National support work summits
Te Pou is working to develop a comprehensive profile of the support worker role and create a picture of the emerging development of this key workforce group.
National support work summits were held in September 2007 and March 2009. The summits were designed and run in collaboration between Platform, Te Pou and the Ministry of Health.
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National support work summit 2009
The national support work summit held in March 2009 provided the opportunity for some 130 support workers, sector leaders, ITOs and education providers to participate in a number of workshops and create discussion about the workforce opportunities and challenges for the role of support work in Aotearoa.
Group workshops explored the type of information mechanisms that could be established to keep support workers connected, informed and be an accessible workforce group. A national website, Aotearoa Mental Health and Addiction Support Workers, was established during the summit and many attendees took the opportunity to join up.
Over 40 topics were held as conversations through Open Space Technology. Harrison Owen and summit attendees identified the following key themes to inform future workforce development:
- training development and supervision
- national body for support workers
- registration for the role of support work
- pay and recognition
- service access and development.
All workshop information collected at the summit is available at the Aotearoa Mental Health and Addiction Support Workers website (sign in required).
National support work summit 2007
In September 2007 120 support workers from throughout the country gathered in Wellington. Participants included educators, DHB funders, the ITO Careerforce, NGO managers and leaders, union representatives and workforce centre representatives.
The results of the Platform NGOit 2007 Workforce Survey were presented. The report is an important snapshot of the NGO workforce and the contribution of support workers across the key support roles of community support work, residential support work and the employment facilitator and emerging peer support work roles within the sector.
The core of the conference was designed on 60 'Most significant change' interviews. Trained and selected support workers interviewed other support workers, service users and tangata whaiora, family field workers, family members and managers in a range of settings across the country. The interviews captured the essence of the difference that support work and support workers make every day. The stories were used as a basis for identifying the key outcomes of support work, the critical challenges and significant areas for improvement to move support work forward.
The findings of the summit were published in the Performance Story Report, which combines programme logic and stories of significant change to describe the progress and performance of support work using multiple voices and multiple lines of evidence. Vignettes from the report are available on the Platform website.
Further information
For more information please contact David Bradley, project lead NGO workforce development.
Page last updated: 11 March 2010