The Methods Behind PH WINS.

The Public Health Workforce Interests and Needs Survey (PH WINS) has yielded the first-ever nationally representative sample of state health agency central office employees. The survey represents a step forward in rigorous, systematic data collection to inform the public health workforce development agenda in the United States. PH WINS is a Web-based survey and was developed with guidance from a panel of public health workforce experts including practitioners and researchers. It draws heavily from existing and validated items and focuses on 4 main areas: workforce perceptions about training needs, workplace environment and job satisfaction, perceptions about national trends, and demographics. This article outlines the conceptualization, development, and implementation of PH WINS, as well as considerations and limitations. It also describes the creation of 2 new data sets that will be available in public use for public health officials and researchers--a nationally representative data set for permanently employed state health agency central office employees comprising over 10,000 responses, and a pilot data set with approximately 12,000 local and regional health department staff responses.