Information for Scrutiny Panel
How did FORWARDS respond to the Panel’s recommendations in September 2009?
Scrutiny Recommendation
/Actions undertaken
1. That the FORWARDS service ensures that there is an appropriate referral system with the James Cook Hospital to enable the service to provide a facility to support people who have had a stroke back to work / · G.Rea has met with Dawn Temple- Scott of the North East of England Cardiovascular Network (NECVN)· G.Rea also contacted Helen Iley the Service Improvement Manager for the Tees Valley
· FORWARDS working closely with Sarah Heathcote and Fiona Fletcher both Occupational Therapists from the Community Neurological Rehabilitation Team
· In 2009/10 FORWARDS had four referrals for people who have suffered a stroke. One of these clients has successfully gained paid employment; - the work with all of theses clients is ongoing and FORWARDS continues to raise awareness of its work amongst staff working with stroke patients.
· The team is linking closely with Kirsty Jones the Stroke Co-ordinator for the Council and contact has also been made with Carol Halton the Stroke Rehab Lead for the Acute Trust.
· A further contact is Mandy Verrill a Family- Carer Support Coordinator with the Stroke Association.
2. That the Council considers the option of ensuring that any vacancies within Middlesbrough are submitted to the FORWARDS team prior to their publication. / This recommendation has been discussed at CMT with the outcome that FORWARDS will receive any information about new vacancies at the time of publication.
3. A ‘champion’ be appointed in each Service Department, to help ensure that the Council is at the forefront of initiatives designed to help people with disabilities into work. / The FORWARDS Team has included Richard Horniman and Clare Elliot – Regeneration, Mike Robinson and Jackie Robson – Environment and Paul Mitchell
- Children Families & Learning to the list of invitees for the quarterly Employment Champions meeting. Regeneration and Environment have been represented in the meetings.
Update of FORWARDS achievements in 2009/10 and other developments.
Here are some of the outcomes achieved by the team:
Outcome / TotalTotal number of referrals / 197
No. who obtained paid employment / 26
No. into voluntary/ work placement / 43
No. who accessed training / 75
No. of ‘Better off in work’ benefit calculations / 148
No. of Partnership working sessions / 973
No. of Job applications completed / 252
No. of Employer Engagement / 286
No. of In-work Support / 112
No. of Appointments with clients / 2,280
No. of In-work Reviews / 96
The five main barriers the team have experienced regularly and how they were overcome:
No / Barrier / How the team has overcome this1 / Fluctuation in health and motivation / Particularly intensive working with individuals and their Social Workers, Support Workers, Occupational Therapists,
Carers etc to monitor health and motivation and give needed support.
2 / Clients setting unrealistic career goals and aspirations / Professional careers advice (Adult Directions) arranged for individuals. Work tasters provide work experience and the completion of a vocational profile assists to identify appropriate job match.
3 / Limited skills, experience and qualifications / Training and placement opportunities are identified and arranged. An up to date CV is produced and employers are approached to discuss and negotiate job opportunities for individuals (e.g. job carving, working interviews)
4 / Competitive job market / Matching the right people to the right jobs. Convincing employers of the advantages to work with FORWARDS (e.g. continuing in- work support for both the employee and the employer). Assist with job carving
5 / Low expectations and resistance to change / Working with clients to increase self-esteem and aspirations by building positive professional relationships, facilitating education and promoting employment
FORWARDS is working successfully in partnership with numerous organisations. These are five examples of successful partnership work
No / Partner Organisation /How the team worked in partnership
1 / Citizens Advice Bureau – (Paul Grainger) / The team have regular contact for benefits advice for individuals. Paul provides accurate and timely ‘Better Off in Work’ calculations and provides support with benefit appeals.2 / ‘Nextstep’, - (Gwyneth Deprez) / Gwyneth provides Careers Advice sessions using the ‘Adult Directions’ package. Following this, Gwyneth advises on relevant training and provides information on routes into careers. There are currently three people on placement with ‘Nextstep’ gaining up to date experience in Administration and Data Entry.
3 / Middlesbrough Borough Council – across numerous departments / Within Middlesbrough Council the team has worked in partnership with a number of Departments. This led to 17 people employed by Middlesbrough Council. 13 of those are job carved positions. The team is working closely with Transport & Design Services on providing independent travel training to individuals and is also working closely within Social Care to develop our services to provide support for individuals to access paid employment.
4 / Middlesbrough Adult Education Service (MAES) / The team regularly access MAES to refer people onto courses and basic skills assessments. The team also use MAES’s additional support service for individuals who need learning support during courses.
5 / Job Centre Plus (JCP) / FORWARDS works in close partnership with JCP and their partner organisations (Reed in Partnership, Working Links) accessing with our clients current vacancies, ‘Pathways to Work’ the Condition Management Programme and to make appointments with Disability Employment Advisors. Through our partnership work with JCP clients are also enabled to take advantage of relevant schemes offering financial incentives into employment.
Employer Engagement
FORWARDS has successfully gained employment for 26 people with disabilities. These are some examples of the employers and jobs:
Employers
/ JobsThe Springfield Hotel / Glass Collector
Erimus Dry Cleaners / Dry Cleaning Assistant
Cleveland View Care Home / Kitchen Assistant
New Look / Stock Room Assistant
BHS / Store Room Assistant
BUPA Care Home / Kitchen Assistant
Once a person has commenced paid employment, continuous in-work support is available. This is tailored for both the employer and the client’s needs e.g. a Job Coach can spend time within the workplace supporting the client to learn the role.
Unlike other organisations that have to rely entirely on external funding sources, which limit their support work to a given period of time, the FORWARDS service is currently financed in a way that allows to provide continues support, which is imperative for this client group.
Job Carving
Since Job Carving has been introduced and regularly publicised amongst staff within the Council, numbers have slowly increased and more departments are considering to apply it for their vacancies;
Departments applying Job carving / JobsStreet scene / 1 x BAIT Officer
Post Room / 1 x Team Assistant
Area Care / 2 x Area Care Operatives
Personalisation Team / 1 x Team Assistant
Property Services / 2 x Cleaners
Ayresome Community Transport / 6 x Valetors
Examples of Success Stories
Susan’s Story:
Susan began working at Elmridge Care Home in January 2010. She works 10 hours a week as a Kitchen Assistant. Her Job Coach is continuing to support her at work, helping her to complete reviews and help with ongoing health and safety training. Susan has gained her Food Hygiene Certificate and is learning new tasks required in her role. (Live presentation)
Lauren’s Story:
Lauren had never worked before. She did a lot of job searching and applications with her job coach. Responding to a window advertisement, led to a successful job interview. Lauren now works 16 hours per week in a dry cleaning business. Lauren and her employer receive ongoing in-work support. (Live presentation)
Further Developments
Siebel Database
This is a tailor-made database developed between Mouchel’s IT Services and FORWARDS. This database will increase the efficiency of the team and enable the manager to extract vital management information for evaluation, monitoring and planning purposes. It is expected that the system will go live in August 2010.
Tees Valley wide Employer Event ‘Employment Positive’
The FORWARDS team is currently working in partnership with Hartlepool, Redcar & Cleveland and Stockton Councils to plan an Employer event to be held on 23 September 2010 at Wynyard Hall. The aim of the event is to raise awareness of Employment Support Services for People with Disabilities within the Tees Valley. We have also invited speakers to give employers a better understanding of the new Equality Act and the positive aspects of employing people with disabilities and working with the Employment Support Services.
PSA16 Innovation Fund Projects
FORWARDS is constantly looking to improve their services. One of the steps has been to give each Job Coach a specialised area of interest, e.g. Learning Disabilities, Mental Health, Autism, and Transitions.
To improve further, FORWARDS recently applied for some PSA16 funding together with the Early Intervention Psychosis (EIP) Team and was successful. This will enable FORWARDS to employ a specialist Job Coach working exclusively with clients suffering with psychosis. The project will run for 18 months. During this time FORWARDS will gain the experience of working with this client group and the EIP Team will gain experience in terms of progressing clients into paid employment.
We are awaiting the outcome of a second PSA16 Funding application for a specialist pilot project to create customised employment opportunities for people with an Autism Spectrum Condition (ASC). The money would be used to recruit a Job Coach for 18 months and to pay the salaries for five people with ASC for 12 months. The creation of ‘customised employment’ around the needs of the employee and matching it with employer demand is a very time consuming and specialised way of working and we should be able to gain some new and valuable experience from this pilot, if the application receives approval.
Pilot Project using Cognitive Support Technologies via ‘Telecare’
FORWARDS are going to use ‘Telecare’ equipment (Cognitive Support Technologies) in their work with their clients. Six clients have been chosen who could benefit from the use of a Schedule Assistant and Visual Assistant Task Prompting programme and a Way Finder Travel Training programme.
The pilot is expected to commence some time in August or September 2010 and will assist people to manage all aspects of employment.
Future Working with the Acute Trust at James Cook Hospital
Thanks to a link via Councillor Brenda Thompson, FORWARDS has made contact with the Board of the Acute Trust at James Cook Hospital and is hoping to introduce Job Carving and involvement with the FORWARDS team when recruiting. G. Rea and the team are going to give a presentation to the Acute trust Board on 15th September 2010.
Stewart Park Walled Garden Vocational Training Centre
Stewart Park’s training facility is now well established and there are currently 12 people attending horticultural training. The first two of these trainees are progressing into paid employment - one into full time and one into part-time work.
The refurbishment of the new training rooms will commence in October 2010 and be completed in July 2011.
We are also currently working on an agreement for some of our clients to work on the garden maintenance for MTLC and getting paid for this work.
‘Ayresome Confidential’ (previously known as ‘Ayresome Shredd-it’)
Ayresome Confidential, which is a new arm of Ayresome Industries, has been developing very well. It is currently financially supported via Working Neighbourhoods Funding until March 2011. By that time it is hoped that this social enterprise is going to be self-sustainable. Steve Giles and Peter Riley have been working closely with the FORWARDS team and are currently employing six people with disabilities within ‘Ayresome Confidential’, doing a variety of tasks (shredding confidential waste paper, scanning documents onto a database, archiving and file management etc.)
Other ideas for development
FORWARDS has made contact with Job Centre Plus, Tees Valley Unlimited and the Council’s Regeneration department to discuss the possible development of a Government contract idea to pilot a Tees Valley project within the Government’s ‘Work Programme’ which supports specialist Employment Support Services for People with Disabilities – as currently supplied by FORWARDS and neighbouring Local Authorities. This would address the Government’s aim to reduce the number of people on long-term health benefits by directing DWP funding directly to Local Authorities to fund their Employment Support Services for people with disabilities. This would mean specialists would be working with people furthest away from the labour market.
‘Help to find your way into paid employment’ Event
G.Rea has submitted an application for funding to the Cabinet Office to finance an event, which FORWARDS is planning to hold in October 2010.
This event will be for people with learning disabilities and people in secondary mental health services known to Middlesbrough Council services. The aim is to remove the misconception that people with a disability are unable to progress into sustainable paid employment. The agenda will include presentations by FORWARDS about their work, success stories of real people no in paid employment and networking/ signposting with local partners such as Job Centre Plus, Shaw Trust, Working Links, Reed in Partnership, Talent, MVDA and others. This event could be for many of those invited the first step towards paid employment and true social inclusion.
External and internal Training
To make FORWARDS’ work more effective and to spread the responsibility to find employment for people more widely within the Council the plan is for FORWARDS to internally train relevant staff within the different services in CV writing, Job Search etc. FORWARDS with those members of staff will also attend specialised training in employer engagement and customised employment which will be delivered through the British Association of Supported Employment (BASE).
Marketing / Publicity
FORWARDS now has its own website : www.middlesbrough.gov.uk/ccm/navigation/health-and-social-care/disabilities/forwards---employment-for-people-with-disabilities/
The website can be easily accessed via the Council’s website with a direct link from within Social Care. The website is being regularly update every three months.
FORWARDS is producing a quarterly Newsletter , which is disseminated widely, in- and externally.