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Support for Living's Excellence Awards
Support for Living's Excellence Awards are being replace from September 2010 by the Certitude Excellence Award.
Our August winners are the Frays Avenue staff team
The Frays Avenue staff team have worked
exceptionally well in challenging circumstances with a very depleted
management team. All members have come together and taken on tasks that
would often be done by a manager to make sure that service continued to
run really well.
Our July winner is Elsa Grigg, Project Manager of Treat Me Right!
Elsa
received a number of nominations for the outstanding achievement in
planning, organising and facilitating the “Think Healthy” event. Elsa
went over and above her job description in organising this event and
pulled together one of the biggest information events for people with
learning disabilities in Ealing and managed to ensure that all
professionals and other providers were involved. The Director of Adult
services in Ealing gave this feedback on the event: "Can I add my thanks
too? The turn-out certainly was most impressive and I know a lot
of hard work went into it, so well done."
Our June winner is Sam Mason, Office Manager
Congratulations
to Sam Mason who is the Office Manager and works on reception at Allied
House. He had not just one, but three nominations this month, for being
brilliant and going out of his way to provide a great service to
everyone. Sam is recognised for a number of achievements –
not least, never seeming flustered in a very demanding role. He builds
rapport with everyone, always trying to help whatever the problem and
even saves us lots of money on stationery! People really like Sam’s
personal touches, such as spontaneously sending info out to people who
live in the houses about things they may be interested in, and putting
flowers around Allied House!
Our May winners are staff at Grange Close
A number of staff acted commendably when faced with the situation of someone requiring CPR and emergency treatment. They offered the immediate support required, as well as a team approach to ensuring the situation was followed up and communicated appropriately. Members of the team then showed excellent communication skills and sensitivity, when the person sadly passed away. The team members are praised for their commitment and sensitive approach throughout the difficult and stressful situation.
Our April winners are from Canning Road
Three staff who work in Canning Road, (and have asked to remain unnamed), win the award in recognition of their outstanding work in supporting someone through a true life or death situation. When someone they support had an aeortic anuerysm, they worked together to carry out effective CPR until the emergency services arrived. Despite this condition having an extremely high mortality rate they were able to keep the gentleman alive until medical professionals took over. Truly a once in a lifetime scenario where people's responses cannot be predicted until in it, and amazing strength and skills were demonstrated by all three.
Our March winner is Debbie Wallace
Congratulations
to Debbie Wallace from Oaklands Road for winning the award this month!
Debbie receives the award in recognition of her strengths as a manager
taking the service through a difficult time with only one team member.
Despite this she maintained commitment to supporting people to attend
parties and the Look Ahead group and be as involved as possible in
social opportunities.
Our February winners are the Harrow office staff
team
Russell, Catherine and Cecilia were all very involved and instrumental in the move from Brent House to 82 Craven Park being so successful. They spent the two and a half months leading up to the move, archiving and shredding years of information. Cecilia prepared a project plan, and liaised with removal companies, Russell oversaw the constant removal of information for archiving and shredding and on the day of the move the actual movements of what went where. Catherine sorted out the archiving system which has allowed us to track where the information we are looking for is stored in and she also worked alongside Cecilia and Russell to ensure that the move went as smoothly as possible. The move couldn’t of taken place without them!
Our January 2010 winner is Jacob Ajei-Frimpong
Congratulations
to Jacob Ajei-Frimpong, Deputy Manager at the19 Haymill Close Respite
Service for winning the first excellence award of the year! Jacob
receives the award in recognition of his manner and responses in a
highly stressful situation in which a service user attending the service
had a stroke. He showed flexibility and initiative in his
management of the team, and support of everyone present. His calm
approach ensured that the whole experience was as stress-free as
possible for the person who needed to be admitted to hospital.
Our December winners are the Townsend Road staff team
The team at Townsend Road as well as the
manager, were nominated for their fantastic work together to improve and
enhance the service provided to the person they support.
This individual has shown through his behaviour and communication just
how happy he is with the staff who work there, and the activities he has
been enjoying. Whereas before he may have gone out infrequently he has
recently been out on a number of trips, which have been really
successful. The team has also developed the relationship with the
person’s family.
Visitors to his home have noticed a more relaxed, happy and friendly
atmosphere. Well done to the team!
Our November winners are the ARC staff team
The
whole team at the ARC has been awarded the prize this month for their
hard work, creativity and the fabulous results of the recent BreakAway
Art exhibition. Special commendation goes to Emma for taking a
lead in the whole project. The project on the theme “therefore I
am” has given much prestige to the BreakAway service and people who use
it, as well as publicising Support for Living. People who use
BreakAway also benefited from support to develop their art by
professional artists. Not only was the exhibition supported by many
local people and celebrities, it also led to a front page cover on the
most recent Learning Disability Practice. Well done to everyone
involved!
Our October winner is Derrie Evans
Well done to Derrie Evans, House Manager, who wins the award for her long term and fantastic support of one of the people living in Frays Avenue (well all of them– but one in particular on this occasion!).
In particular she has used the person-centred review process to the advantage of this service user and his brother. The two may soon be seen whizzing down Frays Avenue on a motorbike together, and off on holiday with their whole family.
Our September winner is Kami Flora
Congratulations
to Kami Flora, our one and only Customer Finance Manager. Kami
receives the prize this month in recognition of her huge contribution to
ensuring that people who live in Hounslow now have control over their
finances.
After negotiating a successful handover of people’s finances from an organisation who used to hold these, Kami has been able to sift through and is ensuring that everyone is receiving the right benefits and paying for everything necessary too. She has enabled some people to claim large back-payments in benefits which they were not in receipt of, and because she manages and supports people with their money in a transparent way, everyone now knows how much they have, how much they need, and can also plan for some of the more fun things in life!
Our August winners are Tara Gallagher and Alina Babik
Tara
and Alina were jointly nominated for their work in setting up a series
of workshops for the people they support on health and keeping safe.
They have booked external people to run these, and the first two have
been highly successful.
The aims of the workshops are to educate, and make people aware of the
local support and resources around. Both workshops have been well
attended, enjoyed, and backed up by fabulous
accessible handouts and posters.
The communication and involvement of both the service users and people
in the community has been brilliant. Anyone wishing to get more
information, please contact Tara and Alina in the Brent Team. Well
done to both!
Our July winner is the Warwick Road staff team
Congratulations
to the team, who received 2 nominations this month!
Warwick Road staff are recognised with this award for fantastic team
work, and continuing to provide excellent support for people, during a
difficult period while they did not have a manager.
The team has also received praise both internally and externally for
their support of someone in particularly difficult circumstances.
Although she is not currently at Warwick Road, thanks and praise is
extended also to Paulette Mohammadi for her work in this area.
Our June joint winners are Laura Tully and the Brent staff team
Well
done to Laura who received not just one, but two individual nominations
and four as part of a group! It is her work mentoring and developing a
student in social work, for which she is recognised with this award.
Laura has facilitated a student on a 100 day placement to learn about supporting people with a learning disability, including person centred working and other essential aspects of work. She has also used the student’s skills to greatly benefit the people who live in Star Road, through him leading a project to better involve people in service user meetings, and offering training to the team. Laura has built an excellent working relationship with the university, elevating the reputation of the whole organisation.
This work has also benefited Star Road further through payment for the placement, which will be spent on creating a relaxation/ sensory room in the house.
The Brent team are receiving this joint award
this month for two excellent events they ran recently for current
service users and their families, and prospective service users.
The first event was to consult people who are supported and their
families about how things are run, what works for them and what doesn't.
Everyone who attended was extremely impressed with the event and the
team. A second event was an open evening to a service, for possible new
residents with their families and friends. The team thought of personal
touches to make people feel welcome, including homemade cake.
On both occasions the team showed their commitment to the people they
support and ability to involve and listen to people and involve people
really meaningfully. They have also promoted services run by Support for
Living in a very positive way.
Our May winner is Barbara McDonald
Barbara
who works at Victoria Road, has consistently supported individuals in a
way which is person-centred to enable them to have active involvement in
local and wider community and to maintain important relationships.
One example was supporting two people to use the local gym, which
required involvement of the local GP and an extensive programme with a
physiotherapist. She ensured that the rota could accommodate staff to be
matched to the individuals to make sure that their support is continued
after the Physiotherapist’s involvement.
Barbara supported four people to cook a mother’s day meal for all their
mothers, which all parties really enjoyed, and on another occasion
supported a person without family contacts, to hold a birthday meal for
all their friends.
If you wish to find out more about the process, and/or how to nominate a member of staff or staff team, please email Marianne.Selby-Boothroyd@supportforliving.org.uk.