Community Integrated Care Launches Major Personalisation Programme

Community Integrated Care is proud to launch The Golden Thread – a major programme to adopt a leading approach to personalisation that puts the people we support at the heart of our organisational decision making.

The Golden Thread is a long-term programme that will see our charity embed leading person-centred planning tools, pursue an involvement strategy that gives the people we support direct input into our organisational strategy, and advance our use of Peer Reviewers – people we support who are employed as experts by experience.

This ambitious project has been named The Golden Thread to represent how true personalisation will become the thread that binds the people we support, our colleagues and the communities we work in together.

Person-Centred Support

The project offers every colleague, no matter what their role, a host of training and mentoring on person-centred support. We have adopted Helen Sanderson Associates’ Person-Centred Planning Tools and will be utilising the University of Kent’s Adult Social Care Outcomes Tool (ASCOT), to ensure that we are enabling the people we support to achieve the outcomes that they want and need in life.

Community Integrated Care has embraced the use of One-Page Profiles, with over 7500 colleagues and people we support actively using them in their daily life. To support the use of this tool, we have produced a unique internal One-Page Profile Builder for The Golden Thread campaign that allows colleagues to easily create and share their own One-Page Profiles, choosing from many creative and fun templates to reflect their personalities.

The Golden Thread has also introduced ‘Voice Groups’ – regional and national forums, made up of people we support and colleagues who want to champion personalisation, who will work with our Executive Team and contribute to organisational strategy. The groups will review Community Integrated Care’s policies to ensure that they are person-centred and highlight the issues that matter most to people we support.

Community Integrated Care has also committed to increasing its use of Peer Reviewers following a successful pilot of this role in 2014/15. We employed five people we support last year as Peer Reviewers – experts by experience who assess the quality of life that people lead in our services. The group received in-depth training from the leading rights-based organisation, Changing Our Lives, as well as our in-house Quality team. The Peer Reviewers oversaw 20 audits, making an incredible impact on the services that they visited – enhancing rotas, improving support plans and inspiring many people.

The group has also achieved national success, speaking at national conferences and Westminster, and being recognised at the Great British Care Awards and National Learning Disability Awards.

As part of the Golden Thread, Community Integrated Care will be employing Peer Reviewers in every region we deliver services – employing up to 15 Reviewers this year. It is anticipated that this group will audit over a third of Community Integrated Care’s services (132!) over the next twelve months.

This effort has also been supported by the appointment of a number of Quality and Excellence Partners, experienced colleagues who will provide practical assistance to services, helping to ensure they are delivering high-quality, personalised support.

Engaging Colleagues

Community Integrated Care launched the Golden Thread to colleagues at a series of events across the country, co-delivered by our Peer Reviewers and in-house Quality Team. These have been followed by each of Community Integrated Care’s services hosting their own ‘Golden Thread Get-Togethers’, fun events where teams come together to learn more about personalisation and consider how they can enhance the support that they deliver. These will ensure that every colleague learns about and receives training on the Golden Thread programme.

Neil Matthewman, Chief Executive Officer, says: “Community Integrated Care is pursuing an ambitious strategy with the vision of becoming The UK’s Leading Health and Social Care Charity. Delivering life-enhancing services that meet the needs and aspirations of the people we support is fundamental to achieving this aim. The Golden Thread will give our colleagues the skills, support and encouragement to deliver truly personalised support.”

Martin McGuigan, Director of Quality and Innovation, says: “I’m excited to be leading the Golden Thread project – an initiative that will benefit every single person we support and each of our colleagues.  Through offering enhanced training and mentoring to colleagues, utilising the experience and insight of the people we support, and celebrating the impact of personalised support, it will transform for the better what it means to be part of our charity.”