Communication

In 2018, SCLU completed a consultation with other care leavers to see what support and communication they get from their Personal Advisors (PA's). Some of the questions we asked included "How often do you see or hear from your PA?", "How quickly does your PA return your phonecalls?" and "What is the best way for your PA to contact you?".

We collated all the results and developed a PowerPoint presentation which we shared with PA's and their managers. 

Within the presentation we identified some really good practice and also some issues which care leavers have had. At the end of the presentation we shared some of our ideas about how communication could improve. These included:

-PA's returning phone calls quicker and and for the service to have a specific timescale for this that can be monitored,

-For the Leaving Care Service to have a freephone number that all Care Leaver’s know so that even if you have no data or credit care leavers can still get in touch with their PA,

-Workers to always tell care leavers when they are going to be on holiday before they go,

-For all workers including managers to make sure they return calls and let care leavers know when there are staffing/structural changes,

-To make sure that all care leavers know who their PA’s manager is,

-For there to be consistency in systems and processes so that everyone gets the same treatment,

-For workers to be available after 5pm.

The feedback from the presentation was really positive and we are hoping that the Leaving Care Service use our ideas to make some changes which will mean that communication improves for all Sheffield care leavers.