Provide Community Interest Company

On this page

• Overview
• Shared direction and culture
• Capable, compassionate and inclusive leaders
• Freedom to speak up
• Workforce equality, diversity and inclusion
• Governance, management and sustainability
• Partnerships and communities
• Learning, improvement and innovation

This means we looked for evidence that service leadership, management and governance assured high-quality, person-centred care; supported learning and innovation; and promoted an open, fair culture.

At our last assessment we rated this key question as good. At this assessment the rating has remained as good.

This meant the service was consistently managed and well-led. Leaders and the culture they created promoted high-quality, person-centred care. Leaders were knowledgeable, approachable, and visible within the service. Patients and staff were able to meet members of the senior leadership team and governors to share feedback and raise concerns.

Staff understood the provider’s vision and values and how these were embedded in their team’s work. The service created a positive culture where people felt that they could speak up. They worked towards an inclusive and fair culture by improving equality and equity for people who worked for them. Leaders had oversight of risks, issues, and performance, which they reviewed regularly. The service worked closely with system wide partners across the community collaborative. The service focused on continuous learning, innovation, and improvement across the organisation.

This service scored 75 (out of 100) for this area. Find out what we look at when we assess this area and How we calculate these scores.

We scored the service as 3. The evidence showed a good standard. The service had a shared vision, strategy and culture that was based on transparency, equity, equality, and human rights. They considered diversity and inclusion, engagement, and understanding and meeting the needs of people and communities.

Staff understood the provider’s vision and values and how these were embedded in their team’s work. The provider’s values included delivering high-quality, compassionate care, placing patients and staff at the forefront. Innovation was emphasised, with a commitment to developing new solutions and approaches within the care sector. Compassion was central, ensuring that individuals were at the heart of all actions and were treated with empathy and respect.

The provider’s senior leadership team had successfully communicated the provider’s vision and values to the frontline staff in this service. Managers ensured the values were reinforced through team meetings and supervision. The organisation held a mission statement that incorporated the values of the organisation. We saw Bayman wards mission statement on the ward which stated they provided compassionate, holistic stroke rehabilitation, supporting patients’ independence and wellbeing while promoting dignity, safety, and best-practice care.

The provider held a corporate strategy spanning from 2024 to 2027. The organisation focused on 4 strategic priorities.

Staff felt respected, supported and valued. They said the service promoted equality and diversity in daily work and provided opportunities for development and career progression. Staff could also raise any concerns without fear.

We scored the service as 3. The evidence showed a good standard. The service had inclusive leaders at all levels who understood the context in which they delivered care, treatment and support and embodied the culture and values of their workforce and organisation. They had the skills, knowledge, experience and credibility to lead effectively and do so with integrity, openness and honesty.

Leaders had the skills, knowledge and experience to perform their roles. Staff, patients and relatives spoke positively about the leaders within the wards.

The hospital’s leadership team was well-established and worked effectively together.

The organisation encouraged leaders to develop and provided several leadership development opportunities including the Resilience, Intelligence, Strength and Excellence (RISE) programme, a certified continuous professional development scheme. It supported aspiring and existing line managers across the health and care workforce to grow in confidence, capability and leadership.

Other leadership development opportunities were also available. The service nominated staff to participate in the Provide Leadership Academy where they had 11 colleagues enrolled. The programme initially focused on modules covering self-awareness, values, and practical leadership skills and progressed to feedback sessions to help participants identify strengths and development areas. The programme then progressed to its project phase, where participants were researching and will present organisational initiatives to the strategy board in April 2026.

Leaders had a good understanding of the services they managed. They could explain clearly how the teams were working to provide high quality care. Leaders we spoke to were aware of what was happening on the wards, were knowledgeable, were approachable and visible within the service.

We scored the service as 3. The evidence showed a good standard. The service created a positive culture where people felt that they could speak up and that their voice would be heard.

The service had 6 clear routes for staff to raise any concerns. These included the Freedom to Speak Up (FTSU) guardian, champions, the council of governors, the staff partnership forum, colleague networks and the people directorate.

The service’s FTSU guardian reported annually to the people and culture committee, with the latest update covering April 2024 to March 2025. During this period, 15 contacts were made to the FTSU guardian, seven of which related to Halstead and Bayman Ward. Outcomes included 2 referrals to HR, provision of advice and listening support, and 4 matters escalated to management, all of which were responded to appropriately.

The service held a FTSU action plan which runs between 2024 and 2027. The plan identified seven key focus areas: updating the FTSU policy, developing champions, improving the colleague engagement survey, raising awareness, strengthening board feedback, and reviewing training.

All staff including all line managers and board members completed FTSU training. Training completion was currently at 88% for FTSU.

The service provided sexual harassment training from May 2025, to enable staff to understand the impact of harassment and support people to recognise when harassment is taking place along with their duty to report where harassment is evident.

Patients and carers had opportunities to give feedback on the service they received in a manner that reflected their individual needs. This included the Friends and Family Test (FFT) and the inpatient survey.

Managers and staff had access to the feedback from patients, carers and staff and used it to make improvements. Survey results were regularly communicated from board level to the ward teams.

Patients and staff were able to meet members of the senior leadership team and governors to share feedback. Staff had multiple channels to engage with senior leaders, including monthly all colleague webinars, the senior leadership team week in summary, the Provide leadership team webinar, council of governors’ meetings, the annual members meeting, board site visits, and the annual learning and development week and health and wellbeing week.

We scored the service as 3. The evidence showed a good standard. The service valued diversity in their workforce. They worked towards an inclusive and fair culture by improving equality and equity for people who work for them.

The organisation had several polices on inclusion and diversity. These included the inclusion diversity policy and procedure and dignity at work policy procedure.

The service had 4 staff networks including the disability network, ethnic minorities network, men’s network and the LGBTQ+ network where all staff can join for a supportive and inclusive space.

The service promoted fair recruitment by ensuring they tried to employ the best candidate to the role. A member of the organisations staff ethnic minority network was present during several interview panels for senior roles, including board appointments.

The organisation ensured they had representation from diverse backgrounds across their senior leadership team and on the board. They held regular equality and diversity presentations during their all-colleague webinars to ensure awareness across the organisation and encouraged staff engagement and uptake.

The organisation worked with Community Collaborative partners to support and showcase activities including Black History Month and International Nurses Day.

The staff networks supported and encouraged leadership development, ensuring colleagues had equal opportunities. Six colleagues had been identified for the Rise Programme, aimed at developing leaders from diverse and minority backgrounds.

The service also had staff from minority groups, undertaking the internal Provide Leadership Academy, to identify leaders of the future.

The organisation shared an inclusion and diversity calendar with staff reflecting important events for all networks to ensure inclusivity whilst raising awareness of diversity in culture, celebrations and events of importance for staff and their families. This was communicated via internal communications celebrating the 6 main faiths alongside other identified activities e.g. Black History Month, South Asian Heritage Month and Pride.

Staff could apply to work flexibly to account for personal circumstances such as caring responsibilities and health issues. Managers put reasonable adjustments in place for staff members to help them carry out their role.

We scored the service as 3. The evidence showed a good standard. The service had clear responsibilities, roles, systems of accountability and good governance to manage and deliver good quality, sustainable care, treatment and support. They acted on the best information about risk, performance and outcomes, and shared this securely with others when appropriate.

There was a clear framework of what must be discussed at a ward, team or directorate level in team meetings to ensure that essential information, such as learning from incidents and complaints, was shared and discussed.

Staff had implemented recommendations from reviews of deaths, incidents, complaints and safeguarding alerts at the service level. The organisation had implemented the Patient Safety Incident Response Framework (PSIRF) to ensure that incidents were investigated appropriately and that learning was captured and shared in accordance with the framework. A Patient Safety Incident Response Plan had been developed to ensure the service met the requirements of the framework, and this plan was regularly reviewed to support continuous improvement. All incidents were recorded within the incident reporting system, where harm levels were reviewed, outcomes documented, and learning identified.

Moderate harm incidents were referred to senior management and the Quality and Safety Team, who reviewed them at the Incident Review Group (IRG). The IRG determined the most appropriate investigation approach, which could include an After-Action Review (AAR), a Patient Safety Incident Review (PSIR), or a Safety Incident Review (SIR).

Severe harm incidents and deaths were escalated through the Serious Incident process to determine how they would be investigated and managed. Depending on the nature of the incident, investigations could include a Structured Judgement Review (SJR), a Learning from Lives and Deaths (LeDeR) review (for people with a learning disability or autism), a Patient Safety Incident Investigation (PSII), or a Serious Incident Investigation (SII) to identify learning from incidents and to improve safety.

The service held a strategic safeguarding group who met quarterly and escalated issues to the Quality and Safety Committee who in turn feed up to the board at Provide to ensure all safeguarding risks were managed.

The service used data from their incident reporting system to identify and analyse themes and trends across both wards.

Staff undertook or participated in local clinical audits. The audits were sufficient to provide assurance and staff acted on the results when needed.

Staff understood the arrangements for working with other teams, both within the provider and external, to meet the needs of the patients.

Leaders had oversight of risks, issues, and performance, which they reviewed regularly through the monthly Quality and Safety Committee. The committee monitored quality assurance visit action plans, the clinical audit programme, incident reviews, patient safety investigation reports, safety alerts, and NICE guidance. It also considered customer engagement, research and development, the Care Quality Commission Toolkit self-assessment, and policy reviews.

Staff maintained and had access to the risk register at ward level. Staff at ward level could escalate concerns when required.

The service had plans for emergencies – for example, adverse weather or a flu outbreak.

The service used systems to collect data from wards and directorates that were not over-burdensome for frontline staff.

Staff had access to the equipment and information technology needed to do their work. The information technology infrastructure, including the telephone system, worked well and helped to improve the quality of care.

Information governance systems included confidentiality of patient records.

Team managers had access to information to support them with their management role. This included information on the performance of the service, staffing and patient care.

Information was in an accessible format, and was timely, accurate and identified areas for improvement.

We scored the service as 3. The evidence showed a good standard. The service understood their duty to collaborate and work in partnership, so their services worked seamlessly for people. They shared information and learning with partners and collaborated for improvement.

The service worked closely with system wide partners across the community collaborative made up of Provide, Essex Partnership University Trust, and Northeast London Foundation Trust. They worked together through a system-wide, integrated partnership model with shared priorities to ensure alignment and coordinated delivery across the system.

Our review of records from Multi-Disciplinary Team (MDT) meetings indicated collaboration with family members, key stakeholders, and care teams in relation to the patient journey.

The service worked closely with local authorities, voluntary sector organisations, and service users, ensuring services were shaped around their needs.

The service had a quality and engagement lead whose role was to enhance patient experience, promote involvement in their care journey, and support service improvements.

Patients and staff could meet with members of the provider’s senior leadership team to give feedback. For example, patients provided feedback at community meetings and staff gave feedback at staff meetings.

We scored the service as 3. The evidence showed a good standard. The service focused on continuous learning, innovation and improvement across the organisation and the local system. They encouraged creative ways of delivering equality of experience, outcome and quality of life for people. They actively contributed to safe, effective practice and research.

The service was accredited through a range of recognised professional memberships, including The Queen’s Nursing Institute, Care England, Social Enterprise UK, Essex Family Friendly Employer, and Disability Confident Employer, among others. Wards participated in accreditation schemes relevant to the service and learned from them.

There was a focus on continuous learning, innovation and improvement across the organisation. The service focused on improvement and learning from incidents. Managers and staff shared lessons learned after incidents and met to discuss incidents and make improvements.

The service was part of the National Wound Care Strategy as an accelerator site and had recently implemented Purpose T, a structured clinical framework used for pressure ulcer assessments. The service supported its rollout, not only within the organisation, but also across hospices in Mid and South Essex.

The organisation recognised the importance of maintaining a research culture and held a research policy describing the processes and requirements of services engaging in any type of research. This policy ensured that all research carried out by their employees and external partners, complied with statutory guidance and legislation.

The organisation actively supported and engaged staff in innovative practice and had a clear process in place to facilitate this. Ideas were considered by the Provide Innovation Group and assessed using a scored prioritisation matrix and evaluation process, with staff fully involved and appropriately credited for their contributions. To date, 29 ideas have been explored during the year.

The organisation conducted a range of research and innovation projects. This included the TELSTAR study on telerehabilitation for stroke survivors, and development of Level 1 Psychological Care training for stroke services, which was under Health Research Authority review.

Staff explored electronic prescribing, participated in national audits, and implemented findings to improve practice.

Digital innovation included using RealWear technology in care homes and podiatry services to enable virtual assessments, reducing visits and cancellations.

Additional research included weight management with the University of Essex and paediatric audiology using bone conduction headsets to support children with glue ear.