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Person-Centred
Planning
Joe Wolfe & Associates offer a range of supports and training programmes in person centred planning to services.
Joe Wolfe & Associates Person Centred Process 2003 - 2006
Joe Wolfe & Associates have developed a Person Centred Planning process which is specifically developed to provide organisations with the means to deliver their services in a person centred fashion.This is further complemented by the provision of the necessary policies, procedures and guidelines.
The most important aspect of this process is that the person with disabilities becomes a central focus for the service. This focus has to be real and not tokenistic and in order to achieve this the organisation needs to address changes in both culture and structure.
In our experience most services require assistance with developing a strategic and business plan in order to address these needs. This planning is vital if organisations wish to successfully develop a person centred focus with the necessary investment in training and development. Ttraining alone has proved to be ineffective if it is unsupported by wider organisational commitment to change.
Joe Wolfe & Associates have completed one project which was undertaken over a three year period involving six voluntary services across the country. The aim of the project was to set out a person centred planning process which could be undertaken over a three year period. The process undertaken involved the briefing of the CEO’s, the senior management team and Board of Management of each organisation about the process and the strategic roll out of the project. Presentations were made by service users in Ireland, Service Managers from the UK and Joe Wolfe & Associates.
Phase 1
Prior to any training being undertaken, Joe Wolfe & Associates conducted some baseline research on service user experiences of life, with the intention of determining whether person centred planning made a difference to the person's life. Seven (7) people from each organisation were randomly selected and interviews were conducted with the person and his/her communication partner (if required). A further interview was conducted with a carer.
Phase 2
An integral part of the process was for the organisations to address the infrastructural changes required to facilitate greater person centredness. During Phase 2 of the project Joe Wolfe & Associates provided training in Policy, Guideline and Procedure writing to three/four staff members from each organisation and they were provided with 15 template policies which they could further customise.
These policies included:-
- Abuse
- Sexuality / relationships
- Intimate care
- Behaviours that Challenge
- Complaints/ grievance procedure for service users
- Selected Health and Safety policies e.g. Manual Handling; Using Volunteers
- Medication Management
- Violence and Aggression / physical interventions
- Community participation / socialisation
- Advocacy
- Communication Systems
- Guidelines on documentation and record keeping
- Guidelines on the correct use of service users funds – saving, managing
- Risk assessment/risk management
Phase 3
A 6-day training of trainers programme was delivered to three/four staff nominated from each organisation. The content of this programme included materials for a 4-day in house training programme. The topics covered included
- Values for person centred practice
- History of person centred planning
- Introduction to person centred planning
- What person centred planning is not
- Portfolios
- Facilitating a plan
- Person centred tools (Maps, Path, Essential Lifestyle Planning, Person Futures Planning)
- Communication Partners
- Advocacy
On completion of both the training of trainers programme and the policy and procedure training each service were asked to nominate staff to attend a number of action learning sets.
Phase 4
A series of six facilitated action learning sets were undertaken with two nominated groups. One group focused on person centred planning and the second on person centred organisational policies and procedures. The groups met over the period of two years and were facilitated by a member of Joe Wolfe & Associates.
The aim of these groups was to have solution focused discussion in order to identify strategies to address issues and problems that the various organisations were experiencing in the roll out of the person centred process.
Feedback on this stage of the process indicates that the groups found the opportunity to network and share information and experiences a very positive support. The policy group made a lot of progress customising and developing accessible documents. This group now continue to meet and support each other without formal facilitation.
Phase 5
We conducted an audit in each of the organisations, during the second year of the process . The purpose of the audit was to determine to what extent the organisations had undertaken the process as outlined by Joe Wolfe & Associates. The audit included: -
- identifying the content of training programmes
- if the training programmes had been delivered to staff, service users and families,
- identifying if the documents which can assist in underpinning person centred practice had been developed.
Innovative practices were also audited as well as identification of the existence of a plan. The audit reports were completed in December 2005. Other news
We have completed training of trainer’s programmes with a number of agencies and each time we complete training the attendees ask about the opportunities to network. If you are interested in becoming part of a wider network please contact e mail your name to info@jwolfeassociates.com |
