Creative Recruitment in Social Care

Caroline Tomlinson17th February 2014

How to participate today

www.my-life.org.uk

Pathways to Employment (P2E)

An asset based approach to mobilising people with BIG hearts

into the social care workforce.

Caroline Tomlinson CEO

My Life Social Enterprise CiC

www.my-life.org.uk

About My Life• Young Social Enterprise CiC founded by Caroline

Tomlinson in summer 2012.• If you want something different, you have to do

something different.• Built on the ethos that together we are better.• Crowd funded – self sustaining. • Based in Lancashire/Wigan/NW but open to all.• Created from the need of local families.• Provides a wide range of meaningful opportunities

and space for people to connect.• Innovates new community based solutions that

makes a practical difference.• We give, gain and grow together – those that put

something in will get something out.

www.my-life.org.uk

Background To P2E• Families struggling to find PAs.• Being an employer can be hard work.• Training is very limited for PAs• No sense of connection • Cost of recruitment and retention to providers.• PAs job hopping.• Potential social care workers needing to go into work

with their eyes wide open.• Values, dignity, respect, stickability and relationships.• The need for a confident, competent and a caring

workforce.• Keeping support staff motivated and connected to

keep being good at their job.• Creating a sense of belonging.• Having a wide range of opportunities for people to

access.

www.my-life.org.uk

Innovation needs a little £We had a great idea!

A wider membership offer to local people.

Invest to save – needed a financial injection to demonstrate concept.

Needed to demonstrate VfM and and it being a workable investable support mechanism for local people.

Secured some pump priming from Skills for Care.

www.my-life.org.uk

Process

• Find potential workers• Information Sessions• Application process• Recruitment and Selection• Training• Screening• Matching• Mentoring and ongoing support.

www.my-life.org.uk

Finding Potential Workers

• Going to the place were people where at.• Went out to the local community spreading

the word.• Attended job fairs and places were people

were looking for work.• Presented at colleges, universities, places of

learning.• Had quality conversations encouraging

participation by getting people to believe in possibility.

• Social media.• Local papers / news articles.

www.my-life.org.uk

Information Sessions

• Hospitality and creating a sense of belonging.

• Inspiring people to believe in possibility.• Being honest about what we were

looking for.• Helping people to help themselves – if

you want work there is work.• Questions and answers.• Explaining application process.

www.my-life.org.uk

Application Process

• No Experience Necessary - The only requirement is a positive attitude.

• Privilege not a right – how we select.• Need to commit to the whole course.• Interested in skills, gifts and qualities.• Honesty about history.• We will let you know if your successful

within 2 days of our deadline.Its about putting the CARE back into social care

www.my-life.org.uk

Recruitment and Selection Process

• Poster or 30 second video.

• Looking for a positive, can do attitude.

• What can you offer?• Have you got stickability?• The rest is simple…. 35

people signed up.

Whats give you a fire in your belly?

www.my-life.org.uk

Training• Based on a model of citizen leadership.• Inspire with stories of change.• The history of ‘care’ in this country.• Learning to listen.• How to build community.• Meeting individual employers – families and disabled people.• Meeting providers.• Meeting PAs and people working in the care industry.• Understanding the social care system.• Identifying areas where you would like to work.• Lots of interactive activities building confidence and self

belief.• Encouraging friendships and relationships to evolve• How to have and maintain peace of mind.• Practical homework• Graduating people and invite friends and family to celebrate.

33 people graduated that’s is a 95% success rate!

www.my-life.org.uk

Screening

• References• Social Media• Disclosure and Barring Service.• Spending 5 weeks with people.• Seeing people in different

environments.• Finding out what other people

think.

Getting to know you, getting to know all about you!

www.my-life.org.uk

Matching

• Supporting each individual to build up their portfolio.

• The My Life team identifying skills, gifts and qualities.

• Identifying who were looking for workers.

• Creating a unique, qualitative matching tool.

• Keeping a strong communication link going out.

• Collating stories of success.

Its about who gets on with who……. You can teach the rest!!

www.my-life.org.uk

Mentoring and ongoing support• We continue to offer one2one support by

telephone, electronically or Face2face.• We provide lots of spaces for people to connect

including wider voluntary opportunities.• Opportunities to attend the Inclusive

Community Experience.• Provide references.• Promote a personalised approach to

recruitment.• Give honest feedback.• Keep in touch learning over time what works

and what doesn’t.

Tom said “You have to feel it, no training could ever teach me this!”

www.my-life.org.uk

Outcomes• 19 people have found work• 6 have found voluntary opportunities• We are a point of reference for people.• We continue to support families to be good

employers.• We act as a conduit between EL

insurers/HR and families.• We have supported families and PA

throughout bereavement.• VfM cost per head approx £180 per head

opposed to £1k.• It has changed the ordinary lives of people.

Stuart, Sue and JOHN

JOANNE and BRIAN

IAN

www.my-life.org.uk

Next Steps• Developing a report on our findings.• Continuing to link people into work and voluntary

opportunities.• Promote membership wider to individuals and families

with the offer.• Offer bespoke membership to provider organisations

seeking staff by holding one2one, training and hospitality events.

• Develop early intervention and prevention support to give people experience whilst meeting the needs of the community.

• Planning to run further courses across NW over the next year.

• Developing a social franchise to scale up.

Any questions?

www.my-life.org.uk

Do keep in touchCaroline Tomlinson

CEO My Life1 The Vale

Appley BridgeWigan

LancashireWN6 9HD

Tel: 01257 252288 Mobile: 07947 608 915E Mail: caroline@my-life.org.ukFB: Caroline Cuerden Tomlinson

FB Page: My LifeTwitter: @cazzatomlinson @mylife-CiC

Linked In: Caroline Tomlinson

In Control further information

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