The Art of Communication: - Derry City Council

To address the key concerns expressed by EHO regarding costs, time and resources thefollowing recommendation is made.1. The working group must give due consideration to the strength of feelingexpressed by EHOs regarding costs, time and resources as identified barrierswhen developing practical initiatives/applications. To effectively inform this processthe working group should research best practice interventions (such as Rudder,2006) that other researchers/Environmental Health departments have investigated/delivered and evaluated. From these investigations the working group should alsocompile a best practice ‘toolkit’ of case studies as a resource for EnvironmentalHealth departments.7.6 ProcessesThis investigation has identified the key processes involved when Chinese employers andEHOs share communication. A number of key difficulties have been identified by EHOs andChinese employers that require an improvement of process-related issues. An improvementin face-to-face verbal communications has been identified as the number one priority.To help facilitate the necessary improvement in Environmental Health processes thefollowing recommendations are made.1. The working group should design an appropriate data collection instrument (e.g.survey in a bilingual format) and analysis procedure that enables EnvironmentalHealth departments to immediately determine the individual communicationneeds and preferences of Chinese employers operating within the catering sectorin the western region.2. Based on the information collected from Chinese employers, the working groupshould report their findings to Environmental Health departments and assist in thedevelopment of practical interventions that can support improvements in relatedprocesses.3. The working group should also consider how current Environmental Healthprocesses that impact on underlying issues such as lone working, timing ofvisits and out of hours remote access to support services (e.g. if unexpectedcircumstances arise in premises) can be improved.The Art of Communication: A landscape shared between regulator and ethnic employer 41