Benchmarking through crisis: Building a more resilient mental health service

NHS Benchmarking and Te Pou were delighted to co-host the "Benchmarking through crisis: lessons for building more resilient mental health services" match at the IIMHL Leadership Exchange held in October 2022.

In times of crisis or traumatic events, benchmarking can act as the great equaliser, giving voice to people and communities who are not able to directly share their experiences or be physically included in policy setting or official decision-making processes. In this IIMHL match, the group used the Covid-19 pandemic as a real-life example to analyse and question mental health service data to improve decision-making, adaptive capacity, and to anticipate and mitigate adverse events.

Three virtual sessions were delivered during this match, across three days, with more than 30 participants attending via Zoom each day. Representatives from ten countries attended, and most of whom were service directors, chief executives or regional/national leaders.

The match highlighted several possible "game changing" approaches to benchmarking:

1. Web-based data collection, analysis and presentation improves access and supports discussions.
2. Global virtual meeting tools improve planning and networking.
3. Collective action is made easier when benchmarking advocates can together to share challenges and solutions, and identify critical data gaps.
4. Applying the principles of equity to data metrics can help maximise positive outcomes.

While the COVID-19 pandemic is only one example of the many significant crises or challenges our global community is facing, it presented a unique opportunity to improve how we use data and benchmarking to continually grow our collective capacity to make meaning of our experiences, learn, and adapt, to better anticipate and/or withstand adversity.

Recordings from the match

You can watch recordings of the key parts of each day of the match below.