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News
1st May, It's good to talk
I was out and about on my travels the other day at a meeting with providers in a neighbouring county. As is traditional with these things, we were invited to ask questions and encouraged to introduce ourselves. Me being me, always has a question (or two) to ask, and dutifully explained who I was before I did so. At the end of the meeting, I was approached by a lady who stated that she had read this blog series and had a question for me. Now I am unsure what intrigued me the most, the fact that someone actually reads the blogs I write or the question she asked.
Read more.
John T-B
19th April 2012, Marc’s got the X-Factor!!
Down at the ‘Hop Pocket’ pub in Chorley, every Tuesday evening, there’s an X-Factor Competition for people with disabilities. Marc who is in an outreach programme, got away from mum and dad last week and with the help of his care and support worker, Andrew, competed and won! He sang a ‘West Life’ song to win the competition and beat his rivals! Marc is 23 and has been busy meeting friends and getting out and about more, since last year.
John T-B
6th April, Recruitment Revisited
It's been nearly a year since I started writing these blogs and to be honest the time has flown by. One of the first themes that I discussed was the need for getting the right staff on board, not just in terms of skills, but also in terms of values. The last blog that I wrote discussed the need for re-invention and innovation so I thought I would combine the two and let you know what our Person Centred Task Group has done with our recruitment process over the last year.
Read more.
John T-B
4th April,
Bradley Wilson, One of our Citizens organised a fundraising event in aid of Alzheimers in East Lancashire last weekend, he raised a massive £575. Well Done Bradley! to see mor events / imformation please visit Bradleys Facebook page @ Read more.
John T-B
27th February, A Rolling Stone Gathers No Moss
At Living Ambitions we recognise that it is really important not to get too complacent about the support services that we provide. If you met me at a conference or similar event, you would always hear me referring to Living Ambitions as "working towards a person centred culture" or being "on a person centred journey". Now some of you may think that this is a bit strange, coming from an organisation that writes blogs for Helen Sanderson Associates and has won awards for its innovative person centred support delivery.
Read more.
John T-B
27th February 2012, Football success continues!!
At Eastleigh in Skelmersdale, Football fanatic Pat recently attended the FA Cup match with support worker Steve, to watch her beloved Everton beat Blackpool and progress to the next round! Pat, who is a wheel chair user and in a supported living programme with 24/7 care, hopes to see her team continue all the way to the final at Wembley Stadium. What a trip that would be!
John T-B
20th February 2012, Living Ambitions Wins The Innovation Award!
On the 9th February 2012, at St. Cuthbert’s Church, Fullwood, Preston, Lancashire County Council held a Celebration Award Event to mark the good practice within social care provider services in Central Lancashire. Over 80 guests award winners and guests attended The Innovation Award looked for providers who had used innovative ideas to maintain and improve services while at the same time reducing costs. The background to this award was based on the facts that with funding pressures at the fore, Organisations are no longer able to sustain existing services by working in the time honoured way. This, however, offered opportunities to redesign services on a scale not seen before. The theme for the day was very much one of celebration and sharing good practice.
Read more.
John T-B
20th February 2012, Learning new skills is fun!
21 year old Danielle, who has Autism and Cerebral Palsy and has been in supported living accommodation in Penwortham, Preston since September 2011, has decided to join a local drama and musical group called ‘ The Musical Minstrels’. She gave her first performance at their Christmas show in 2011 and is now currently learning new songs to sing for their forthcoming Easter Show. ‘Break a leg Danielle’ as they say in Theatre land! Danielle has not stopped there with learning new skills, however. With the help and guidance of her supported living worker, Rachel, she has also begun to contribute to cooking her own meals. After living at home for many years with her parents, this has given Danielle, a great sense of Independence and achievement.
John T-B
8th February 2012, Some Good News Stories from across Living Ambitions
Eastleigh, Skelmersdale
Carers Matt & Steve are amazed at Pat’s hectic social life!
Pat who is a wheel chair user and in a supported living programme with 24/7 care, recently went to watch her beloved football team Everton play Fulham in the FA cup at Goodison Park! Everton came from behind to beat Fulham 2-1 and earn their spot in the fifth round.
Pat’s enjoyed the game and is over the moon with the result!
Pat also enjoyed a holiday over the Christmas period in Blackpool for 7 nights, taking in the sites and having trips out as well making many new friends.
Elvis Night for Eddie!
Supported Living Citizen, Eddie, also from Eastleigh, attended an ‘Elvis Night’ organised and held at Loweswater. Eddie had a fantastic evening and re-lived some great ‘Elvis’ moments with friends. Last November, Eddie also travelled to Memphis, USA to visit everything Elvis!
Eddie’s love for music also took him and support worker Steve, recently, to see ‘Dirty Dancing-The Musical’ and spend an evening and over- night in Manchester.
Time please!
Yvonne, a supported living citizen, recently started a new job as a Glass Collector at a pub in Skelmersdale old town. She meets lots of people in the community and has made lots of new friends. Yvonne also recently went for a day trip to York with her friend Pat for a good old shop and to look around the museums!
Congratulations!
Christine, enjoys her independence under the supported living service and has just completed her Dance & Drama course. Well done Christine!
Burscough, Lancashire.
When you wish upon a Star!
Lauren, who is in a supported living programme, recently travelled to France, with support worker Nina, to the amazing Disneyland Paris. She was away for a total of 5 nights and enjoyed every minute!
Accrington, Lancashire.
New Adventures!
Matthew & Jason, who are both supported living citizens, are planning some exciting holidays this year with their support workers. Matthew is going on holiday to Wales and will be doing various activities for the first time and Jason is travelling further afield to the USA! Don’t forget to send postcards!
John T-B
25th January 2012, A big welcome to a new service!
Living Ambitions would like to extend a big welcome Clinton, Joanne and Anne to our organisation. These citizens live in Salford and will now have their support provided by Living Ambitions we look forward to working with you and helping you to achieve the outcomes that you wish for your lives.
John T-B
16th January, Happy New Year
So 2012 has finally arrived and what a great year it promises to be. We have the Olympic Games in London, the Paralympic Games, in Football we have Euro 2012 (no doubt England exiting once again on penalties), the U.S Presidential Election and the Queens Diamond Jubilee. At Living Ambitions, we also hope that this year will continue to be a good one for all the people we support. It's around this time of year, that Jodie and I assess all the information that we have received from our various feedback events and try and establish our core priorities for the year ahead.
Click to find out more .
John T-B
12th January 2012, Living Ambition’s New Year’s Resolutions
Living Ambitions has now announced its New Year’s Resolutions; following consultation with Staff and Service Users Living Ambitions has released its key priorities for the coming year. These New Year’s Resolutions will be the focus of the organisations work over the next 12 months with view to improving the outcomes for people who use its services. To read these resolutions please click here.
John T-B
6th January 2012, New Year of hope for 74 Years young Student with Learning Disability
Margaret is 74 in January 2012 and is about to embark on a visual arts course at the START creative arts centre in Salford. In today’s society that doesn’t seem very interesting news, but what makes it MORE remarkable is that Margaret has a condition called Schizoaffective Disorder & Mild Learning Disabilities! Read more.
John T-B
20th December, Commons Select Committee for Social Care
Our Managing Director, Robin Bush was invited by Lancashire County Council to speak with the Commons Select Committee for Social Care.
The Committee were visiting Lancashire to establish how individual budgets and the personalisation agenda were working locally. Robin spoke with West Lancs M.P Rosie Cooper and the Rt Honourable Stephen Dorrell MP who Chairs the committee (below), to raise some of the pro's and cons of Individual Budgets. Living Ambitions will be interested to read the findings of the inquiry when it's published in spring 2012.
John T-B
20th December, What difference does it all make?
Hopefully there are some of you out there that read my monthly contributions and have been following our journey towards a Person Centred Culture.
But maybe there is a "so what" thought that enters your mind every now and then.
Now if there is, don't worry. I am referring to the thought that might say "So what difference does it make" if you have a person centred approach to risk, if you use communication passports or if citizens recruit their own staff teams? Read more.
John T-B
20th December, Christmas Card Winner!
Back in November we announced our Christmas card competition winner as Jason Rhodes for submitting the card pictured (Right), we have now had chance to meet Jason and present his winning prize (a HMV Voucher). Click to see picture
John T-B
5th December, Derek’s Passion
Living Ambitions have been working in the community to help a local man develop his woodworking talents and to help him raise valuable funds for local charities.
“Derek also wants to encourage others to spend more time in their gardens and beautify his local environment” said Jodie Allen-Cawley, Director of Operations at Living Ambitions “Eventually he would like to earn a living from his craft, get closer to nature and give something back to his community”
Derek has learning disabilities as well as epilepsy and receives 24 hour support. He has, however, a real passion and talent for woodwork, but sadly in the past was refused entry to college to study because of his epilepsy. The college thought this was too “Risky” despite Derek having capacity to take that risk!!
Please Read More.
John T-B
18th November, Person Centred Thinking a Holistic Organisation Approach
Over the last few years, Jodie and I have been working hard to establish a culture within Living Ambitions that reflects our values. One of the problems that we had was that no one knew what the organisational values were, in fact Living Ambitions in 2009 had two mission statements depending on what document you were reading and over 30 different values. It was no surprise therefore that when we asked staff and citizens whether they knew what Living Ambitions did and how it did it, we were faced with blank stares and some random guesses.As it now seems to be typical with these blog features, I'm going to jump back a bit to when we were developing our approaches to person centred thinking. Jodie and I knew what we wanted to achieve in terms of changing culture, but there were a couple of fundamental issues.
Click to find out more .
John T-B
15th November, Employee Charter
Over the past year Living Ambitions have worked hard with our staff teams to develop our primary purpose and the core principals, we also worked on finding out what our staff think about working for us. A staff moral survey was conducted and having read the results we have developed the following charter for our staff.
• Living Ambitions will always recognise and celebrate good practice;
• Living Ambitions will encourage and support professional development;
• Living Ambitions will listen and respond to staffs feedback about the organisation;
• Living Ambitions will promote an open and transparent culture to ensure fairness and a safe place to work;
• Living Ambitions will ensure that every manager promotes a positive work environment for their staff teams;
Robin Bush our Managing Director had this to say; “One of our core management principles is to have a skilled and valued workforce , We have worked hard with the staff teams to develop our primary purpose and core principals. Work has also been on going to find out what our staff, think about working for us.” “Although Living Ambitions have always put staff training and development at the forefront of their services, media attention has recently focused on ‘work related stress’ and ‘poorly trained social care workers’ in the industry.”
Please Read More.
John T-B
10th Novemeber, Design a Christmas Card 2011 Competition
This year Living Ambitions decided to run a competition for our Citizens to design a Christmas Card that would be professionally printed and sent out from Living Ambitions as a seasonal greeting.The winner for this year’s Christmas Card Competition is Jason Rhodes! Well done Jason for designing the winning card your prize is on its way!!
View it HERE.
John T-B
10th November, Training Facilities @ Living Ambitions
A recent makeover of one of the rooms at the offices of local Social Care Provider, Living Ambitions based in Lostock Hall, Preston, has provided the organisation and the local community with an up to date meeting, training & conference room facility.READ MORE.
John T-B
9th November, Lancashire Work Force Development Partnership
Robin Bush, Managing Director of Living Ambitions has recently been appointed as the Independent Chairman of the Lancashire Workforce Development Partnership in Preston. Formed in 2003, the Lancashire Workforce Development Partnership (LWDP) is an employer led partnership representing over 700 providers of independent Social Care in Lancashire. The organisation manages the workforce development grants which support employers by making funds available for staff training and development with an ultimate purpose of improving Social Care in Lancashire for service users by valuing and investing in the Social Care workforce.Please CLICK HERE to read more.
John T-B
4th November, Disability Hate Crime Campaign
Living Ambitions along with many other organisations have been campaigning for a change to the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders bill, this change would enable the law to treat disability hate crime in the same way that it treats murders instigated by race, religion and of a sexual nature.This campaign has been spearheaded by Labour MP Kate Green who had this to say;
“With the support of MPs from across the House, I’d tabled an amendment to ensure that the sentence for murder where the victim’s disability is a motivating or aggravating feature would be increased to align with that where sexuality, race or religion is involved.
I’d heard harrowing stories from families of disabled people who’d been victims murder (and often tortured), who were understandably very anxious to see the law tightened up. I was very proud to propose the amendment – and absolutely gob-smacked when the Lord Chancellor, Kenneth Clarke, responded by committing the government to bringing forward its own proposals to achieve what I was asking for when the bill reaches the House of Lords.
It’s not often an opposition MP persuades a minister to change the law, and at first I could hardly believe what I had heard. But this really was a great victory for campaigners, disabled people and their families”
For further information / background to this campaign please CLICK HERE to read more.
John T-B
16th October, Helen Sanderson Associates Blog
Our lastest blog (eighth) has been posted on Helen Sanderson Associates website detailing How Living Ambitions used the Progress for Providers Training! To view please click here.John T-B
10th October, Employee of the Month
Congratulations to Steven Briggs one of our Support Workers for obtaining the employee of the month for September, the award was a £30 giftcard, however Steven has asked that we donate his award money to Cancer Research, please click and make a donation towards this life saving charity.John T-B
13th September, Our Latest Blog on Helen Sanderson Associates Website
Our fifth blog has just been posted on Helen Sanderson Associates website describing our view on A Person Centred Approach To Risk! please view it click here.John T-B
11th August, Panaroma's Report on Abuse Government Response to Living Ambitions
The Department of Health has replied to my letter of concern regarding the Panorama report, to view it please click here.Robin Bush
11th August, Helen Sanderson Associate Blog
The latest blog that we have posted on Helen Sanderson Associates Website looks at how much support is "Just Enough" to view it please click here.
John T-B
13th July, Helen Sanderson Associate Workshops
Living Ambitions is running 2 workshops in conjunction with Helen Sanderson Associates;
Progress for Providers for Managers Training to book the course please click here.
Just Enough Support Workshop to book the course please click here
You can view course information and book using the above links or by contacting our administration desk on 01772 310 280.
Keep in mind however that spaces are very limited so book early to avoid disappointment!
John T-B
