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A new multi-agency team development programme is breaking down barriers to successful collaboration. Angela Spencer reports.
It’s three in the afternoon and the community police officer, senior youth worker and headteacher are meeting in the head’s office to discuss plans for an after school club.
Having arrested a student earlier in the day, the officer wants to know how the youngsters will be kept under control. In fact, he wants to be present to keep an eye on security, health and safety and the upholding of the law.
The youth worker is on the defensive. She believes the whole point of the club is to try something new for the school in allowing young people to design, organise and run their own activities. If it’s heavily supervised by adults, the point is lost.
The hard-pressed head remains unconvinced of any educational benefit and grows impatient on hearing a list of students’ demands. Her authoritarian approach offends the professionalism of the youth worker and the meeting grinds to a shuddering halt.
Fortunately, the above is not an account of a real meeting but of a hypothetical scenario enacted by members of a forum theatre group as part of a new NCSL Multi-Agency Team Development (MATD) Programme currently being rolled out nationally.
The programme, designed by NCSL and consultants from a mix of agencies, aims to help multi-agency teams address the challenges they face in delivering the Every Child Matters (ECM) agenda and developing Extended Schools.
It’s open to professionals from all sectors working with children, including voluntary and community sector members. Teams must include representatives from at least three statutory government agencies, plus one member of an extended school leadership team.
By providing a professionally safe and respectful environment in which they can share ideas information, knowledge and experience, assisted by facilitators from multi-agency backgrounds, the programme moulds team cohesion to build ‘collaborative advantage’.
It’s being delivered across eight of the nine government office regions by four providers and evaluated by Sheffield Hallam University.
Today’s interactive theatre ‘audience’ is a mix of education, health and social care professionals gathered at provider Brathay’s HQ in the Lake District for an MATD ‘taster’ day.
Having been invited to stop the actors at any time, rewind the ‘play’ and give new direction, they interject with constructive feedback for the characters about being more mindful of the concerns and responsibilities of other members of the team, more respectful of one another’s professional status and more aware of how their own use of language, jargon and body language can alienate those with whom they seek to collaborate.
The ‘rewound’ scenario provides a happier ending in that the headteacher listens, the police officer doesn’t let the arrest influence his approach to the after school club and the youth worker agrees to consider the idea of sixth formers and volunteer parents being trained in security and health and safety to ensure the safe running of the club.
Delegates reflect on how such small adjustments to their own way of thinking and behaving might effect similarly positive outcomes in projects with which they are involved.
“In the car on the way home I thought about how I might have behaved in a meeting like that and how I could behave more effectively in the future,” said Nicola Jackson, Commissioning Project Manager, Cumbria Children’s Centre Board.
“In ordinary team meetings when you’re dealing with live situations it isn’t always possible to hold a mirror up to yourself and others in that way. I’m convinced that taking time out to have a closer look is incredibly useful in helping overcome the barriers to multi-agency working.”
Forum theatre is just one part of MATD, a six-month programme which places emphasis on this ‘experiential’ approach to learning. It’s a process-based programme that takes the team on a journey: it’s not about teaching content, though research and theory is used to support the process.
Delegates at the taster day were also given a flavour of another simple but compelling element – a facilitated group conversation in which every member is invited to recount a typical day in their professional life in order to increase other team members’ understanding of their background, responsibilities, passions and motivations.
“It’s amazing how powerful such tools can be”, said Nicola, whose board of 13, including senior officers from the County Council’s Children’s Services directorate, Job Centre Plus, Primary Care Trust (PCT), NCH, Barnado’s and other providers, is the first team in the UK to go through MATD Programme.
“While our team is new, most of the people on it have a history working in children’s services in the region, so many of us already know each other to some extent. Nevertheless, by the end of the second day we could see how we had already begun to move forward as a team.
“Thanks to the facilitated events, issues that may have bubbled away beneath the surface have arisen and been addressed together. We have been able to offload our historical baggage and have developed a shared vision and objectives enabling us to work more quickly and effectively.”
Cumbria Children’s Centre Board, now three quarters of the way through the programme, is so convinced of its ability to build cohesion that it is already working with Brathay to organise further MATD programmes for frontline practitioners within children’s centres and extended services.
One taster day delegate said: “The programme has some very refreshing approaches and provides a lot of insight into how individual behaviours impact on a team’s effectiveness. For me the best part of the whole thing is that it is grounded in practicality – there isn’t a Powerpoint in sight.” ldr
Next steps:
www.ncsl.org.uk/programmes/matd
or email phil.fisher@ncsl.org.uk
www.ncsl.org.uk/programmes/npqicl |
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