Recently in social care Category
Peter Mason who I met yesterday took a year to build a social business
which now turns over 4.3 million pounds (it took me ten to do the
same).
Secure Health Care provides nurse-led health services to inmates at Wandsworth prison. His is the first outsourced health service in the UK and next he is tendering for four more. If successful he will have about 1000 staff and a urnover of 30 odd million.
So what is his USP? Peter offers a model which doesn't make a take profit out of healthcare and uses a model of employee ownership, a sort of John Lewis Partnership for health.
He is swimming with the sharks in that his private sector competitors (Serco for example) circle menacingly looking to legally challenge his use of public funds like Futurebuilders.
Social entrepreneurs don't come a lot bigger and better than Peter. He is operating at a scale most eschew and his capabilities and ambitions place him in the top tier.
I like meeting people like Peter because he reminds me that we do have serious players who can operate and win at scale who are also able to infuse what they do with the right values. This is a man who regularly gets on his nurses uniform to show people about what his vision means on the ground. This is real leadership, something people in the cynical, tired and institutionalised prison health sector can believe in.
Coupled to this is the business nous and ruthlessness to tackle competitors and poor quality.
I came away from our meeting refreshed. I would love to see Peter's story out there and for him to be on the platforms. But as he says himself, he is immersed in a business and that is where he is needed.
What started as a nurse in Rikers Island penitentiary in New York in the nineties will I hope end in health care system across in UK jails which is a quantum better than we have now. Then, he tells me, he will write his book, 'The Road from Rikers Island'.
Secure Health Care provides nurse-led health services to inmates at Wandsworth prison. His is the first outsourced health service in the UK and next he is tendering for four more. If successful he will have about 1000 staff and a urnover of 30 odd million.
So what is his USP? Peter offers a model which doesn't make a take profit out of healthcare and uses a model of employee ownership, a sort of John Lewis Partnership for health.
He is swimming with the sharks in that his private sector competitors (Serco for example) circle menacingly looking to legally challenge his use of public funds like Futurebuilders.
Social entrepreneurs don't come a lot bigger and better than Peter. He is operating at a scale most eschew and his capabilities and ambitions place him in the top tier.
I like meeting people like Peter because he reminds me that we do have serious players who can operate and win at scale who are also able to infuse what they do with the right values. This is a man who regularly gets on his nurses uniform to show people about what his vision means on the ground. This is real leadership, something people in the cynical, tired and institutionalised prison health sector can believe in.
Coupled to this is the business nous and ruthlessness to tackle competitors and poor quality.
I came away from our meeting refreshed. I would love to see Peter's story out there and for him to be on the platforms. But as he says himself, he is immersed in a business and that is where he is needed.
What started as a nurse in Rikers Island penitentiary in New York in the nineties will I hope end in health care system across in UK jails which is a quantum better than we have now. Then, he tells me, he will write his book, 'The Road from Rikers Island'.
I slagged Nick Clegg off the other day for a fairly bland speech to
ACEVO members in Sheffield. However, this week he launched an excellent
new tax policy for the Lib Dems. Tax cuts and smaller government. He's
not the only one saying this. Alan Milburn, ex Health Minister, has
called for a cull of Whitehall of 25% of headcount.
The idea here is not to create a nasty 19th century state but to recognise that the state has had its day (well, its century actually) as lead agent in public service provison.
Life for me throws up regular examples of why Nick Clegg and Alan Milburn are right.
Last night I was Guest of Honour at the AGM of a growing charity called Out and About. Based in Suffolk, they deliver exciting options for young disabled people. Their CEO, Steve Allman is a fantastic young talent who wants to grow it from its current £1 million to a multi-million outfit working right across the Region. I am so excited about Steve that I have just agreed to mentor him during the next year or two. He really is that good.
After my talk, Steve showed me round the building which Out and About share with Connexions. Till a year ago, Connexions was an independent company, a bit like a social business, albeit state-funded. Then it was taken in-house as part of some warped idea that this would somehow achieve joined-up-ness with the rest of the Council's derisory offer to young people.
One of the most depressing outcomes of this forced-takeover (this has happened everywhere) was in the internet cafe or Infobar which is jointly run by Connexions and Out and About. Once a thriving place, this is now much quieter and less well used. Why? Because the council says its OK to go on most sites except...get this...Bebo, MySpace and Facebook.
Now, I am not particularly `down with the kids' but even I know that young people essentially live their lives through such sites. Apparently, Steve tells me, the council are worried about their liability if a kid ends up being groomed by a paedo on one of their PCs. Their concern about a `Kiddy Fiddler on Council Laptop' headline outweight all others. Even for the kids themselves who end up using other facilities, presumably with no limits at all on viewing. But this is OK because risk to the council has been eliminated.
It is this sort of specious logic that makes so many people want to stop paying so much tax to organisations that think its OK to behave this way. Yet this is what happens when you give the state the right to become a monopoly. It serves its own interests, not those of the people. Or the kids, in this case.
While I am sure you get a bit of this in the third sector, its not nearly so pervasive and the lack of monopoly means organisations not delivering soon get found out. And I know for a fact that Steve would lift this ban immediately were Connexions outsourced to Out and About.
Now there's an idea...
The idea here is not to create a nasty 19th century state but to recognise that the state has had its day (well, its century actually) as lead agent in public service provison.
Life for me throws up regular examples of why Nick Clegg and Alan Milburn are right.
Last night I was Guest of Honour at the AGM of a growing charity called Out and About. Based in Suffolk, they deliver exciting options for young disabled people. Their CEO, Steve Allman is a fantastic young talent who wants to grow it from its current £1 million to a multi-million outfit working right across the Region. I am so excited about Steve that I have just agreed to mentor him during the next year or two. He really is that good.
After my talk, Steve showed me round the building which Out and About share with Connexions. Till a year ago, Connexions was an independent company, a bit like a social business, albeit state-funded. Then it was taken in-house as part of some warped idea that this would somehow achieve joined-up-ness with the rest of the Council's derisory offer to young people.
One of the most depressing outcomes of this forced-takeover (this has happened everywhere) was in the internet cafe or Infobar which is jointly run by Connexions and Out and About. Once a thriving place, this is now much quieter and less well used. Why? Because the council says its OK to go on most sites except...get this...Bebo, MySpace and Facebook.
Now, I am not particularly `down with the kids' but even I know that young people essentially live their lives through such sites. Apparently, Steve tells me, the council are worried about their liability if a kid ends up being groomed by a paedo on one of their PCs. Their concern about a `Kiddy Fiddler on Council Laptop' headline outweight all others. Even for the kids themselves who end up using other facilities, presumably with no limits at all on viewing. But this is OK because risk to the council has been eliminated.
It is this sort of specious logic that makes so many people want to stop paying so much tax to organisations that think its OK to behave this way. Yet this is what happens when you give the state the right to become a monopoly. It serves its own interests, not those of the people. Or the kids, in this case.
While I am sure you get a bit of this in the third sector, its not nearly so pervasive and the lack of monopoly means organisations not delivering soon get found out. And I know for a fact that Steve would lift this ban immediately were Connexions outsourced to Out and About.
Now there's an idea...
Say the name Simon Duffy to most people in our sector and they won't
know who you mean. That bloke who played Bobby Ewing in Dallas? Father
of that Welsh girl with a voice like Dusty Springfield?
However say `personalisation of public services' and people will know what you're on about. Well Simon is, as far as one can say these things, the person behind the story. And in this sense, he is a far bigger influence on the future of our nation than most of today's social entrepreneurs put together.
Yes, Simon Duffy is probably our lowest profile-highest impact social entrepreneur. Or, I should lowest profile in the select world of social entrepreneurship. In the wider world he's a big name, winner of the Albert Medal, an honour bestowed on, among others, Albert Einstein. He's credited with the intellectual spadework behind the creation of personal budgets for disabled people. His organisation, In Control, has been in the vanguard, enabling over 5000 people to take control of their own resources to shape a life of their own choosing.
Now Simons thinking is now spreading like brushfire through Government. The Darzi review speaks of patients with lon term conditions managing their own budgets. The Department of Work and Pension is looking at personal budgets for the long term unemployed. The rest of us are gasping to keep up.
A philospoher by background, Simon wrote 'Keys to Citizenship' a few years ago following time spent overseas as a Harkness Scholar. This became the template for his work, first, with Inclusion Glasgow and latterly with In Control. His approach is one based in his philosophical work which, broadly speaking, is libertarian but places the individual and the `good life' firmly in a social setting.
I met Simon at the RSA. I called the meeting to ask his views about a new service we are thinking of selling to councils to help more disabled people use personal budgets. Characteristically, he said yes (no blocking PAs or prima donna-ism that I have encountered, sadly, a few times of late from people with big views of themselves) and here he was.
Thankfully he liked our idea. This mattered. He understands the market and the way things are developing on the ground. There was one caveat. He doesn't like the idea of yet more superstructure adding to the costs of giving people with disabilities their lives back. Any additions would need to be more-than matched with reductions in the activity of the state at local level. To this end we agreed to partner with local authorities that needed to disinvest in care management as they ramped up the kind of informal `people-powered' support we are proposing to faciliate at local level.
We talked a lot about the social care sector. For me it was like coming home. Speaking to someone who shared most of my own deepest feelings. It was both a relief and somehow quite vindicating. I spend a lot of time feeling like a chorus of one, be it in my dealings with the social care establishment (councils etc) and even certain people in the advocacy sector.
Simon pointed to advocacy as a sector desperate to create a self-justifying theology out of what is, in essence, helping people to control their own lives. He expressed the view that many people in the advocacy business make things unnecessarily complex to cover their own lack of accountability for achieving things. Even though I run one, this was I view I could certainly understand. We do spend a lot of time coming up with all sorts of stuff about what our job is and isn't to do. Perhaps we need to stop and admit that its actually really simple.
I came away from our meeting feeling pretty good. I'd met in Simon a guy with strong values, unflinching drive and the intellectual self-confidence to cut through the bullshit. I'd also met someone who could give anyone a Masterclass in how to be influential.
He inspired me too. I have had some dark doubts in recent times about my level of motivation and my life-strategy of creating a big, strong business that could help a lot more people - but which is undoubtedly corporate and highly growth oriented. I know Simon prefers small scale and has eschewed this kind of approach but I somehow, in a weird way, felt better about what I was actually doing with my life. Day to day I often struggle knowing that I am making any real difference at all.
When I started it was idea today, action tomorrow. I could see the changes with my own eyes. Now the amount of co-ordinated effort, time and money to produce change seems to much greater, and more vulnerable to the needs of funders, the organisation, staff and so on.
Arrived home from London to pick up Ruby from her Nan's. She was very pleased to see me. Until the arrival of her fish and chips. Then I was very much secondary to proceedings. That girl knows where her priorities lie.
However say `personalisation of public services' and people will know what you're on about. Well Simon is, as far as one can say these things, the person behind the story. And in this sense, he is a far bigger influence on the future of our nation than most of today's social entrepreneurs put together.
Yes, Simon Duffy is probably our lowest profile-highest impact social entrepreneur. Or, I should lowest profile in the select world of social entrepreneurship. In the wider world he's a big name, winner of the Albert Medal, an honour bestowed on, among others, Albert Einstein. He's credited with the intellectual spadework behind the creation of personal budgets for disabled people. His organisation, In Control, has been in the vanguard, enabling over 5000 people to take control of their own resources to shape a life of their own choosing.
Now Simons thinking is now spreading like brushfire through Government. The Darzi review speaks of patients with lon term conditions managing their own budgets. The Department of Work and Pension is looking at personal budgets for the long term unemployed. The rest of us are gasping to keep up.
A philospoher by background, Simon wrote 'Keys to Citizenship' a few years ago following time spent overseas as a Harkness Scholar. This became the template for his work, first, with Inclusion Glasgow and latterly with In Control. His approach is one based in his philosophical work which, broadly speaking, is libertarian but places the individual and the `good life' firmly in a social setting.
I met Simon at the RSA. I called the meeting to ask his views about a new service we are thinking of selling to councils to help more disabled people use personal budgets. Characteristically, he said yes (no blocking PAs or prima donna-ism that I have encountered, sadly, a few times of late from people with big views of themselves) and here he was.
Thankfully he liked our idea. This mattered. He understands the market and the way things are developing on the ground. There was one caveat. He doesn't like the idea of yet more superstructure adding to the costs of giving people with disabilities their lives back. Any additions would need to be more-than matched with reductions in the activity of the state at local level. To this end we agreed to partner with local authorities that needed to disinvest in care management as they ramped up the kind of informal `people-powered' support we are proposing to faciliate at local level.
We talked a lot about the social care sector. For me it was like coming home. Speaking to someone who shared most of my own deepest feelings. It was both a relief and somehow quite vindicating. I spend a lot of time feeling like a chorus of one, be it in my dealings with the social care establishment (councils etc) and even certain people in the advocacy sector.
Simon pointed to advocacy as a sector desperate to create a self-justifying theology out of what is, in essence, helping people to control their own lives. He expressed the view that many people in the advocacy business make things unnecessarily complex to cover their own lack of accountability for achieving things. Even though I run one, this was I view I could certainly understand. We do spend a lot of time coming up with all sorts of stuff about what our job is and isn't to do. Perhaps we need to stop and admit that its actually really simple.
I came away from our meeting feeling pretty good. I'd met in Simon a guy with strong values, unflinching drive and the intellectual self-confidence to cut through the bullshit. I'd also met someone who could give anyone a Masterclass in how to be influential.
He inspired me too. I have had some dark doubts in recent times about my level of motivation and my life-strategy of creating a big, strong business that could help a lot more people - but which is undoubtedly corporate and highly growth oriented. I know Simon prefers small scale and has eschewed this kind of approach but I somehow, in a weird way, felt better about what I was actually doing with my life. Day to day I often struggle knowing that I am making any real difference at all.
When I started it was idea today, action tomorrow. I could see the changes with my own eyes. Now the amount of co-ordinated effort, time and money to produce change seems to much greater, and more vulnerable to the needs of funders, the organisation, staff and so on.
Arrived home from London to pick up Ruby from her Nan's. She was very pleased to see me. Until the arrival of her fish and chips. Then I was very much secondary to proceedings. That girl knows where her priorities lie.
