Unseen, unsung

Last week I watched the last ever episode of Game of Thrones. Apologies to those of you who have never watched a single episode (this blog may not make a lot of sense!) and to those of you who do, I will try not to do any spoiler alerts.

I got into this television juggernaut only about six months ago, and after an intense binge of two to three episodes a night, I caught up with the many millions in loving this epic drama.

Whilst there has been a lot of noise on social media about whether the finale lived up to expectations, there was one scene that struck a bit of a chord with me.

Tyrion Lannister, as the newly appointed King’s 'hand' has gathered his Council around him to assess the devastation of the wars. He is handed the A Song of Ice and Fire book which the clerics have written to tell the story of everything that has happened.

Tyrion asks with trepidation how badly he is depicted in the book, only to be told he doesn't feature at all! As viewers of the show will know, Tyrion has been absolutely pivotal in every series, one of the characters with the greatest integrity, and in some sense, one of the most influential people in the story. So it's surprising that he isn't mentioned.

Rather unfairly, the kings and queens, knights and nobles are the people talked about and portrayed with immense power, but so often it is the unseen and unsung heroes - not recognised in the stories - that make the biggest difference.

And that’s true in our everyday lives. There are lots of people doing great things who remain quietly in the shadows. We need to find ways of acknowledging the impact and importance of these unsung heroes, and find ways to show our appreciation.

Because it is these quiet heroes, which we have all across our organisation, that keep moving us forward. They’re not high profile, but each and every day they work hard, shape things and make a difference. They aren’t seeking the limelight, as all they try to do is the right thing.

We're very modest as an organisation, but I would love to applaud and celebrate these quiet heroes more.

So, it's great to see a recent wave of teams and individuals getting more public recognition for their work, such as our estates team who won a prestigious national award last week and Chris Reynolds in our Informatics service who has just been listed in the 'top 100' chief information officers in the UK.

We’re also hearing about many other local heroes, via visits to clinical teams and uplifting social media stories. Judith Crosby, our service development director recently tweeted about her great visit to the Tatton unit in Tameside, where she gained greater insight into the rehabilitation journey that patients are on. Judith described a “lovely calm feel and positive atmosphere” and name-checked Michelle Davies for rightly being so proud of her team.

Nicky Littler, our workforce director, also tweeted about her visit to Prospect Place in Rochdale. She thanked Gemma Mlambo, our rehab services manager and Pip for “sharing his poem” - let’s keep ‘sharing the love’ via social media.

And while we’re on social media, I’m also going to name-check and thank some staff members for bravely sharing their personal stories during Mental Health Awareness Week which ran this year under the theme of ‘body image’-: Katie Benson, Sam Hartley, Shusha Smith, Sam Mooney and Ciaran Wilkinson. You impacted and inspired so many people.

Well done also to social media queen Inez Ingham, whose powerful photo post on our HMR children’s respiratory specialists Facebook page encouraging people to use their inhaler has gone viral reaching 4.5 million people.

There are so many others that I could name, but that would make this blog ridiculously long, so let’s all keep giving our quiet stars the attention and appreciation they deserve.

We want to do more to recognise and thank people through sharing your stories, recognising your achievements and celebrating your successes. We’ll be launching our staff awards in June, with new categories.  Please look out for these and put people forward. The awards are open to both individuals and teams and you can nominate yourselves and others.

I know that many of our community service colleagues will be leaving us shortly, but we really want your nominations. These awards are an important opportunity for us to acknowledge and celebrate your tremendous successes and contribution.

Best wishes,
Claire