Authentic PPIE – the (re)search for authentic engagement

I’ve been in my new role for just over a month now, and I’ve been learning a lot! Although I knew some things about public services, including Social Services, Adult Social Care and Public Health, I’ve learnt a lot more in the last few weeks and filled in some important gaps.

I was fortunate to be able to take part in a training day where we heard from Toby Lowe in the morning who talked about Human. Learning. Systems and in the afternoon we heard from Mark Smith who explained about The Liberated Method.

The summary is that currently our public services are run under a model known as New Public Management. This model, which I’ll call NPM from now on, makes some assumptions, as a lot of theoretical models do. NPM assumes that public services can be run in a fairly linear, straightforward kind of way.

You have services to run. Those services are designed to solve problems and meet public needs -> so you put the right mixture of resources in at one end -> do some nifty processes with those resources, and as a result -> services function efficiently and problems are solved.

It’s a very simplistic process and on the surface it makes sense. Rather like a production line, you put resources in, apply them to the problem and answers should come out the other end.

The only snag with this approach is that it looks at each problem in isolation. It deals with one problem at a time, rather than understanding that all the problems are happening at the same time. Human lives are complex, we all know that. It’s never one thing tidily followed by the next thing – it’s lots of things all at once, and each of them seems to assume that it’s more important than any of the others.

Human.Learning.Systems (HLS) and The Liberated Method (TLM) use complexity theory to look at the world in a different way. They acknowledge that many issues in our lives are interlinked or overlap, and if we’re going to solve those problems, a production line approach isn’t going to work. There’s a really good summary in this video which summaries what HLS is working towards. The Liberated Method sits within/alongside this framework I think, and provides more focussed way of delivering public services in a relational* way.

*Ah, she’s mentioned relational…I’m beginning to see how this might be connected to previous areas of work”, I hear you murmur.

And you’d be right! In my mind, if HLS is the overall umbrella, and TLM is the step below, providing more concrete examples of how to do relational work in practice in public services, then I’m thinking that Social Pedagogy could be the fine detail of how that works in each interaction.

For example: Social Pedagogy starts where each person is at, and through the Diamond Model, reminds us that each person possesses rich and unique potential, which we can draw on and help them bring out. In addition we have The 3 Ps – Professional, Personal and Private, which help us soften the ‘professional edges’ in order to build positive relationships, but also help us to maintain healthy boundaries. There’s a lot more which I could add here (and I’d encourage you to explore the ThemPra website), but what I really want to get to is the short story.

Before I worked for the NHS and now Portsmouth HDRC, I was a creative engagement practitioner. I worked in that role as a freelancer for ten years, and part of my creative practice was storytelling. Telling stories is a fantastic way to explore issues affecting people without confronting them directly – it’s one step removed, which allows for a bit more objectivity and reflection.

I was at the HDRC Christmas lunch on Thursday last week and we got to talking about storytelling and I began to wonder quietly how I could shape what I’d learnt into a story…my brain began to rumble gently in the background and the next day ideas began to form. Overnight the rumbling continued and this afternoon I took some time to commit those words to paper (as it were!). And here we are. Please find below the first draft of The Twisting House. It’s a short story reflecting on all the things I’ve described above. If you work in public services, or have explored Human.Learning.Systems, The Liberated Method or Social Pedagogy, I’d be interested to hear if any of the story resonates with you?

So, are you sitting comfortably? Then I’ll begin…

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