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Engaging with Involuntary Service Users in Social Work

Engaging with Involuntary Service Users in Social Work. Professor Viv Cree, September 2010. Involuntary service users. Not a straightforward term Diversity A broad spectrum? Aren’t all service users in sw involuntary? Too general to be useful?

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Engaging with Involuntary Service Users in Social Work

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  1. Engaging with Involuntary Service Users in Social Work Professor Viv Cree, September 2010

  2. Involuntary service users • Not a straightforward term • Diversity • A broad spectrum? • Aren’t all service users in sw involuntary? • Too general to be useful? • But a term like this reflects the reality of everyday social work

  3. Everyday social work • Can be hard, lonely, and at times, scary • Service users can be angry, upset, violent at times; drugs and alcohol may make things worse • Social workers have to do things that are not welcomed – who is the ‘client’?? • Impact of public attitudes to social work on service users – makes people reluctant to engage with sw • Also on social workers – may make sws (at times) tentative, defensive, less willing to share assessment & plans

  4. What can research offer? • Not perfect answers, not simple solutions • Involuntary service users are – unsurprisingly – difficult to research • Social work research produces different kinds of knowledge to health research – is more messy • Research offers a source of guidance, some pointers, some suggestions for principles, some examples of good and bad practice • This project has provided some starting points for discussion, reflection and critical thinking about what user engagement is, and its place in social work • Those involved have opened up opportunities for discussions around a challenging area of practice, and suggested some possible ways forward

  5. Key themes for engagement with involuntary service users • User engagement isn’t politically neutral; we need to think about why we are doing it and where the impetus comes from • It requires trusting long-term relationships to be established with service users • Communication and providing clear, accessible information to clients is essential to enabling user involvement • Involuntary clients will most likely require some form of active support to express their views • Engaging with involuntary service users is messy and compromised; what makes the difference is the persistence and creativity of individual workers in specific circumstances • We need to affirm core social work values and skills again! • We also need to reaffirm the importance of supervision

  6. Thanks to • Mike Gallagher, Heather Wilkinson and Mark Smith who led the ESLA project • All the practitioners who gave their time and headed up research projects in their councils • All the service users who took part in the research projects • The six LAs which participated in the project • The ESRC & Scottish Gov for its financial support • The University of Edinburgh for hosting the project • You all for coming and sharing our concern for this important topic

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