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It's pretty difficult being someone who cares deeply about fairness and making a real difference to see actions being taken that, in all conscience, will never make that difference. And, in fact, in some cases make it worse. It's this fire in my belly that keeps me going and so to quell the fire would not be authentic to myself. Furthermore, raging against the machine and at others can be counterproductive and damaging.
If you work in schools, social care, or indeed pretty much any part of public service delivery, you will almost certainly witness and may even have little choice to be complicit in actions that service an agenda that is not about providing the best support; the best education or best protection.
The agenda might be financial, it might be organisational interest or external requirements such as funders or regulators performance monitoring.
You will likely recognise the game playing that happens before an Ofsted inspection, the inability to support someone because they do not meet a threshold or the conjuring up of a false reality for a funding application. We've all been there.
For a much more in depth investigation of the alternative, see here http://realworld.report/.
Over the last week I have been party to a number of discussions that ignited my fire and made me wonder "how on earth is that ok?", "why can they just work together", "can't they see the bigger picture here?" and an attitude of 'I'm right, they're wrong'. So last week the first draft of this blog was, rant, rant, rant. And rather incoherent. Today I'm calmer, but I did not want to let the fire subside as it dissolves back into the day to day. I want to see whether I can hold on to the fire, but tame it into a thoughtful piece about how we collectively stand up to those idiotic behaviours that sometimes we're forced into. I want to see whether I can use moral outrage in a way that is not holy-than-thou, but more shared pain and a collective journey to find a more ethical way forward.
The context for the first discussion is that we are a partner in a programme supporting people back into the workplace. The people we work with often lead very changeable lives. Mental health is a big factor in this and from day to day this impacts on how much they can engage in the activities. This programme which is very target-driven has some pretty odd targets. In amongst the great work – with many people being genuinely supported to get their lives back on track - we see the darker side of being target driven. A successful outcome can be someone that has 'come on programme' attends a free course, not provided by the programme and then leaves the programme.
One example is the time when the programme made contact with individuals living in accommodation for people with profoundly chaotic lives - drug, alcohol abuse, mental health & homelessness. A group of them were bought laptops (held by the accommodation provider) and walking boots. They were they taken on a free course up on Dartmoor. They were then Exited i.e. a successful achievement of targets. The other example was a woman with long term, enduring mental health issues with physical disabilities was put on a free mental health course. She was also then Exited. Oh, and then not allowed back on the programme when it turned out she would have benefited from a laptop. That would have messed up the figures.
So why did I get upset by these examples? They got some free stuff, possibly had a good time with no harm done? My fire says different. It says these people have been victims of another little abuse by the system. A system that can (but not always) treat people as numbers. They have been given another little life lesson that says they do not matter. Adding another micro abuse to histories that are already full of abuse.
And if ethically that's not quite enough, then look at it financially. The stated goal of the programme is to get people into work. Staff time and money have been used to hit an arbitrary target with no chance of achieving the goal. Isn't this a waste?
The context for the second discussion is at the other scale. We move from the individual to system level. In Devon (and the rest of England) the Community Mental Health Framework is rolling out. One of the aims in Devon is:
"to make sure people no longer ‘fall through the cracks’ between different services. VCSE and independent sector organisations will be taking a leading role in this, including supporting people’s mental health recovery, delivery of psychological and therapeutic activity and strengthening community assets to support people with serious mental health needs."
The stated intention of the Devon commissioners is to avoid a competitive tendering process. But the prospect of competition looms. And we're seeing the impact of this threat play out.
Different groupings, or alliances are springing up. This is natural as we hold stronger relationships with some organisations not others. Some we trust, some we don't. Some we need to cover the contract requirements, some we don't. So we inevitably start picking and choosing those we wish to work with. We will not share our intent or model because we don't trust others to sneak in there and steal the bid. It's a bit like a reverse prisoners dilemma - do we all share our thinking maximising our collective impact, but risk someone taking it all and us getting nothing?
Unfortunately this fractures relationships. Initially it fractures relationships between organisations, then it risks fracturing the relationships with those people with severe mental illness. To explain this, people with severe mental illness are in a vulnerable situation and they are very likely to be in contact with a support organisation. Some of these organisations will be 'in' the winning bid, some will not. By setting up a closed boundary around organisations we have necessitated a referral from one organisation to another i.e. we will need to break one relationship to form another. We know that consistency in relationship is critical factor to ensuring we can successfully support people with mental health issues.
This shows that by creating a competitive environment we both reduce collaboration and the quality of support available to those we need to support the most. Not even an explicit intention by the commissioners to avoid a competitive process are successfully creating a collaborative environment. The risk of competition is preventing the openness that is needed to progress collaboratively. No alliance organisation is openly stepping forwards to lead on this. Why not? Why is this?
- Is it greed - I want to ensure my organisation gets the most money out of this contract so I want to keep the numbers as small as possible?
- Is it status - I wish to be seen as the 'top dog'?
- Is it fear - I'm worried that if we reach out we'll be played off by potential alliance members and another bigger alliance will come along and steal the show?
- Is it pride - the other organisations are a bit crap and we're better. We'll provide better support than they will?
- Is it capacity - I do not have time to deal with the complexity of leading an overly large alliance of organisations?
Whatever the reason/s, the result is a poorer system of support for those we need to support - those with severe mental health conditions become a commodity.
In both of the examples I have given, the individual that needs support is not considered as highly as the other factors. We need to call this out, and we need to employ ‘considered’ moral outrage. Not to start blaming. Instead we need to light our fires so we can overcome those reasons that prevent us from taking action to improve the situation.
These actions taken by individuals cannot be blamed on the individuals. They are simply the product of an environment that promotes this behaviour. Or can they? Should we expect more from those who are tasked with making other people's lives better? Who is it that holds the responsibility? Is it the individual member of staff that needs to hit the targets, or the manager that needs to secure income, or the funder that sets the targets, or the commissioner that designs the contract?
My view? It is all of us. Each of us has the opportunity to identify our own responsibility, our own power. Sometimes all we can do is call it out. Sometimes we can act differently. Wherever our power is, when we identify it we invoke the Peter Parker principle "with great power comes great responsibility". Unless we act our way into the new system we want to see it will never happen.
So this is an invitation for everyone that experiences these same moments to call them out. Be outraged, let your fire be lit, step forward and stand up for a better way of making the world a better place. You are not alone and together we have power.
So what can you do?
- Are you Devon/Plymouth based? Get in contact. We'll work out what we can do together. There's tons of stuff already going on, come and join us.
- From further afield? Go here - http://realworld.report/- join the ever growing movement of people who have already ignited their fire.
- Read and watch a bit more on this
- EXPLORING ALOUD: 'What Is The Role of Moral Outrage In System Change?' with Andy Brogan | Next Stage Radicals - Exploring Aloud, https://www.easierinc.com/blog/a-reflection-on-system-change/
Format: Blogs
Tags: Human Learning Systems , Commissioning , Collaboration , Systems Thinking , Public Services , Empathy
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