What I want my social worker to do
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Knowledge
As my social worker, I want you to:
- Know how I communicate
- Be friendly, kind and get to know me
- Provide easy to read information about money, housing, support and other things that I may need to make decisions about
- Understand that things can change
- Think about how you give me difficult information.
Skills and Intervention
As my social worker, I want you to:
- Use simple language
- Prepare for visits
- Think about using activities to help me communicate
- Take the time to visit me, listen to me and understand how I express my feelings
- Stick to what we’ve agreed and let me know if anything needs to change
- Help me to make my own decisions - bring information that I can understand with you.
How you treat me (Values, ethics and personal behaviours)
As my social worker, I want you to:
- Ask me, do not tell me
- Focus on what I can do
- Treat me as an equal
- Support me to make choices for myself
- Respect my privacy- do not share information about me without my permission
- Keep in touch, tell me what is happening next
- Tell me why if my social worker is changing
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What I do not want my social worker to do
Personal behaviours (How you treat me)
As my social worker, I don’t want you to:
- Waste my time
- Be late, not turn up or cancel appointments with me
- Be mean or rush me
- Assume I am ok, ask me
- Say one thing but do another
- Make promises you cannot keep
- Ignore me
- Make decisions for me
- Focus on my diagnosis only
- Judge me
- Ignore my behaviour or feelings.
Knowledge
As my social worker, I don’t want you to:
- Forget to bring information or give me the wrong information
- Turn up knowing nothing about me
- Patronise me or talk to others about me first
- Keep changing my social worker.
Skills and Intervention
As my social worker, I don’t want you to:
- Just get your laptop when you visit me, have a conversation first
- Rush your visit or make me feel like I am wasting your time, or that I am not important to you
- Look at your watch all the time or keep checking your mobile phone.