The Staff Matters Mental Health and Wellbeing at Work Model

The Staff Matters Mental Health and Wellbeing at Work Model design has been derived from components of the health promoting schools concept. The design was futher influenced by the following.

Our own staff training and reading, especially Bill Rogers' I Get by with a Little Help from My Friend - The impact of colleague support in schools. Through this the elements of the interpersonal and the collegiate became an essential component of the final model.
Triangular or three-part models.
The influence of systems theory. This is evident in the dynamic nature of the processes of staff mental health and wellbeing.
The idea of domains. These emerged from the MindMatters alternative evaluation method used for special school sites. Operating in domains - from personal through to the community - reflects how a sustained mental health promotion and health literacy approach actually works for individuals.
The health promoting schools model and self-determination theory. The ideas of relatedness, competence and autonomy influenced the development of a professional domain for all staff.
Research and theory. In developing the Personal domain, we wanted to reflect research and theory ranging from the more generally applied expectancy value theory, attribution theory and self-determination theory through to Hargreaves's work in education that recognises the emotional component of working and teaching.
The reflection that schools are increasingly less isolated institutions. This resulted in the addition of the School in the Community domain. Its inclusion is an acknowledgment of the huge impact community support and opinion can have on the work site and staff wellbeing.

Model

The model centres on the importance of a person's beliefs about mental health and wellbeing as they apply to work (The Thriving Self). The three dynamic and two-way relationships around this centre recognise the influence of the relationship with others at the work site. The Interpersonal domain interacts with the Professional and the Organisational domains. The Professional domain has a potentially positive impact on work success and access to mental health and wellbeing information. The Organisational domain has a role in formally encouraging and supporting mental health and wellbeing. These processes operate within the wider community context (The School in the Community) that can also work to confirm, inform and reinforce mental health and wellbeing directions in the school.

Wellbeing for staff as individuals and as a group depends on positive interaction across all the domains.