Due to continued growth, our team has been expanding rapidly. In addition to the continuous addition of new Independent Social Workers we have also recently appointed a brand-new role; Deputy Panel Manager.
This new role will be filled by one of our highly experienced panel members, David Butterworth. David has been part of the Advanced team for 3 years and brings considerable experience and knowledge to the role.
We sat down with David to find out a bit more about him, his previous experience, and his plans for the new role.
Hi David, can you tell me a little bit about your experience within the social care sector?
I completed my BSc Hons Social Work and Social Policy plus Diploma in Social Work in 2001, after studying for four years at Plymouth University. Although Plymouth is more renowned for its marine biology and I was one of only 38 students on the social worker course, it was an amazing programme and sitting on Plymouth Hoe on a barmy summer evening was stunning.
What I knew then and it’s even more apparent now, is that four years on a university course does not prepare you for social work practice.
I then spent the next 18 years working as a social worker within children and families’ statutory teams. I worked with children who were at risk of harm, children that required safeguarding by the Court, children who were displaying anti-social and offending behaviour, children with disabilities and most recently, children who were likely to require social work intervention if the required preventative work was not completed successfully.
During my journey, I’ve held specialist roles in completing and quality assuring parenting and risk assessments, I’ve supported students as a practice teacher, supervised staff, completed assessments and direct work with young people who sexually offend, lead the delivery of Signs of Safety and PAMS assessments as a practice lead and designed policies and procedures to develop an early help provision and out of hours process.
Obviously, professional development is crucial in our work and training in signs of safety, practice teaching award, restorative work, family star, nurturing attachments, trauma informed practice, alongside many many safeguarding level 1 and health and safety!!- has benefited my practice along the way.
So, 21 years in the job and I’m still learning and still striving to be better.
Congratulations on your new role, can you tell us more about what this role requires and what you might be doing day to day?
In my new role as a part-time deputy panel manager, I will be supporting ACCA’s Independent Social Workers for case discussions whenever needed, recruiting and quality assuring reports. In addition, I’ll be helping to procure more work, working on existing and new products and services and I’ll help to develop and support the delivery of the 24/7 in home assessments where I can.
I will also be continuing to work as an Independent Social Worker completing assessments for the other part of the week. I hope to meet many workers during the video calls that Debbie has planned, especially the coffee catchups!
What do you think you’ll bring to the role?
In all my roles, I try to be thoughtful, helpful, utilise the skills of the person that I am working with, provide honest feedback in a sensitive way and always find some humour in most things. My experience in social work, alongside three years as an Independent Social Worker means that most situations are not new to me, but I still look forward to getting that surprising call where I can exclaim, “that’s the first time I’ve heard that”.
I am passionate about providing the best service for the children and families that we work with and would never shy away from making a decision that maybe unpopular with the Local Authority, Guardian, or indeed the parents, if it is what I believe to be in the child’s best interests. To this end, when asked to support, discuss or advise on any decision-making process, I will encourage those workers to reflect on their findings, explain what this means for the child/ren and be confident in their ability to recommend what they understand to be the best outcome.
What are your plans for the future of this role and what are you looking forward to most?
As I’m a people person, I’m looking forward to meeting, chatting and supporting other Social Workers in all areas of their role.
I fully support our Panel Manager, Debbie with her intentions to develop more engagement with workers, whether it is social catchups or possibly group discussions or small seminars where we can discuss a new procedure, regulation, training or a tricky issue on a case. We have so many skills within our workforce, I am incredibly keen to utilise these for the benefit of all.
It remains a very exciting time for ACCA, with the active support, clear direction and drive from The Handl Group, and I am sure it will enable us to grow our product list and geographical reach whilst always providing high quality interventions and assessments.
Finally, I’d love to get your opinion on the current state of the social care sector, how do you think the industry is recovering from the pandemic and dealing with the cost of living crisis?
In terms of the overall position of children’s services currently, this is clearly a very concerning time. We are hearing of increasing shortages of social care staff across the country, leaving authorities overly reliant on agency workers and undoubtedly many cases remaining unallocated with no social worker available to provide the assessment and intervention that is required.
At the same time, the overwhelming majority of parents are finding the demands of raising food costs, huge rises in electricity and gas bills as a real-life struggle placing significant and even overwhelming pressure to provide for the basic needs of their children. For many of our parents and their children, this is therefore a very worrying time and a time where I hope services such as ACCA can assist Local Authorities to protect their vulnerable children.
