Drowning Not Waving

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This week I am feeling completely drained from work. I have done something this week that will most certainly impact on me time wise in the next week or so. Guess what I did ? I have spent a grand total of 7.5 hours of actually supervising cases this week, doing some actual intervention, relationship building, home visits and supporting a case to an appointment and managing risk. It’s been emotionally draining because the majority are high risk. But, it’s been worth some of the outcome from it. Not all cases were happy, but I did get a high five today from my most challenging and aggressive case - which was worth it! I have made my self reflect on my practice today, especially after Panorama. Whilst I remain worried of what I do, what we do is right - am I assessing risk correctly? Am I being risk adverse? etc, this week I really feel I have put my all in. I am knackered beyond belief by the emotional impact this job has at times, but I am proud of what I do, what we all do. It feels good to create the time in an ever increasing busy job to actually be able spend time with the people that need it the most, this is what I signed up to do. Trying to be positive is really hard at the moment, we all get those moments when we know we make a difference. Stay positive people.

Fantastic!!! A really heartening post and exactly why we all joined the service!!! We're all risk averse, particularly at the moment, but trust in your judgement, you know your cases best remember!

The face to face jobs you accomplished today are examples of what we used to do because case loads were lower and there wasn't as much bureaucracy n duplication as we have today. This was why we chose this profession to rehabilitate support assist change and constructively challenge offenders.... all this underpinned with compassion understanding empathy to help the offender to change. Whilst this was done we assessed risks AND had the time to reflect n confer with colleagues. Cases were discussed we had a good grasp of other colleagues cases... today there is not time to implement real quality in the job. And yes you feel emotionally exhausted but at the same time there are also positiveness to gain like you experienced hence the high five with the offender. I felt so many negative emotions when it was clear that the government didn't have a clue what this profession is about and neither does the public, therefore if the government had a slight knowledge of our work they manipulated their way thru public ignorance.

Well done you!! It’s so hard to keep going at times like this but you are ace to still have the resolve to give it 110%. Xx

Great post. Years back. I was in a queue of people when a man came up to me who I didn't recognise, he took my hand and greeted me like an old friend. Told me what a difference I had made to his life whilst he was on CS that he now had his own business, he knew my name, asked after my xxxxxx and then gave me a big hug. I obviously smiled and told him how thrilled I was. But I had not got a clue who he was. There had been so many offenders I had met over the years. Just remember when you struggle to do your jobs, the offender's maybe one of many hundreds you meet and deal with over the years but to them you at the time when they need it, you are their focus, they may not show it but you are their life line. If you can in a crazy bloody world make a difference to just someone then hold your head and be proud and don't give up.

Remember back in the day (it seems so long ago now) when Managers used to supervise you about the work you did with clients and the emotional impact it might have had, rather than just ensuring that you have ticked the right boxes in time?

What a wonderful post. I’m so fed up of ticking boxes and data entry.

I'm taking time off. Exhausted beyond belief.

Hold on to good practice it makes a difference!

I feel drained. Just had leave and found it hard to totally let go of work issues.

I left the service earlier this year as the job has changed beyond belief and do I miss it......do I hell.

--oo00oo--

Do any other CRC colleagues` experience SPO bullying whole team via email rather than having the balls to come out of their office and ask their team questions regarding performance. Then giving it a couple of hours and hitting the whole team with another bullying email. Funnily this is the response to a poor inspection where, ok failings in meeting performance targets around reducing reoffending (allegedly), but also where poor staff morale and no confidence in bullying managers was of grave concern. At this point there is not one PSO or PO within the team who wouldn't walk if they could afford to........

Not my experience in my CRC. We have a very supportive and transparent SPO - so much so that she gave up her office and sits in the open office with her team!

Good to hear that, we had a really good management team till the split when both SPOs ended up in NPS........

The irony is it is bullying from top down, the Company that own us were so appalled by morale from the staff survey at beginning of year that they forced us to go to events to talk about why we were unhappy, many not able to be honest as their managers were in the same room...... We then have the inspection and now further monthly meetings with ACO and SPO present where we are supposed to talk about how we make things better...... FFS this from an organisation where we at coal face deal in motivating people to change, take responsibility for their actions and show empathy.

'tis a familiar tale in HMPS too!

It’s like that in NPS too.

From high up the chain.

The culture has changed so much.I Remember when we were like a family ...now so different.

Since moving to our CRC office, our SPOs have sat in the general office with us. Now used to it, I prefer it. Must say ours are fantastically supportive and I've never been on the receiving end of any bullying from the current ones we have. I feel very lucky. Xx

Couldn't agree more.

I have but not from SPOs x

"bullying emails"! I'd be sending the bloody thing back with a reminder of the bullying & harassment policy. Cheeky sod.

We keep getting emails about - make sure you do your Arms, make sure HETE stuff on delius all done, make sure e learning done by such a date, get evidence for SPDRs. But we are coping with the accumulative effect of managing high caseloads for over a year - even tho things are reducing. It feels like there is little awareness from higher up the chain of the impact all this is having on staff.

It’s about time the police did their own ARMS assessments and it’s still not on the WMT.

Our team were told at a meeting (I wasn’t there) that the week an Arms is done that staff would be given 4 hours (I think ) on WMT - but all that means is that that PO would be four more hours over that week. We do have a PO who has come back to work who is purely doing some of our ARMS and other staff are being offered overtime to complete.

The police in our area have been doing them as overtime. Tbh I think we have enough to do by doing the OASys!

Exactly!! I often feeling like we are drowning.

Why do they keep piling more work on us knowing full well it is a risk assessment for the police?

I got the feeling it was our thing to do now.

SPO needs to prioritise your workload & agree on what can be missed/delayed (written agreement of course) if your WMT level is excessive... complete the stress assmt (can't recall its proper name).

Not so bad now it’s just the effect of the last year.

Since TR - the levels of caseloads aren't sustainable long-term...

Recent consultation with my manager re a Bit of a Situation. (No immediate or even medium term risk) The response re priorities "Never mind all that humanistic stuff for now... Get into Delius and make sure all entries are in for performance" Nuff said.

Managers have to send out the info to staff - it's part of their responsibilities and they are probably measured/reviewed on it. If staff are being asked to undertake unrealistic tasks then managers need to be told so they can feed it back up. If comms are seen as bullying then managers should be told. Everyone is under pressure, managers, SCMs, CMs, POs, PSOs, CAs - we all need to feed it back up and note it at every opportunity. If you can't do a task detail why - 'Due to time constraints this assessment has not been thoroughly completed..'Due to a lack of resources I did not have access to the information required to complete this/those tasks..' Any concerns then contact your Napo reps and let's all support each other :-)

--oo00oo--

Have NPS colleagues noticed a sudden pressure from management forcing us to use the CRC's rate card services? I wonder why?

Yes.... even when the RARS they offer are not suitable for everyone.

Well I'm CRC and I have never ever heard of this concept before. Can any explain? What might the services be which CRCs have to offer?

An example is the Getting it Right programme in prisons. If the NPS want an NPS service user to go on the programme we have to purchase it off the rate card via an NSI.

It’s just more work to do on top of everything else.

We were supposed to start using them 3 years ago, but MTC Novo only published their rate card earlier this year. We need to start using the budget that was set aside for purchasing services or we’ll a) lose it and b) can’t commission alternative services until we’ve shown we tried to purchase them from the CRC. Email me at work and I’ll give you more detail.

Maybe CRC management have told them that CRCs not making enough money.

I am wondering whether these services might be available for CRC service users without CRC staff being aware.

I'm sure part of the CRC package sold by MoJ was that they would have the interventions from NPS as a source of income. However, CRC is expensive and NPS haven't been using them.

That is right, but now we have been told that we have to .. couldn’t make it up could you.

But I suppose it's about time, maybe if NPS had been doing it from the get go, CRC wouldn't be in so much financial difficulty.

Yea that’s true.

I don't think it's all RARs is it? Just ETE and programmes? But I think NPS have stopped recommending programmes in court.

I’m not sure .. I’ve had two orders come through with Rars.

We very rarely get recommendations for resolve,TSP or DID - think we’ve had one programme of each run in past year!

As said above the CRC's are failing and the Govmt are trying to bail them out by directing management in the NPS to force their staff to use the services. The rate card system is a lucrative source of income for the CRC's.

True, but I think it's a shame that MoJ have to make NPS do it. If it was part of the original agreement, why wouldn't they want to make sure their colleagues are kept in work? I bloody hate what the MoJ have done!

Good point. It's a moral dilemma. I don't feel good about buying services that aid the continuation of the CRC's but don't want to do anything that places colleagues jobs at risk. The sooner these contracts are ended and probation is unified again the better!