Naomi Taher, social worker, integrated care team, Salford Council
Photo: JackF/Fotolia
I have found the Community Care Inform Adults website extremely useful. Over the last few months I have used the website to aid my practice throughout my assessed and supported year in employment (ASYE), which I have now passed.
I found the guide on making safeguarding personal: person-centred practice with adults at risk particularly useful. I had a complex safeguarding investigation to undertake and used Inform to look up the recent safeguarding guidance which Salford as a local authority has signed up to and pledged to explore as a result of the Care Act. This gave me further understanding of how to make safeguarding more person centred.
The guide allowed me to gain further knowledge of the ethos behind the new safeguarding legislation, which sets a new focus on how individual practice and organisational processes can be transformed in order to improve both the processes and the outcomes associated with adult safeguarding.
This helped me form the basis of my approach towards this safeguarding investigation, keeping the client at the heart of my intervention, focusing on personal outcomes that she wished to achieve from the safeguarding, and allowing her to maintain control and focus over her life.
I have continued to use Inform to gain further knowledge and obtain specific information. I find the website tremendously easy to use and have no problems in seeking the reliable information I am looking for.
I have attended Inform training sessions where I’ve been able to discuss how I use Inform and have found these sessions very useful. I was able to comment on the positives of the website and provide input on upcoming policies/legislation from the Care Act which, as a practitioner, I felt would be useful to have on the site.
I feel that having this input and being able to express my opinions – which were always listened to – makes me feel confident with Inform’s content and any future suggestions I may have. I have fed back to the integrated care team I work with about Inform’s usefulness.
I will continue to use Inform, specifically the useful feature ‘CPD log’, to help me work towards achieving my level 3 and keep my professional development and learning logged.
