There can be no denying that separate, ‘siloed’, non-integrated ‘solutions’ often fail to achieve the meaningful and lasting transformation they seek, simply because they overlook the interconnected and multifaceted nature of human needs.
Vulnerable and isolated families become even more vulnerable and isolated as they find themselves shunted from agency to agency, and required to attend various clinics for multiple and interlinked problems in their lives, with unconnected organisations staffed by ‘officers’ they don’t know and therefore don’t trust. Already facing a range of issues, they now also find themselves navigating a complex and confusing array of service systems and networks. And the delivery model which then sits people opposite each other, across counters, desks or tables in sterile and soulless offices or rooms, simply amplifies the problem. Everything about these methods shouts, ‘you’re a case’, rather than, ‘you’re a family that we respect and are here to support’. The whole process robs them of agency, and creates trauma, rather than empowering them.
We have tolerated a system for too long that puts so much emphasis on box ticking, and is so reluctant to take a chance on doing things differently. How have we ended up with so many multi-agency meetings about every vulnerable child, which last longer than the amount of time any of the professionals in the room for that discussion will have ever spent with the child concerned?
Why are we surrounding some vulnerable children with ten, and sometimes more, different professionals from different agencies, where none of them actually take the lead or build a trusted relationship with the child or family concerned? Why do our systems do so much to stifle relationship building and hold back innovation, and why are they so risk averse?
In contrast to this approach, we have learned that a broad range of integrated services delivered in a relational and community-led manner, has impact beyond that of any of its individual elements. The ability to be able to connect advice and support work with our educational offer, or to integrate youth work with health and wellbeing programmes, means that it is possible to support individuals in a holistic and yet personal manner.
The needs of children and their families cannot be addressed in individual silos that are not connected: educational, social, emotional, economic, spiritual and physical. That’s why we need an integrated system, rather than the disjointed, ineffective and over-expensive muddle we have at the moment. Work that is not holistic will always be suboptimal, simply because it dismembers an individual’s interdependent needs.
And this is the problem with ‘service delivery’. Service delivery has a very narrow lens. It puts money into specific initiatives and quick ‘results’. It’s blinkered to the wider needs of the community, simply because it is not employed to notice them. But because of this, it tends to deal with the symptoms: addictions, health and weight issues, etc., rather than exploring the causes of these poverties. It focuses on the presenting need of the day – what it is being paid for – rather than making the necessary investments to reduce tomorrow’s risk. Then, when the money runs out, it’s gone too!
Genuine community development requires a longer-term approach, one with a wider lens, because the currency for long-term systemic change is trust, and trust comes through taking time to form healthy relationships, rather than frantically running a programme in order to get the right ticks in the right boxes. That’s the difference between service delivery projects and authentic community development.
We have to get joined up. And, this joining up has to start at government level.
Individually we are one drop; together we are an ocean: Too often a child or families who need support are told, ‘you’re a case’, rather than ‘you’re a child or family that we respect and are here to support’. We need to transform services from box-ticking exercises. In this episode Steve’s guest and expert witness is Mark Russell, CEO of The Children’s Society. In part one Steve sets out his sixth principle, in part two Mark responds.
Mark is the Chief Executive of the Children’s Society and leads a team of 850 staff and 10,000 volunteers working to support some of the most vulnerable children in the UK. Before moving to The Children’s Society, Mark worked with children and young people for 20 years and was Chief Executive of the social justice charity, ChurchArmy. Mark began his youth work career in Northern Ireland (where he is from), working in one of the most divided towns at the time, bringing Protestant and Catholic young people together in the run-up to the Good Friday Agreement. He is committed to disrupting the disadvantage that many children and young people face.
This podcast series, and the accompanying book by Steve Chalke sets out ten tried and tested practical principles for ‘how’ to develop joined up, cost effective, community empowering work, gleaned from the hard-won experience that sit at the heart of the mission of Oasis over the last four decades. Steve talks to 13 expert witnesses who help him bring his book to life with their own thoughts and lived experiences. We believe it’s time for a radical reset. It's time for A Manifesto for Hope!
Steve’s book is available wherever you buy your books but we recommend you buy it from Bookshop.org an online bookshop with a mission to financially support local, independent bookshops.This book is also available on Audible.
The Manifesto of Hope podcast is brought to you by Oasis. Our producer is Peter Kerwood and the sound and mix engineer is Matteo Magariello.
If we are going to build and fund an integrated and holistic system of care for children, young people and their families; one which is aligned and attuned to the real needs of those it seeks to serve, we have to reimagine society together.
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