Background: High levels of both burnout and job satisfaction have been foun
d in recent studies of mental health professionals. A qualitative methodolo
gy was used in a related study to explore reasons far these findings and to
investigate staffs accounts of their strategies for coping with their work
, and their views of support provided for them and how their jobs might be
made less stressful and still more satisfying. Method: A semi-structured sc
hedule was used to interview a purposive sample of 30 mental health staff d
rawn from three South London geographical sectors, selected to include juni
or and senior members of each profession in both hospital and community set
tings. Interviews were transcribed and analysed using QSR NUD.IST software.
Results: Informal contacts with colleagues were the most frequently mentio
ned way of coping with the difficult and demanding aspects of work in both
hospital and community settings, closely followed by time management techni
ques. The main formal sources of support described by staff were individual
supervision and staff support groups. Accounts of the former were generall
y positive, but there was great variation in opinions about whether support
groups are useful. Almost all the interviewees believed that their jobs co
uld be improved by further training. For community mental health staff the
main training gaps were the development of skills in various forms of clini
cal intervention, whilst ward staff identified the need for further skills
in diffusing potentially confrontational and aggressive situations.