It was good to see ADASS’s reflection on 10yrs of the Care Act and the view that it is still fit for purpose. Less good to note the lack of confidence in LAs ability to meet the statutory duties of the Care Act, let alone its principles – most worryingly of all in the inability of LAs to invest in prevention.  We also noticed the Minister’s speech to the ADASS spring conference.  While it was good to hear the minister’s commitment to choice and control, people living independent lives, the potential for technology to assist in this, and the value…

The Care Quality Commission have just published details of their next round of Adult Social Care Assessments which includes Wirral Council.  As a recent Three Conversations alumni, Partners 4 Change would like to wish the council the best in this and feel sure that their work with us over the last couple of years will stand them in good stead during the process, hopefully highlighting some of the progressive work taking place there.  As an example of that, we’d like to share a link to a video on our YouTube channel of one of their managers giving an example of…

I just wanted to share with you some of the recent work that Partners4Change have been doing, and how we believe that our approach and way of working is more important than ever before.  Since Covid we’ve seen the already high demands on Adult Social Care only increase as the cost of living crisis, health waiting lists and pressure on budgets and other resources results in more and more people struggling to live independently, let alone to live the lives they would wish. Throughout this period, Partners4Change has continued to work with forward thinking and deeply committed Local Authorities who feel…

In 2017 Dr Graeme Betts Director Adult Social Care set the vision for work with Adults within Birmingham. The transformation of adult social care practice in Birmingham was launched in March 2018.  The 3 Conversations Framework and Family Group Conferencing focus on social work practice and the commissioning led Neighbourhood Networks Scheme focusses on co-production with citizens and communities. Birmingham committed to a phased rollout approach to the 3 Conversations framework. Teams were encouraged to directly report any issues,concerns and potential solutions in live time throughout roll-out. In following this methodology frontline workers have directly developed all paperwork, processes and guidance through reflection in and on practice and…

The Three Conversations was introduced as an approach to adult social care in June 2019 as part of a major Transformation programme, working in the Early Intervention Team with about half of all new people making requests for support. It then expanded to cover most of the remaining new requests and was subsequently introduced for people with existing care and support in August 2020, during the Covid-19 pandemic. Working collaboratively with a project team including Partners 4 Change, the Mosaic (database) team and Business Intelligence, the innovation site staff co-designed the three innovations running for 12-16 weeks each. Results from the first year of working in this…

When I first heard Sam Newman talk about The Three Conversations® I knew it was an approach that could push the boundaries of what we had been doing in our mental health social care team. Having dissolved the s75 arrangements with the local Trust in 2012, the team had strengthened its social work identity and was working in a Care Act compliant way. The legacy of working within a medical model system was still apparent however, and visiting people at home to ‘carry out assessments’, ‘undertake reviews’ and ‘put in services to meet need’ was only continuing to reinforce a…