This year we have had racial discrimination and injustice highlighted to us all by events like the killing of George Floyd and the disproportionate effects that COVID-19 has had on BAME communities.

As a national organisation, the NHS is embedded in society. We are part of the problem of systemic racism - but we are also part of the solution.

We’re launching a new project that will put issues of racism on the table and bring people from Sheffield Health and Social Care together to find solutions and make change.

The Big Conversation will be run over three stages:

In phase one, groups will get together and have an open, honest and safe sharing of experiences related to racism within our organisation.

Phase two will see the project leaders take what they’ve heard and pull together the themes underlying these experiences.

In phase three these themes will be fed back to our staff, who will then work together to come up with as many ideas as possible about how we can address them. This will involve everybody from all ethnicities and all parts of the organisation coming together to bring about change.

If you’re a member of Team SHSC you can get involved by looking at the news section on the intranet for more information.