Membership Engagement Strategy and Plan 2023 - 2026

Why membership matters

This strategy sets out our vision for engaging with our Foundation Trust members and the communities we serve. Their involvement is important in helping us to achieve our vision of providing excellent care at the heart of the community. 

As an NHS Foundation Trust we are accountable to our patients and the public. Our members have a key role in the Trust's governance; they elect representatives to sit on our Council of Governors, which in turn appoints the Chair and other Non-Executive Directors to the Board of Directors, and oversees the performance of the Board.

Members are our staff, our patients and members of the public. We believe that involving our members, patients and the public in decisions about services is an integral part of meeting the needs of the communities we serve. Membership helps give those communities a voice in the running of the Trust and shaping our plans for the future.

Over the next three years we will continue to focus on recruiting public members from people who have received care from us including their carers, families and volunteers and those who have actively provided feedback to the Trust. This Membership Engagement Strategy builds on the previous three-year strategy and sets out the ways in which we will engage with members and the public, listen to their views and act upon them. Members and the public will have opportunities to participate in member and Trust engagement activities and, through their Governors, will have a direct voice to the Trust Board.

Our vision is to develop an actively engaged and vibrant membership. Over the next three years, we want to make a fundamental step change in how we engage and involve our members and the public, building a more active membership and giving members a voice in shaping how the Sussex Community NHS Foundation Trust develops. This strategy outlines the measures we will put in place during 2023-26 to achieve that vision, supported by an action plan.

In summary this strategy sets out how we will:

1. Improve member engagement
2. Develop an inclusive membership that is representative of the communities we serve
3. Increase the number of members

We have developed this strategy based on national good practice from other Foundation Trusts and following statutory and regulatory requirements, reflecting updates within the 2022 Code of Governance for NHS provider trusts. The development of the strategy has been led by our Council of Governors and feedback is welcomed from members and the public.