Combining Local Creativity with National Mandates
Focus of the Appreciative Inquiry:
To create and implement integrated mental health services in the southern region of the UK.
Client organization:
Hampshire County Council Social Services Department which is responsible for the full range of social services in the region.
Client Objective:
The specific purpose of the project in each locality:
- To envision an integrated mental health service in each locality, jointly delivered by health and social service agencies
- To create this service by involving the psychiatrists, psychologists, nurses, social workers, art, occupational and behavioral therapists, administrators, clerks and secretaries who were engaged in delivering mental health services in the community
- To achieve this by maintaining stakeholder trust, integrity, cooperation and optimism
The organizational objective was to encourage and support a ‘can do’ culture where local creativity could flourish within the national mandates. A wider objective was to develop regional joint agency health service and social service standards to meet national targets.
What was done?
A series of one-day events for all the stakeholders was held in each locality to discover the best of the two cultures in the health service and social services teams, to envision a new integrated mental health service for the users and carers in their specific locality, and to identify the key areas that will make that future happen. While each locality developed its own set of images of an integrated service and systems to deliver that future, consistency across these localities was maintained by line managers and managers who had held national and regional perspectives. They also maintained a watching brief on the follow-on activities which were crafted for each locality.
At the regional level, there was a set of activities for health and social services executives to establish joint agency standards.
Outcomes:
In the initial events, professionals, managers and administrative staff in the Health service and Social service teams:
- Developed an appreciation for and understanding of each other’s commitment to creating a quality integrated mental health service
- Described the skills, capabilities and qualities they shared as well as those that were complementary
- Became aware of their colleagues’ support for the new team approach, for retaining their professional identities and for having a full role in creating the new integrated service
- Developed plans that built on current or earlier initiatives rather than replaced them
In the first locality, the integrated service has been launched with many of the key systems in place that were identified in the initial events. The other localities are gradually implementing their integrated service. At the joint agency level, budgets, plans and targets are being set with a much greater mutual transparency.
“Teams are feeling positive about the change and are looking forward to it… They know much more about each other’s work and jobs than similar teams in the area. Their attitude towards change is significantly different from that of other teams in the area.”
For further information:
Contact: Anne Radford
+44 (0)20 633 9630
AnneLondon@aol.com
www.aradford.co.uk
www.aipractitioner.com