Advanced Practice – The Challenge of Professional Leadership
Advanced practice in social work can be a driving force in meeting the expectations of people using services, delegates at a recent conference on professional leadership heard. The conference was organised by the Advanced Practice Social Work Network and supported by Skills for Care London and the Childrens Workforce Development Council.
Speaking to more than 100 delegates, Fiona Hill, director of Brent Mental Health User Group (BUG), said constructive partnerships can be formed with people using services who have appropriate knowledge and skills in service development and improvement.
Such partnerships can yield creative and modern approaches to the challenging agenda of service provision, commission and delivery, she added. The use of a multi-disciplinary approach and the incorporation of the recovery approach offer opportunities for advanced practice.
The one-day conference entitled “Professional Leadership – The Challenge for Advanced Practitioners” was jointly organised by Skills for Care (SfC), the Children’s Workforce Development Council (CWDC) and the Advanced Practice Social Work Network (APSWN).
Hill said that mental health users want to be recognised as part of the multi-disciplinary team involved in their care, with social care and health professionals prepared to use a range of creative approaches.
People receiving services often want to be enabled to identify for themselves the factors which help them deal with their mental illness and improve their wellbeing and health.
Mental health users are not often encouraged to develop their strengths and resilience or to take creative risks that are positive as people who use services are more likely seen as “isolated individuals” rather than in the context of their lives, she added.
Positive change can be achieved by professionals working together with people using services to pro-actively gather information about evidence-based practice and seeking out opportunities to modernise service provision which is focused on outcomes of those using services.
Areas for Development
The development of organisational commitment to, and ownership of, evidence-based practice; increased use of evidence-based approaches amongst staff; and greater access to research evidence and evidence-based practice materials are three key areas for development in social care.
Addressing delegates on developing evidence-based practice in a UK children’s charity, Tony Newman, assistant director of research and development at Barnardos outlined several proposals for senior management to help stimulate organisational commitment.
Staff should be provided with time and opportunities to develop critical thinking, discussion of research should form part of staff supervision and appraisal sessions; and research competencies included in job descriptions.
He also suggested that social care management should maintain strategic links with research institutions, as well as build evidence into service planning and review and support effective evaluation of outcomes of practice.
In identifying the various challenges for the UK social care sector which would help to strengthen the research capacity, Newman said, creating and sustaining management ‘buy in’ was important, as was linking what social work professionals do with why they do it.
The sector needs to go beyond dissemination of evidence and instead increase its focus on how evidence can be applied in practice application to practice.
A challenge also exists in addressing the perception that some practitioners have towards research and to tackle the shortfall in the skills and knowledge of the social care workforce, added Newman, who told delegates that was required was sustained support and follow through from senior management within organisations.
Opportunities exist in competitive tendering, “New Philanthropy” and an increased emphasis on evidence; existing expertise and resources; links with social work training and PQ requirements, and a demand by government for policy focused research.
Transcendent knowledge
Experienced professional practice requires an ability to juggle and apply knowledge from a range of sources, in what is often complex and changing situations, Jan Fook, professor in social work studies at the University of Southampton, told delegates.
Speaking on the role of the advanced practitioner in integrating knowledge in practice, Fook said the implications for knowledge were transcendent.
Professional practitioners had the skill to negotiate meanings in context, to invert knowledge hierarchies, and to engender a sense of professional integrity.
Fook heads the Southampton Practice Research Initiative Network Group (SPRING), to develop and resource practice research initiatives in partnership between practitioners and academics, and to profile the use of innovative methods in practice research.
Joan Orme, professor of social work at the University of Glasgow, chaired the conference. Other speakers included John Nawrockyi, director of adult social care at the London Borough of Greenwich, who presented an employer perspective on PQ higher awards and the contribution that advanced practitioners make to social work practice.
Malcolm Payne, director of psycho-social and spiritual care at St Christopher’s Hospice gave a moving account of the role of the advanced social work practitioner in supporting individuals and their families come to terms with terminal illness and death. Christine Holland, consultant social worker, North Essex Partnership NHS Trust gave a first-hand account of her role as a consultant social work practitioner, and its implications.
A range of professionals from health and social care settings conducted workshops on a number of issues covering inter-professional practice, leadership and management, practice education, mental health, and children and young people’s services.
Delegates were able to have key questions on the higher awards in the PQ framework addressed by a panel of social care experts including Amanda Hatton from Skills for Care; and Jan Hill, Skills for Care London sub-regional PQ lead for the north-east.
The conference took place on January 31 in London.
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