Change that leads to better lives

Community is for All: Supporting Specialist Staff

A programme for specialist staff supporting people in their community.

Social care and social work are changing rapidly. These changes are the result of a number of factors including money, demand and expectations. In order to become sustainable in this age of austerity we need to strip away process and make the most of people’s own assets and the resources of their community; working towards people having fuller lives and greater independence, whilst becoming less dependent on service solutions.

Social care and health professionals provide support for many differing groups of people and whilst there are often common issues to be faced, staff who provide specialist support face particular challenges.

This programme, supported by a series of coproduced tools, will assist these specialist social care and health staff to bridge the gap between the aspiration that we should all work in asset based and community focused ways, and the reality that this presents. In particular we focus on the issues for those supporting people with learning disabilities, mental health or other challenges.

This programme will not solve all the problems specialist staff face in attempting to embrace these new ways of working. But we believe that what we can do is provide all concerned with the language and information to aid understanding of how community led support might be of real benefit to particular groups of people.

What do we mean by “specialist staff”

We are offering the programme to specialist staff from any local authority or health and social care trust in England, Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland who offer support to people in their communities. The specialist staff concerned may support:

  • Adults with a learning difficulty or disability and/or autism or Asperger syndrome
  • Working age adults with a mental health issue
  • Older adults with a mental health issue
  • Young people with special educational needs who are preparing for adulthood
  • Adults with a physical disability
  • Adults with a sensory impairment

How will the programme work?

It is a fundamental of this programme that we offer a tailored approach – that is, we will seek to adapt what we do to meet local requirements. The tools and techniques offered were co-produced with specialist staff in learning disability services – and further co-production and testing will be required as we work with other specialists. We welcome this!

Programme Structure:

Specification phase – what is required and how can we help?
Email, phone, skype and possibly face to face discussion with local managers about the focus, aims and practicalities of the programme. Experience teaches that this phase is key to success. The length of this phase will be dependent on the specialisms covered and the resulting development of any new course materials.

Delivery phase- A one-day workshop on site resulting in an action plan.
Facilitated by NDTi, with additional input and support from local managers. Resulting actions on the action plan are assigned to both practitioners and managers. To be attended by an agreed list of practitioners and managers. Please note: Group size needs to be small, so depending upon staff numbers, the workshop may need to be repeated several times.

Action phase – delivery of the action plan.
Typically, this is over a three-month period. NDTi provides remote support by phone and email; and where appropriate, optional modules are available to support practitioners.

Review phase – Progress against the plan.
A workshop with managers and practitioners to review what has worked, any challenges to progressing the action plan and what is still left to do.

Download a more detailed programme structure here

For more details about the programme please contact Andrew Tyson Andrew.Tyson@ndti.org.uk
or call 01225 255 268

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