We are posting this article off the back of a very successful event at the Create Center in Bristol, where we had a fantastic turn-out of Warp It customers, as well as other parties interested in improving their organisational reuse.

We had a great chinwag and shared loads of interesting ideas, with the event starting off by going around the tables introducing ourselves and our roles. We were pleased to welcome friendly visitors from:

• The NHS
• Exeter University
• University Hospital of Bristol
• Cardiff and Vale NHS
• 2GETHER NHS Trust
• North Bristol NHS Trust
• Many other fantastic organisations.

Once we all knew who was who, we talked about issues, the challenges that we all face when trying to implement reuse into new policies and practises. We explored issues relating to storage, transport, communications and buy in.

Tip: Visit the links above to see solutions to these problems

First on the floor…

Luke Champion from NHS 2GETHER Trust presented his experience of their reuse journey over the last few years (presentation available as a free download at the end of this article). He gave an overview of the system he used prior to Warp It, a kind of online messaging board. Luke then highlighted the benefits of this system, but also why it didn’t maximise reuse and couldn’t encourage mass participation. After this, he explained the business case to commission the Warp It service, before talking about the fantastic results and impact Warp It has had in the last 18 months. He also looked at the set up from a staff perspective, as well as how he got their buy in through effective communication.

Luke stressed how important a mini pilot was in getting the system set up correctly. He talked about his attitude and approach to getting people on board through face-to-face training and other novel communication methods. Another subject he covered was how important it is to have capital development supporting reuse, because this is where there are big gains to be made in the building clearance and refurbishment activity. The question and answer session for Luke's presentation went on for well over half an hour, with everybody being very interested in what he'd done and keen to gain as much information as possible from his experiences.

Esther Coffin-Smith, University Hospital Bristol

Esther was next up, from the University Hospital Bristol. She has set up Warp It in an unusual order within their trust. They have one person who is focused on reuse and moves the furniture from day-to-day, and who actually takes leadership on Warp It and makes sure it runs smoothly. Esther highlighted that there is an embed guide, or implementation plan to follow when you embed Warp It into your organisation, however, she threw caution to the wind and set off on her own, doing it in a completely different way to others. Following her instinct was a great idea and the hospital has saved nearly £100,000 and avoided procurement and waste charges.

Esther highlighted that it was quite a good time to implement reuse because the trust was experiencing special measures with regards to finances, and so there was a block on the procuring of assets. She talked about the various communication methods they used to get their message out, and went on to talk about their ambitions around sharing assets with third parties. As well as implementing a trust-wide reuse system, they are linking up with their partner trust in the area, the Sustainability and Transformation Partnership, with the ambition to spread the network much wider, and swap and share surplus assets between their NHS trusts.

Conclusion

What followed was another wide-ranging discussion around the various issues that crop up that can reduce reuse (linked to previously). We also talked at length about in-house repair of surplus assets, and outsourcing that activity. Daniel then went on to highlight the various resources that are available on the Warp It blog to help managers and offices implement reuse as standard across the organisation. These resources include things like easy wins, campaigns, building clearances.

See Luke Champion's PowerPoint presentation from the event right here!