About the Retention Charter
The RCPsych has developed its first Retention Charter to help employer bodies to support and nurture staff, and to address one of the most crucial issues facing mental health services: the retention of psychiatrists.
The aim of the Retention Charter
This Retention Charter aims to provide a structured, practical approach to implementing and improving retention within healthcare organisations across the four nations of the UK.
It has been developed with the principle of putting people first - both patients and staff - and is based on available data, policy, literature and good practice.
Why the Retention Charter matters
We need to retain psychiatrists in order to build a sustainable psychiatric workforce that can meet the future demand for mental health services.
Retaining and supporting NHS staff is a key priority
in the NHS people plan (NHS England, 2020)
NHS LongTerm Workforce Plan (NHS England, 2023) and
equivalent plans across the four nations.
The RCPsych strategy for 2024 - 2026 highlights that we must nurture and support the psychiatry workforce and strive to ensure that every doctor working in psychiatry feels valued, safe, and able to achieve their professional potential so they can deliver the best possible patient care.
Staff are the backbone of our health services.
How the Retention Charter was put together
This Retention Charter has been informed by the collated views and experiences of Psychiatrists working across multiple career stages, across the devolved nations, and various mental health settings.
The charter has also been informed by patient and carer group feedback, policy documents, research, and good practice examples to develop a structured approach towards retention practices.
Find out about the people who contributed to the Retention Charter.
Using the Retention Charter
The Retention Charter empowers organisations to self-assess what stage they are at in terms of meeting good practice around retention, and helps them to set out plans for improvement.
The Charter sets out four broad areas for employer bodies to assess themselves, and plan improvements around - the four Domains.
For each Domain there are overarching actions, a maturity matrix to assess what stage your organisation is at, recommendations for how to improve in each area, and good practice examples and links to further help.