Website of interest - Skills for Care and how they support people employing their own PA / Care worker.

Skills for Care - Working with individuals who employ their own care and support

The role of Skills for Care is to ensure that the adult social care workforce has the skills and qualifications to deliver high quality social care.

We work closely with thousands of social care employers, people who use services, carers and other key stakeholders to develop tools and resources that meet the needs of the sector in terms of workforce development - building the skills of their employees.

We also inform and advise government on the workforce and skills requirements to meet the challenges that face social care in the future as we move towards more personalised services.

How can skills for care help?

We know that being an employer and manager in the social care sector is complicated. To support you with some of the most challenging elements we've put together a collection of Skills for Care products to help you.

§  A quick guide for new managers employing their own staff using direct payments of individual budgets is available.

§  offer to individuals who employ their own care and support staff

Recruiting your staff

§  A toolkit to help people employ their own personal assistants is available.

§  It's designed to help you deal with the basic issues and legalities of employing your own staff. For example; writing the job description, interviewing and making sure you have the right insurance.

Inducting your staff

§  Induction is the first piece of learning a worker undertakes, it is the first step in training and developing your staff to ensure that they provide you with high quality care and support.

§  The Common Induction Standards set out the first things your staff need to know and guides are available to support both you and your staff through the first 12 weeks.

§  Information on inducting your personal assistants is available.

Making sure your staff have the right skills

§  Skills for Care is developing a whole range of new qualifications with the aim of making it easier to select training and qualifications that are most relevant to the job that they do. Training helps to ensure that staff are able to do their job well and safely, are confident and have a sense of achievement in their work. Staff who are trained feel valued and are more likely to stay in the job.

§  Information on the new Health and Social Care Diplomas is available here: Qualifications & Credit Framework (QCF)

Choosing training and getting funding

§  When you have identified the skills your staff need, the next thing to do is to select a training provider to deliver them. The Care Training Codes; A guide for individuals has been designed to help anyone who may need to buy in training for their own staff, such as a personal assistant or supporter. The code provides an overview of the questions and issues that should be considered when purchasing training and development.

§  There are various sources of support to help pay for training. Skills for Care provides funding called Training Strategy Implementation (TSI) funding. We have also put together a guide on other available funding and resources.

Influencing the decision makers

§  As a social care employer and a user of social care services it is important that you have the opportunity to influence government decisions on policy and funding. The National Minimum Data Set for Social Care (NMDS-SC) is a way of providing information about you and your staff which enables Skills for Care to do just that. For more information and to register visit NMDS-SC.

Peer support and shared learning
The Individual employers as managers project found that peer support and shared learning is very important in supporting individual employers. This was one of the many things Skills for Care learnt while working with individual employers in the development of their knowledge and skills as managers. Skills for Care has shared the findings to help encourage and support further networking.

http://www.skillsforcare.org.uk/about_us/what_we_do/Direct_employer_offer.aspx