the teams to negotiate deployments back to services and how this could be facilitated.
"She has maintained communications with line managers and staff keeping them informed of redeployment and deployment back.
"Her negotiation skills, organisational and leadership skills have been a real asset to this process.
"She has coped with the most challenging situations and competing priorities, whilst also maintaining her actual role and team support.
"We believe Dannii has gone over and above to enable this process to look smooth, not wavering when things got tough, this has been a challenge and one she has supported extremely well."
Adele Francis, business support officer, also nominated Dannii, saying ‘Dannii rose to the challenge and gave full support to whatever was asked of her, accompanied by her warm sense of personality and humour. I believe Dannii is an exceptional example of living the trust values and she fully deserves this recognition'.
Trust chairman, Nuala O’Kane, presented the award during a recent virtual board meeting.
She said: "While the Covid-19 pandemic has brought us lots of challenges as a trust, it has also highlighted the adaptability and determination of our staff to meet the needs of our community.
"Dannii is a shining example of this, ensuring staff were redeployed to where they were most needed in a sensitive and organised way.
"To be nominated not once, but twice, really shows how much Dannii’s work had been appreciated by her colleagues at Shropcom.
"The board and I would like to personally thank Dannii for her unwavering commitment during this challenging time and for really bringing our trust values to life."
Anyone can nominate a member of staff or volunteer for a chair’s award by emailing their details for consideration to shropcom.communications@nhs.net
