To watch the recording from the day, which includes the speakers, slides and transcript of, please click here: https://bournemouth-ac-uk.zoom.us/rec/share/xOspxK7XO-6NReb0v7BdRMCZPOjqpgutnu1fGj3R1HTCPHnPWZxedt6sphOVXEiR.EacntiXfPmorPmML

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Welcome everyone to our Leadership Conference.
I am so excited to share the full programme with you now and proud to say that we have a diverse line-up that will share expertise across Health and Social Sciences.

Our workshops run throughout the day and you can already decide which one you want to join – you will be asked to self-select a Zoom meeting on the day. Have a look at our workshop descriptors  below, which will help you make your choice.

We will finish off the day with a panel discussion where we are going to address our Key Themes:

1. How do we manage leadership in a post Covid environment?
2. What happens if change is forced upon us?
3. Who did well and what were the differences?

The Golden Thread of Inclusive Leadership will run through the day and address opportunities for non-oppressive and anti-racist practice.

Our Panel members:

Jonathan Williams, Leadership trainer for Dorset Health University Foundation Trust
Philippa Geddes, Social Work England regional lead
Claire Medley, Team Manager for Integrated Safeguarding in Somerset Council
Jane Holroyd, Associate Lecturer at BU for Leadership units in Health and Social Care

I am looking forward to the event and excited to ‘meet’ you all!
Take care,
Tilia Lenz, Senior Lecturer and CPD Framework Lead for Social Sciences

Conference Timetable

Time	Speaker	Theme
10.00-10.15	Prof Lee-Ann Fenge	Welcome from the National Centre for Post Qualifying Social Work
10.15-11.00	Dr Neil Thompson	Keynote Speech- Authentic Leadership
11.00- 11.15	BREAK
Workshop A 11.15- 12.00	Femi David	Effective Leadership in Children’s Social Care
Workshop B 11.15- 12.00	Catherine Lynch	Challenges for Leadership in Health
Workshop C 12.00- 12.45	Dr Camila Devis-Rosental Susanne Clarke	Kindness and positive relational energies
Workshop D 12.00-12.45	Dr Neil Thompson	Authentic Leadership- Workshop
12.45-13.15	LUNCH
Workshop E 13.15-14.00	Dr Orlanda Harvey	Situational and Team Leadership
Workshop F 13.15-14.00	Tilia Lenz Louise Downes	Wellbeing and Performance
Workshop G 14.00- 14.45	Dr Lois Farquarson	Strategic Leadership in Health
Workshop H 14.00-14.45	Prof David Croisdale-Appleby	On being disruptive!
14.45-15.00	BREAK
15.00-15.45	Panel discussion	Key Themes – moderated by Tilia Lenz
15.45-16.00	Prof Lee-Ann Fenge	Closing words

A Workshop

Femi David: Leadership in Children’s Services

In this workshop, Femi will discuss the theme of leadership in Social Services. Local Authorities have the statutory duty to safeguard and promote welfare and their effectiveness is measured by the CQC and Ofsted. Although there are very many parallels across Health and Social Care inspections on leadership, this session will focus on Children’s Services.

Using Ofsted framework and guidance inspection services to evaluate overall effectiveness of local authorities’ children’s social care services, Femi’s research focuses on the third evaluation criterion: the impact of leaders on social work practice with children and families. His research is based on the assumption that overall effectiveness of the judgement of a local authority is likely to be influenced by significant evidence of the quality of professional practice and leadership.

The key question all participant are invited to explore: “is social work curriculum, training and practice prepares social workers to assume position of leadership in Social Services in UK?”

Femi David is a professional doctorate student at the School of Social Sciences, Cardiff University. He has been in the field of social work for 12 years as a frontline social worker and executive manager of a charity organisation that works with BAME, people with ‘no recourse to public fund’ and alleviating food poverty in South Wales.

B Workshop

Catherine Lynch: Effective digital Communication for leaders

As the world adjusts to a post covid environment, one of the key challenges for leaders, everywhere, is communication. With the exponential growth in the use of “new media,” new mediums for how we communicate our messages are emerging daily.

Catherine Lynch is the programme leader for the Master’s in Advancing Professional Practice at the University of West London and teaches across a variety of leadership and service improvement modules. Drawing on the feedback she has received from students in the past year, Catherine will showcase three applications (all highly evaluated by her students) which you can easily use in your professional role to improve the way in which you share your message with your staff/students/clients. “Visual communication isn’t just reserved for a few people. It’s becoming a really critical competency for everyone across most professions” (Perkins, 2021).

Three mini master-classes will give you the confidence and the skills to have a go yourself after the session. Discover how easy and quickly you can use artificial intelligence, graphics and design to create professional looking electronic resources (presentations, posters, videos, banners, social media pages and lots more) that will improve your communication with your staff/student/client groups. This will be a very hands on, practical session, and a pre-session crib sheet will be available for anyone who wants to get set up in advance and follow the demonstration live and practice as we go.

C Workshop

Susanne Clarke and Dr Camila Devis-Rozental: Kindness and positive relational energy as leadership strengths

Susanne and Camila have published in the areas of socio-emotional intelligence, kindness in leadership and positive organisational scholarship. They are both passionate advocates in illuminating kindness as a leadership superpower.

The workshop will briefly introduce the science behind Kindness and Positive Relational Energy using research from their own studies and other leading scholars in the field.

Participants will be encouraged to explore these concepts through reflecting on their own lived experiences and how these traits have shaped their practice. As a strength based approach focusing on what works, the workshop will present the case for positive relational energy harnessing the ‘heliotropic effect’ – as a life giving source in organisations, ‘moving us towards the light’ something we can learn from most other living organisms.

Stories and examples will bring the ‘heliotropic effect’ to life as we engage together in exploring how these prosocial behaviours shape culture and positively impact on teams, with a final workshop goal to deliver a strong case for positive leadership as well as dispelling myths and concerns regarding positive leadership and its role in the real world and the daily challenges we face.

D Workshop

Neil Thompson: Authentic Leadership in Practice

In this workshop you will get the chance to have further discussion around Neil’s approach to authentic leadership and hear why he feels leadership is so vitally important in today’s pressurised workplaces.

Much of Neil’s work these days is around workplace well-being and the challenges of immense pressures in people’s working lives. He regards effective leadership as key to making sure that staff are able to not only survive, but actually thrive. He regards all professionals as having a part to play in developing effective authentic forms of leadership that create and sustain a genuine culture of well-being that enables staff and managers to flourish.

There are no easy answers but there are ways we can support one another to produce more user-friendly workplaces by promoting authentic leadership.

Neil Thompson is an independent writer, educator and adviser and a visiting professor at the Open University. His website, with free learning resources, is at www.NeilThompson.info. His recent books include Anti-racism for Beginners and The Spirituality and Religion Practice Manual (with Bernard Moss).  

E Workshop

Dr Orlanda Harvey: Situational Leadership

There is a saying that when people resign, often they are leaving their manager and not the organisation. Although this is not always the case, I believe that when people have leaders that they believe are trustworthy, authentic and empathetic who focus on creating a strong collaborative team culture then their teams are more likely to be highly motivated and engaged.

This is a practically based session, that explores a well-known and useful leadership model: Situational Leadership which was developed by Paul Hershey and Ken Blanchard. The model asks leaders to analyse the needs of a situation then adopt the most appropriate leadership style. The model also acknowledges that many leaders have a preferred approach and asks them to consider how they might adapt to the situations of their colleagues. This session will introduce the model and allow participants to reflect on their own styles and the current situations for team members.

Orlanda has a background in leadership and management development, and have worked in both the private and public sector as a learning and development professional and is now a lecturer at BU on the BA/MA Social Work courses and CPD leadership units.

F Workshop

Tilia Lenz and Louise Downes: The impact of Wellbeing and Resilience on Performance

Neoliberal structures of the welfare state have led to Social Workers and allied professions to work in ‘squeezed’ environments with ever increasing workloads and administrative requirements to evidence compliance and performance. As practitioners we are also required to empathically engage with vulnerable and disadvantaged members of society, exposed to narratives of distress, abuse and trauma.

In this workshop Tilia and Louise will explore the interlink of wellbeing, resilience and performance and what this means for organisations in Health and Social Care. They will share their research on Vicarious Trauma and its impact on Social Work practice and use appreciative enquiry to engage participants to take this further and explore what the key ingredients are for a supportive relationship between the manager and the practitioner.

In this interactive workshop questions what the terms wellbeing, resilience and performance really mean in practice will be raised. Tools how individuals can identify specific areas where their wellbeing can be improved to achieve greater performance.

Tilia Lenz is a registered Social Worker and has 15 years of frontline experience in Children’s Services as a practitioner and manager. She is now a Senior Lecturer for Social Work and CPD Framework lead.

Louise Downes is a Social Worker at Wiltshire Council and Lecturer Practitioner Consultant for the Pan-Dorset& Wiltshire Teaching Partnership. She has a long-standing practice career in Adult Services and is now engaged with Organisational Development through Practice Education.

G Workshop

Dr Lois Farguharson: Strategic Leadership in Health Workshop

Strategy is complex. Thought leaders have created frameworks designed to help leaders develop their own strategies at an abstract level. However, the reality is that strategy succeeds or fails based on how well leaders at every level of an organisation integrate strategic thinking into their day-to-day operations. Therefore, it could be argued that it is less about complexity and more about practical focus – where the rubber meets the road.

Lois will discuss the value and impact of strategic leadership with particular emphasis on the challenges that face strategic leaders working in integrated health and social care settings where collaboration and partnership is critical to success, as well as the future strategic leadership competencies and behaviours that will be needed to achieve sustainability and innovation in the health and social care context. As a CMI Chartered Manager, an CIPD Academic Fellow and as Executive Dean of Bournemouth University Business School, Lois has a strong commitment to supporting and developing leaders working in increasingly challenging environments where strategy and practice collide.

H Workshop

Prof David Croisdale-Appleby: Being Disruptive

David will offer insights into our responsibilities and opportunities to be ‘more disruptive’: to change organisational cultures, policies and practice in the changing landscape of health and social care, and the achievement of better health outcomes, the reduction in health inequalities and the improvement in wellbeing.

When it comes to strategic disruption of professional practice, such as the relationship basis which social workers and patient-facing health and care staff have at the core of their professional practice, “disruption” means innovative thinking which is developed into a new and different way of achieving the desired results or outcomes.

This is essential because pre-, during- and inevitably post-pandemic, it has become clear that our health and social care system cannot cope with the demands made upon it in both exceptional and more-normal times. The constant raising of eligibility thresholds (because it is a rationed system) for receiving health and care interventions has now caused the additional, entirely foreseeable problem that we now face unlimited waiting lists of patients whose conditions have worsened as a direct consequence of the unavailability of diagnosis and treatment, and consequently have need of greater amounts of treatment. A perfect storm!

So, more of the same simply won’t work. We need innovation, but especially we need game-changing disruption to our existing, time-honoured pathways of identification, diagnosis, treatment, prognosis and resolution.

If you are yet to register for the event, please do so at: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/the-national-centre-for-post-qualifying-social-work-leadership-conference-tickets-170018731603