Strategy for working with Gloucestershire Voluntary ... · At an event on 6 December 2017 at the...

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Strategy for working with Gloucestershire Voluntary,

Community and Social Enterprise Sector and VCS

Alliance Consultation Document January 2018

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Foreword

This co-produced strategy sets out the role and opportunities of working with the Voluntary, Community and Social Enterprise (VCSE) sector and its Alliance to improve the health, wellbeing and care outcomes for the population of Gloucestershire. The strategy also identifies and describes the challenges and opportunities to realise the potential of the sector to contribute to these outcomes.

The strategy also provides options for policy and practice changes to address challenges and maximise opportunities, supported by an agreed action plan with recommendations.

This strategy builds upon the priorities set out within the Gloucestershire Sustainability and Transformation Plan (STP) which includes:

Placing greater emphasis on prevention of illness and self-care with investment to support it

Providing more joined up care and support in people’s homes and in the community Developing a sustainable workforce Making the most of new technologies

Our journey to fully engage and make best use of VCSE and statutory organisations can be best described as a ‘Road Map’ broken down into six components:

1. Understanding Commissioning 2. Shared Training/Resources 3. Volunteering 4. Expertise 5. Partnerships 6. Co-Developing Services

You will see the questions, responses and proposed solutions within this strategy framed around these five components.

The purpose of this document is to ensure that we have captured all the input from the engagement with VCSE and statutory organisations, and to check that our proposed solutions match your expectations.

This document and the supporting questionnaire is for anyone with an interest in these area. Even if you were not there on the engagement days, we would be interested in hearing your feedback on the approach detailed below. Feel free to share this with anyone that may be able to support this strategy.

This is your opportunity to communicate your thoughts, concerns or additional solutions to the issues outlined below.

Emma Savage Associate Director of Clinical Programmes (Self-care, Prevention and Diabetes)

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Contents Introduction ....................................................................................................................................... 4

Outcomes ............................................................................................................................................ 7

Summary of Sessions ...................................................................................................................... 8

Session A: Understanding Commissioning ........................................................................ 8

Session B: Shared Training and Recourses ....................................................................... 9

Session C: Volunteering ......................................................................................................... 11

Session D: Unlocking Expertise .......................................................................................... 11

Session E: Partnerships ......................................................................................................... 13

Session F: Co-Development of Services ........................................................................... 14

Next steps ......................................................................................................................................... 16

Appendix A Questions for Facilitators .................................................................................. 17

Appendix B Full Write Up of Sessions ................................................................................... 19

Appendix C Question and Answer session .......................................................................... 25

Appendix D Roadmap .................................................................................................................. 26

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Introduction The role of the VCSE sector can best be described in the diagram below, which operates across two functions, both supporting an individual and supporting the system. The purpose of this strategy is to describe how the VCSE sector and its Alliance can support the VCSE system, who in turn then support an individual.

The VCS Alliance provides a voice for the VCSE in Gloucestershire, acting as a conduit between the VCSE and public/statutory sector. The Alliance works with the Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG), Gloucestershire County Council (GCC), Local Enterprise Partnership (LEP) and Office of the Police and Crime Commissioner (OPCC) to support engagement and partnership working. It enables an information exchange and conduit between the wider Gloucestershire stakeholder partnership and individual VCSE providers. Gloucestershire has a history of working well together across its range of stakeholders. With the creation of the STP in 2016, an Enabling Active Communities Group was created, of which the VCSE Alliance is an active member. It was thoughts and ideas created from this group, that has had a large influence upon this strategy. Our vision

With a growing population and more complex needs, we need a different way of thinking. We cannot rely solely on public services. Prevention, helping people to take more control over their health and neighbourhoods and building up sources of community support has never been more important. We are not starting from scratch, as we already have high levels of community action and strong and dynamic partnerships. This strategy puts an emphasis on ‘Place’ rather than ‘Services’ – a wide partnership at a local level to bring together sources of community support and action. Ambitions: what are we working towards?

Supporting people to look after themselves and each other in a collective

way

Communities involved in co-designing better health and social care

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Using the talent, reach and social value of VCSE organisations for the

benefit of people in Gloucestershire

Seeking opportunities to generate external income through a VCSE, health

and social care partnership

Commitments: what have we agreed to do? Develop a new way of working together in order to meet the challenges our

community face, this strategy details how we will do this

Engage people and communities in new and different ways of doing things

Work within each other’s organisations to share learning and develop

solutions

Share good practice between VCSE and statutory sectors

Partnership working to enable more effective and efficient use of local

resources

Listening to and learning from stakeholders

In August 2017, the Enabling Active Communities Group spent some time in a ‘World Café’ style workshop responding to the three questions below. The participants comprised of representatives from District Councils, GCC, CCG, Public Health England, Police and Crime Commissioner, Create Gloucestershire, Barnwood Trust, VCS Alliance and the Association of Parish & Town Councils:

What is working well that we need to build on?

What do we need to do differently or start doing that we are not doing now?

What should the future commissioning practice look like?

A summary of the responses to these three questions are summarised below: What is working well that we need to build on?

VCSE speak the language of their communities A well-developed VCSE which is diverse/linked to grass roots/know their

communities/understand assets VCSE Alliance is a good conduit to VCSE sector Visibly offer opportunities

What do we need to do differently or start doing that we are not doing now?

Create opportunities for commissioners to work directly with VCSE organisations

Expand STP Organisational Development Plan to include VCSE sector Ensure strategy is fed down to frontline staff VCS Alliance providing the development of partnerships regarding

upcoming opportunities Need to understand capabilities and capacity of VCSE sector Creating training opportunities for VCSE organisations

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Develop VCSE in an advisory role VCSE Alliance to be a portal for PLACE based procurements

What should the future commissioning practice look like?

Draw on national policies/research so we do not re-invent the wheel Agree long term nature of grants enabling longevity of “projects” leading to

sustainability Promotion/training with VCSE so we all really understand the

commissioning process to empower the sector Commissioning where a need is identified rather than simply giving grants Exploring exciting partnership models where VCSE/statutory are working

genuinely side by side Looking at alliance based commissioning/framework commissioning –

how do you commission a system to support a pathway rather than simply commissioning a service?

VCSE Feedback to Build into Strategy - 3 Years

At an event on 6 December 2017 at the Farmers Club, Gloucester, we presented the draft public sector part of the VCSE Engagement Strategy and Roadmap. The purpose of the event was to get a VCSE perspective on how the 3 year strategy should look and what practically can be done to support better VCSE / public sector engagement.

The event generated a lot of useful conversations and suggestions on how to take the strategy forward. This document contains a summary of the World Café workshops that took place as well as the full write up of the sessions. The next steps are to write this feedback into the strategy and then send it out to the VCSE for final comment. The completed strategy will then be presented to the Enabling Active Communities Board for sign off in February.

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Outcomes

Public Sector and the VCSE working more closely together to support people to live healthier lives

Utilising the reach, talent and social value of the VCSE to support policy development and the design of services

Better, more visible engagement between Public Sector, its partners and VCSE providers

Services co-designed and developed in partnership with VCSE that best serve the population and based on identified need

Making use of VCSE expertise and reach in order to support the most vulnerable and ‘hard to reach’ people within communities

Using premises and buildings within communities to deliver health and wellbeing services locally

Gaps in provision identified, communicated to partners and supported Training opportunities, skills and knowledge made available and promoted to

the VCSE and vice versa – from private sector, VCSE providers to the CCG and its partners

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Summary of Sessions

Session A: Understanding Commissioning

Issue identified Proposed Solution Resources Needed/Lead

ProContract doesn’t provide information in a user friendly/accessible format – smaller organisations are not aware of it and most do not use it.

The VCS Alliance will take information from this portal and send it out through our communication platforms. We will link this information to our online forums to create an online platform for partnership working and information sharing.

VCS Alliance Newsletter.

Twitter feed, VCS Alliance

Website. Online forums to be

developed. Funding bulletin

Partnership bids should be encouraged and weighted favourably. Partnerships, relationships and trust take a long time to develop. Local organisations with local knowledge should be considered favourably in commissioning processes.

Partnerships should be genuine and based on shared ethos, a real desire to work together and developed for the benefit of the end user– not quickly pulled together to influence the bid. The VCS Alliance will support events, networking sessions and information sharing solutions to support the development of relationships/ partnerships and consortia working. Public sector review the procurement to look at local organisations and partnership bids being favourably considered.

Bespoke events for public sector work streams and commissioning opportunities

Forums redeveloped and where needed, established to support specific areas of work

Online networking encouraged through forum development

Online information sharing/Q&A and chat functions established via Alliance website.

Consultation is not seen as meaningful or locally based. Often consulting the VCSE feels like going through the motions rather than genuinely

Consultation needs to be carried out at an early a stage as possible. An initial scoping event would support public sector to develop its plans based on evidence

Planning events at design stage conducted by public sector and supported by VCS Alliance

‘Innovation labs’ set up looking at holistic

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looking for innovation and solutions.

and ideas from the VCSE delivering services on the ground.

approaches to solutions

Create awareness of new workstreams and possible ideas through VCS Alliance communications platforms.

Other Comments:

Online Q&A sessions, web chats and webinars could be introduced to explain new opportunities. Live chats with commissioners would be a good time effective way of providing a two way dialogue.

Simplify process – application formats and number of questions Provide bid writing training opportunities for voluntary organisations Provide weighting for local services that have local knowledge/

relationships with national providers

If this session related to you or you would like to provide a comment, please click this link to provide feedback https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/3HR78VM

Session B: Shared Training and Recourses

Issue Identified Proposed Solution

Resources Needed

Training available is not coherently promoted – we need a cohesive training programme for the VCSE

We need to pool all training into a central location and push the information out to the VCSE in a way that is inclusive of all sectors and training available. This must include public sector training.

Cross sector training portfolio created and promoted using user generated content and promoted via bulletin and website.

There is a lack of a coherent ‘offer’ from the VCSE and smaller groups are not able to market their services effectively.

Marketplace of organisations ‘selling’ services and training could be used to demonstrate what the VCSE does and what is on offer. The VCS Alliance to host this on

Develop a VCSE ‘marketplace’. Create a RSS driven portal pulling information from partner sites into one online location.

A bi-weekly bulletin produced and

https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/3HR78VM

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our website and training calendar.

mailed out to the sector.

There are few opportunities for cross sector training available – public sector not attending VCSE training and VCSE not attending/accessing public sector training

The VCSE needs to benefit more from public sector training and know what is available through the private sector.

Promote the training portfolio and training newsletter to the public, private and VCSE sectors.

Set up logins for all providers

Organisations do not have capacity or resources to commit staff to training days. Training is often expensive and resource hungry.

Innovative approached to training need to be considered – webinars, online training portfolios and staff development tools could be better utilised. Not all organisations have the capacity to have staff out the office – training needs to be flexible and web based where appropriate.

Promote GCC online training

Look at online training available and look to harness for the sector

Work with private sector and LEP to look at innovative approaches to learning and development.

Promote and develop use of conference calling, Skype and webinars

Other Comments:

Cost of training is very high – prohibitively so for some. Geography of the county needs to be taken into consideration Non commissioned organisations do not get invited to public sector

training Lack of in-service training availability to meet requirements (dementia) Training often happens on a word-of-mouth basis – what one organisation

knows another organisation is offering (but not formalised or recorded) Training needs analysis to be conducted within the VCSE A certain number of places need to be set aside for all sectors e.g. VCSE

places made available on public sector training and vice versa Social value to be attached to training when tenders are prepared Skills share workshops Tiered costing system (MIND do this in Wiltshire)



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Session C: Volunteering

Issue Identified Proposed Solution Resources Needed Shortfall in professional services available in the volunteer market, Inc. HR, ICT, Finance and Marketing

Encourage more current professionals with required skills to volunteer their time. Especially around clinical governance

Create working model with CCG to support their volunteer ‘offer’ and utilise this resource in an impactful way.

The most difficult roles to recruit volunteers for are trustees. It was felt there is a general lack of awareness around what is involved

Work with volunteer brokers, Volunteer Glos, FVAF etc. to support organisations to recruit volunteers. Get more people into the volunteer market to reduce the reliance on individuals

Promote and if needed develop support for organisations looking to develop role descriptions for volunteers.

Identify and promote volunteer brokerages available in the county

Develop innovative models of volunteering that encourage younger people into the market

Difficulty in recruiting user-led volunteers, those with lived experience and those with knowledge of clinical governance.

Look at existing frameworks, Trussell Trust and Cinnamon Network. Build clinical governance into the proposed model for CCG staff.

Look at using the learning from existing successful programmes

Model to be developed with the CCG


Session D: Unlocking Expertise

Issue Identified Proposed Solution Resources Needed


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Partnership boards can be useful but not always effective and rarely a priority. Useful conversations take place but it’s not cost effective.

Use video link, Skype/GoToMeeting to ensure wider engagement and keep costs low.

Debate unlocks expertise – use technology to facilitate debate rather than physical meetings.

Provide a 1 off day of partnership meetings so people can block it out of their diaries and only travel to one location.

GoToMeeting login – training people to use this tech effectively.

Establish and promote online discussion forums to create debate and unlock expertise.

Hold a trial of multiple meetings covering multiple topics over 1 day.

VCSE not feeding into public sector meetings or influencing policy and work streams.

To have teeth as VCS, need a group to influence.

Consultation needs to be relevant, not tokenistic

Targeted information/agendas needed and needed early. Create email groups and online discussions around specific work areas.

Better use of Survey Monkey for quick fire queries, this will also allow service users to feed in too.

Online forums and promotion of those forums. Email groups established to provide targeted information to specific groups.

Better utilisation of Survey Monkey.

CCG/GCC could fund umbrella organisations to organise VCSE events with their own agenda and invite CCG/GCC to attend – could run events in partnership.

More of a requirement for agendas to be shared beforehand so we have time to think and shape response

Intentions are good – but time and money = VCSE orgs cannot attend

Specialist forums established, with time before public sector meetings to debate and produce a VCSE perspective.

Money for intelligence – funding to support VCSE organisations to attend – time to attend and time to prepare reports etc

Set % VCSE representation in Terms of Reference of boards

Establish specialist forums to work alongside public sector work streams. Money to be made available for the VCSE to provide this feed in and intelligence.

Agendas produced and sent out much earlier to support the VCSE to be able to provide comment.

Co-location – exchange ideas and offers when in same room and talk

Look at VCSE sharing office space and back office functions

Produce research and strategy around what VCSE needs to do this

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effectively and what resources are available.

Public sector need to lead by example in working together and culture for co-production

Better promotion of ‘One Glos’ and the work it carries out. Use the HWB forum as a sounding board for EAC and to gather VCSE feedback on EAC work.

HWB Forum. VCS Alliance communication platforms.

If this session related to you or you would like to provide a comment, please click this link to provide feedback https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/3HR78VM.

Session E: Partnerships

Issue Identified Proposed Solution Resources Needed Smaller organisations focus on day to day survival. Sustainability of small VCSE organisations is a challenge.

Offer less resource hungry ways of keeping up to date about public sector activities.

Create innovative approached to partnership development that do not require lots of resource.

Innovative approach to keep the sector informed and connected.

Online forums Email groups Skype conferencing Live chats/Q&A with

commissioners Video conferencing

and recording presentations to allow smaller groups to access same information

Need to share confidential information with potential competitors. Partnership development takes time and doesn’t always work. Have to be able to walk away. Small organisations don’t have the time.

Non Disclosure Agreements (NDA) need to be introduced so that organisations competing with one another are able & willing to share information that could be commercially sensitive. Partnerships are difficult to broker in a competitive ‘non-trusting’ environment’.

NDA produced


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Larger organisations work with public sector, small ones do not.

Promote umbrella bodies to smaller groups so they are empowered and aligned with public sector priorities.

Promote Cultural Commissioning Programme and other grant based programmes to smaller organisations.

Funding bulletin to focus on public sector grant programmes. Use bulletin to promote umbrella organisations (Create Glos, Active Glos, Young Glos) they will be able to support partnership development within their sectors.


Session F: Co-Development of Services

Issue Identified Proposed Solution Resources Needed Feeling of a power imbalance between the VCSE and Public Sector – a more even relationship needs to be brokered.

This can be achieved through point C of the roadmap with public sector staff volunteering time in the VCSE.

Volunteering model with CCG established.

VCSE unaware of who is responsible for what within the public sector. One Gloucestershire not fully understood and who holds which portfolio

Organisation chart of commissioning portfolios would be really useful so that VCSE know who is responsible for what

Cross organisations commissioning chart produced showing responsibilities and portfolios held.

Lack of consistency amongst commissioners regarding how they view the VCSE and its value. Commissioning processes need to change to value local VCSE organisations.

Commissioners meeting VCSE providers – getting to know them and understanding needs of communities. VCS Alliance to put on regular events providing direct access to commissioners. VCS Alliance to broker volunteering opportunities between the VCSE and CCG.

Regular events covering various aspects of public sector delivery established.

Online chat facility set up and promoted.

Encourage commissioners to get involved in online conversations and forums.


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VCS Alliance to showcase the value, quality and breadth of VCSE groups at the annual conference.

VCS Alliance to establish live web chats with commissioners and online Q&A sessions.

Funders have duty to get together to share intentions. Make clearer what is being funded and how this is being done and ensure consistency

VCS Alliance to create a Funders’ Forum. The purpose of this forum is to bring together all parties that contribute to the funding of the VCSE sector and support them in making funding/ commissioning decisions. We want to provide a mechanism for funders to come together to look strategically at the VCSE funding and work together to improve the way money is invested in the sector.

Funders’ forum created with buy-in from local, regional and national funders with an interest in funding Gloucestershire Projects, Commissioners from GCC, CCG, and OPCC, District Councils that provide community grants, GFirst LEP, Philanthropist and legacy funds.

Other comments:

Building Circles in Gloucestershire example – good relationships with commissioners – commissioners taking a longer term view which has led to service being co-developed with good outcomes

Feedback that commissioners feel like ‘boss’ – would be good if we felt as though we are on the same level

Women’s centre – invite services into centre rather than service users having to go to multiple places/services – working with other VCSE organisations to fill gaps in provision – collaborative approach – good example

Element of risk – commissioners need appetite for some risk Play Gloucestershire – co-creating services – big local – being involved in

consultation – good examples of co-developing services (Public Health Nursing Consultation)

Developing services with individuals to develop their personal plans – housing, support housing, housing health etc – example of co-developing holistic plans.

Longer term view - making pilots longer to allow for impact to be demonstrated

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Women’s centre – co-commissioning service with CCG, Gloucestershire County Council, Housing, PCC, city council – good example of a co-developed service.

Longer term evaluations – Healthwatch example of feeding into dementia strategy


Next steps

Present the strategy to the EAC board in February for approval Email out the revised strategy to the VCSE seeking comment and feedback Set aside a day for one to one consultation with interested VCSE VCSE event to present the completed strategy and to demonstrate how we

have taken the strategy forward based on VCSE input.


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Appendix A Questions for Facilitators Understanding commissioning

o What do you understand of commissioning and how does it affect your organisation’s delivery?

o Where do you currently get information on commissioning from? o Is your knowledge of commissioning sufficient for you to access

opportunities if they are available to you? o What communication channels/mechanisms would be useful to you to

receive information about commissioning? Shared Training and Resources

o What training and resources have you identified as an organizational requirement?

o Do you work a training portfolio offered internally or externally? o How do you offer/promote training and resources? o How do you access training and resources? o What resources could your organisation offer? Office space, back office

functions, volunteer training, expertise? Volunteering

o Does your organisation use volunteers in any capacity? o How do you recruit volunteers? o How do you ensure your board has the right set of skills? o What skills do you currently require? o What would support you to successfully recruit volunteers?

Unlocking Expertise

o Does you think your organisation is able to feed into policy and influence decision-making?

o Would you be willing to offer your expertise if requested? o Are you aware of the public sector work streams and how you can get

involved in them? o Would you be supportive of attending focus groups and policy groups if

they were available? Partnership Development

o Does the VCSE feel able to willing to work in partnership with other providers? What are the obstacles to doing so effectively?

o Does collaboration impact on independents and how can we retain independence whilst delivering on collaborative projects?

o How can we effectively support the development meaningful partnerships? What tools or structures are needed?

o Do you feel willing and able to put together joint bids? What tools or structures are needed?

Co-development of Services

o Can we create an early response to policy and tenders and how and what would be a useful, impactful approach to achieving this?

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o Would orgs be willing to be a part of focus groups to support service design and what would be a useful format?

o Would you like to be a part of the commissioning process and do you feel you are able to effectively contribute to service design?

Strongest Messages

Market place – create a collective digital platform for VCSE organisations to promote and sell their services to produce a one stop shop to show case, promote and sell VCSE services. The aim of this would be to support the sector to become more sustainable and less reliant on Public Sector funding and grant funding

VCSE newsfeed – create a centralised digital portal for VCSE organisations to promote news and events – a front page for all VCSE activity regardless of size or function.

Training / resources portfolio – a pool of all training provided by, or useful to, the VCSE – a centralised cross sector exchange for all training relevant to the VCSE - this increased skill base will reduce the costs across agencies.

Volunteer brokerage with the CCG – create working model we can offer to public sector and businesses.

Better use of technology to support training and information provision. Live web chats, online forums, shared training directory, LinkedIn groups for VCSE and use of GoToMeeting and Skype. Build assets?

Funders’ forum to support commissioning and funding and to increase the investment into the Gloucestershire VCSE sector and deterring local agencies from competing against each other

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Appendix B Full Write Up of Sessions

A: Understanding commissioning

Consultation

Consultation in the design process for contract – awareness of community initiatives for H & SC taking time/ difficult to define until process is underway

Meaningful consultations – go to communities instead of expecting them to come to you

Consultation with VCS around tenders/contracts at design stage Provide weighting for local services that have local

knowledge/relationships with national providers

Bids/grant applications

Joint bids go to the top of the queue Allow more time for brokerage of joint/consortium bids Timescales need to be realistic Simplify process – application formats and number of questions Provide bid writing training opportunities for voluntary organisations

Communication Channels

Use ProContract but not popular Funding bulletin very popular Others – NCVO Funding Central

Other points made

Relationships between National VCS orgs and local VCS orgs can be positive

Commissioners work with providers to innovate be creative – but not competitively

Commissioners – rethink how you listen to VCSE Go after marketing budget not corporate social responsibility

B: Shared Training and Resources

Barriers

Cost of training Geography of the county needs to be taken into consideration Non commissioned organisations do not get invited to public sector

training Lack of in-service training availability to meet requirements (dementia)

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Training often happens just on a word-of-mouth basis – what one organisation knows another organisation is offering (but not formalised or recorded)

Lack of knowledge about what is available

Potential Solutions

Training needs analysis to be conducted within the VCSE (Alliance to do?) Alliance to compile a training resources directory/calendar (along the

lines of the commissioning calendar) which provides details of training available within the county (all sectors)

A certain number of places need to be set aside for all sectors e.g. VCSE places made available on public sector training and vice versa

All commissioned services should be held to account – county-wide must mean county-wide

Think cross-county e.g. what is available in neighbouring counties Think about what the corporate/private sector can provide The VCSE needs to be more proactive Social value to be attached to training when tenders are prepared Capacity building to upskill local Tutors Skills share workshops Membership of particular groups can provide benefits (e.g. County

Finance Group) Alliance to host Wikipedia style site with news/updates (who would be

responsible for this?) Tiered costing system (Mind do this in Wiltshire)

C: Volunteering

A high majority of people attending this session agreed that they do use volunteers within their organisation. Two groups had over 200 volunteers, whilst some only had one or two.

Volunteers were found via word of mouth, through infrastructure organisations and some came to the charity directly. Some recruitment issues were found with challenges in over complicated recruitment procedures especially for national charities.

So that organisations ensured they had the right set of skills on their boards, they would either undertake skills audit, or they would know this information through informal discussions, or through issues that arose which identified a shortfall of skills.

Most of the organisations I spoke with had a shortfall of trustees for their charities, these included people with skills including Finance, HR, Data Protection, IT and website, Evaluation, Marketing and Fundraising. Some had specific shortages around client representation/service user involvement and some around clinical governance.

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To help organisations to recruit volunteers more successfully, different ideas were discussed including job descriptions, clear expectations and boundaries on both sides, using existing frameworks such as The Trussell Trust and Cinnamon Network.

D: Unlocking Expertise

Capacity – partnership boards not a priority if something comes up or lots of work on

Use ‘go to’ meetings – videolink and Skype Using constituents, not just staff – facilitating service users Some people go to partnership boards, but not sure how effective they are 1 off event – whole day for partnership board meetings Jockeying for position and gatekeeping Effective information to engage properly VCSA – Targeted information needed. Surprised at how many boards they

sit on. Work shadowing and mutual mentoring Build trust You need – right place, right time. Currently no coherent mechanism, so

tendency to go to usual suspects Debate unlocks expertise To have teeth as VCS, need a group to influence CCG/GCC could fund umbrella organisations to organise VCSE events with

their own agenda and invite CCG/GCC to attend – could run events in partnership

CCG staff coming out volunteering to lots of VCS groups and skills register If you just have a quick question could use Survey Monkey – could get

views of service users then too Co-location – exchange ideas and offers when in same room and talk Representation on EAC Gap is too big for small groups onto boards Set % VCSE representation in Terms of Reference of boards Value VCSE agenda and input Money for intelligence – funding to support VCSE organisations to attend

– time to attend and time to prepare reports etc More of a requirement for agendas to be shared beforehand so we have

time to think and shape response Intentions are good – but time and money = VCSE orgs cannot attend VCSE network wider to increase community voice Not aware of structures to influence VCSE groups should help shape and write agenda Different groups depending on agenda – need interest and expertise in

agenda topics Need representation at all levels VCSE has responsibility to unlock own expertise – website community

forum to share what we are doing Cost into bids the time to engage effectively

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Attend providers presentations – had to have 4 conversations with 4 different commissioners last year – all the same conversation

VCSE is better at sharing within than we think Gloucestershire Community Foundation do not have relationship with

public sector – should have joined up thinking and approach We all live in community – public sector, private sector, VCSE sector Relevant, not tokenistic Public sector need to lead by example in working together and culture for

co-production Specialist advisors, with time before meetings to debate

E: Partnership Development

What are the barriers?

Need to share confidential information with potential competitors Partnership development takes time and doesn’t always work. Have to be

able to walk away. Small organisations don’t have the time. Partnership is about signed documents and contracts. Starts from

building relationships. VCSE not good at learning from experiences, partly due to lack of time Each organisation needs to retain its independence and maintain their

way of working. Relationships are based on people. When key individual moves on, new

people may have a different agenda Smaller organisations focus on day to day survival. Sustainability of small

VCSE organisations is a challenge. Larger organisations work with public sector, small ones do not.

VCSE are united by issues not because they are VCSE organisation Lack of parity Commissioners don’t listen to VCSE early enough in process Lack of information sharing between public sector and VCSE. Lack of

trust. Public sector doesn’t always work in partnership with itself. VCSE organisations expected to meet public sector requirements, no

willingness to meet half way.

What are the benefits?

Mark Gale and GEM Project seen as having played a positive brokerage role.

Good to have a broad umbrella and change the process along the way. Collaboration has to flow out of relationships, a shared vision and values,

that has to be the driver, not funding VCSE contributing to strategic needs of town/area

What would help the process?

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Understand what expertise different people/organisations bring to the partnership

Give partnership bids the priority and be clear that is what you are looking for

Make sure meetings are pitched at right people. Strategic or operational? Look at different ways of meeting – not just face to face Health and Wellbeing Board meetings are District based, but not in each

District and nothing county-wide. County-wide organisations not have time to attend several District meetings. Need to balance local v county-wide.

Is Health and Wellbeing Board a public meeting? Forum meetings can be patronising. Have to pitch at right level. Look at best organisation to work with eg midwife, college Good to have a mechanism to collaborate that sets out the benefits. Create a database of skills and outcomes available in VCSE There are too many mapping exercises. Attitude of commissioning groups. VCSE is not amateur, we are

professionals. Low cost doesn’t equal no cost. Needs to balance equal power

VCSE needs to work closer with the corporate sector, build their brand and expertise. Small charities inhibited by time and not all charities work in “popular” areas.

F: Co-developing services

Building Circles in Gloucestershire example – good relationships with commissioners – commissioners taking a longer term view which has led to service being co-developed with good outcomes

Feedback that commissioners feel like ‘boss’ – would be good if we felt as though we are on the same level

Women’s centre – invite services into centre rather than service users having to go to multiple places/services – working with other VCSE organisations to fill gaps in provision – collaborative approach – good example

Making consultations meaningful – asking questions in a meaningful way – listening to the answers

Accessibility – these concerns aren’t always listened to Knowledge of who’s who – commissioners – would be helpful Element of risk – commissioners need appetite for some risk Funders have duty to get together to share intentions. Make clearer what is

being funded and how this is being done and ensure consistency Play Gloucestershire – co-creating services – big local – being involved in

consultation – good examples of co-developing services (Public Health Nursing Consultation)

Developing services with individuals to develop their personal plans – housing, support housing, housing health etc – example of co-developing holistic plans.

Longer term view - making pilots longer to allow for impact to be demonstrated

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Vital signs – community survey – working with inform team at GCC – example of co-developing services, informing the ‘needs analysis’ stage of commissioning cycle

Strong prevention focus is important and VCS orgs support this. Women’s centre – co-commissioning service with CCG, Gloucestershire

County Council, Housing, PCC, city council – good example of a co-developed service.

Having one person employed by Gloucestershire County Council to facilitate joint working or consortia development for big bids

Commissioning processes need to change to value local VCSE orgs Longer term evaluations – health watch example of feeding into dementia

strategy Commissioners meeting VCSE providers – getting to know them and

understanding needs of communities Some commissioners aren’t very receptive – it would be nice if all

commissioners felt the same way about the VCS and appreciate its value. All sorts ‘a voice to live’ – feedback to commissioners around services –

young people co-developing services important to them – feeding in to future services – voice of beneficiaries

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Appendix C Question and Answer session

Age UK: CCG needs to start in a different place. An increase in the numbers of older people is not scary. It’s wrong to start from the premise that older people are responsible for the problems of the NHS. Society tends to see older people as a problem – they are not and we need to change the mindset and consider how we can work differently.

CCG: There are lots of opportunities, need to use knowledge and experience. Promoting peer support for lived experience.

How does the VCSE inform and integrate with the STP?

STP is not just about health but doesn’t reflect enough of the VCSE’s role. The STP is an iterative process and there are opportunities to reshape it. The VSCE should share its needs and ideas more. The voice of the voluntary sector should be heard at every level. There is a danger with having targets and numbers on Boards, it’s about listening and respecting views, not a tick box exercise.

Can the Commissioners put more weighting to local bids? People are investing lots of time and expertise only for large organisations to win.

It does depend on the bids but this could be considered. Small charities do need to up their game.

Are Commissioners looking at quality standards, Picasso or ISO?

County Council will accept Picasso. The decision on which to go for is down to an organisation’s strategy.

Grassroots community groups deliver a good service on health and wellbeing but don’t have the time or expertise to complete complicated tenders. How can they get involved?

Each district has funding for health and wellbeing and can advise. GRCC can offer support throughout the county apart from Gloucester city. Small organisations need independent, expert advice.

Staff working in mental health are taking sick leave because of stress. Employers looking after those with mental health are struggling to look after their staff.

CCG is doing work with the 2gether Trust on staff wellbeing, including mental health. Working with 40 organisations now on wellbeing and want to expand that.

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Are you looking to work with small community organisations?

Not doing enough yet and needs to expand.

Appendix D Roadmap

Strategy for working with Gloucestershire Voluntary ... · At an event on 6 December 2017 at the...

Documents

Transcript of Strategy for working with Gloucestershire Voluntary ... · At an event on 6 December 2017 at the...