Like many health departments nationwide, Mecklenburg County Public Health (MCPH) in Charlotte, North Carolina, the state’s largest health department, faces workforce retention challenges. After reviewing PH WINS and other data, the department decided to focus its workforce development efforts on improving something that can greatly affect an employee’s work experience — the expertise and skills of their supervisor.

“We looked at Gallup’s nationwide business survey that showed over 70 percent of staff say a contributing factor in them deciding to leave a job is their supervisor,” said Autumn Watson, MPH, REHS, public health organizational development director for MCPH. “That may not be the only factor, or even the primary factor, but it’s a contributing factor. We knew that having strong supervisors would ultimately trickle down to a stronger and more confident workforce.”

Using public health infrastructure grant (PHIG) funds, MCPH completed a department-wide assessment of newly promoted and just-hired supervisors — “people managers,” as Watson calls them. “I use the term ‘people managers’ because they have varying titles and are at different levels,” she said. “They may be supervisors, managers, or directors.”

In January 2024, MCPH re-launched a training and onboarding initiative for new managers and supervisors. Watson and her team initiated a 2.5-hour virtual onboarding orientation on the third Thursday of every month, which covers policies, procedures, and resources a new supervisor at MCPH may need to be aware of. At the end of 2024, this onboarding initiative transitioned from grant funding to the County-funded MCPH training team to ensure its future sustainability.

There are also bimonthly meetings for all supervisors. “We call them middle manager meetings,” she said. The presentation from each meeting is uploaded to a Microsoft Teams group for all supervisors, so all middle managers have access to the latest departmental information.

Finding confidence gaps

Currently, MCPH has 152 people managers. Anyone hired or promoted to a people manager role within the last 365 days receives a survey that asks: What do they wish they’d known when they first got the role? And where do they feel they still need support now that they’ve been in their role for a while?

But Watson’s team didn’t stop there. They also decided to survey long-time people managers. “We asked about their confidence levels in a variety of areas, such as onboarding new staff members, offboarding staff members that resign, creating interview panels and interview questions, and navigating administrative tasks,” she said. “We also asked how confident they were in helping their staff members develop and grow.”

This supervisor survey is now done biannually for all supervisors to compare the confidence levels of supervisors and managers on a variety of topics over time, according to Watson.

Using what they learn through these regular supervisor check-ins, Watson and her team created a series of resources designed to centralize knowledge for seamless access. “We created step-by-step guides in those areas where supervisors indicated they felt less confident,” she said, using processes for onboarding new employees as an example. “We found that confidence levels increased dramatically when we created guides. We saw numbers jump from about 35 percent confident to 60 percent confident.”

Watson’s team created detailed guides that walk supervisors through the steps they should take to accomplish specific managerial tasks. The guides also include where to go for assistance, such as human resources contacts. The information lives in an easily accessible intranet location called the supervisor and manager resource hub.

“We monitor views and clicks on the folders and on individual documents through Microsoft Teams,” Watson said. “So, we can see if they’re being used or not. We’ve eliminated resources that aren’t being used because we’re committed to bringing the resources people want. We’re not making things to just check a box.”

Reducing administrative burdens

All supervisors have access to PDFs, links, and detailed supervisory reference information, according to Watson. “There’s more information there than we would go through in a training,” she said. “We’ve indexed the information and if a supervisor comes across a situation, they can search for what they need. We cover everything from ‘my direct report slipped and fell at work, what do I do’ to how to execute a contract and how to have crucial conversations with a staff member.”

Information in the supervisor and manager resource hub is categorized into topic-related folders to make it easy for supervisors to search. “There are so many situations with people management when you’re supervising a team,” Watson said. “Whether you’re new or have been a supervisor forever, it’s important to know where to go for resources.”

Among the themes that have emerged from supervisor confidence surveys are balancing the demands of staff management with administrative burdens. Watson said the orientation meetings, middle manager meetings, and supervisor and manager resource hub are all designed to help reduce administrative burdens and build supervisor confidence. The hope is that supervisors and managers will have more time, along with access to the information and skills they need, to help their employees develop and grow, according to Watson.

Key Actions to Support Supervisors

  • Keep an open dialogue. Ask supervisors and managers how they want to be supported. Ongoing conversations help ensure you’re in touch with any changing needs.
  • Reduce overwhelm. Managers who are new to supervisory roles, or who are new to your department or agency, likely have many questions. Make sure they know how to get the answers they need easily.
  • Don’t forget experienced supervisors. Managers who’ve been supervising employees for some time may need support in helping team members grow and develop — especially in a changing or challenging public health environment.
  • Make sure resources are relevant. The best way to find out what managers and supervisors need is to ask them. Develop new resources and tools only when data support their usefulness.