Twenty-six more individuals we support become Quality Checkers at Lifeways!

Have you ever realised you’re an expert? You read that correctly. Everyone’s an expert in at least one thing. And very often, peoples’ expertise is about their home, and where they live.

At Lifeways, we believe this ultra-focused expertise is very valuable. That’s why we run a Quality Checkers initiative among the nearly 5,000 individuals we support.

Quality Checkers, who are people we support, look at the support we provide in their own home and other people’s homes, using a toolkit they have designed with our Quality Team. This toolkit sets out what good support looks like.

Quality Checkers also inspect the service where they live, ensuring that the highest standards are met.

So far, we have several dozen Quality Checkers on board – and we’re looking to train more. Our eventual goal is to have a Quality Checker for all of our 1,500 services.

Quality Checkers are part of Lifeways’ co-production and personalisation approaches.

These two approaches also see us nominate individuals to be Health and Safety Checkers (which is more specialised than being a Quality Checker), and empowering individuals to interview their own support team members, where possible.

At the heart of everything

In the picture above you can see Kirsty and Caroline who are newly-trained Quality Checkers in Northumberland.

Working in the region is Nikki Noble, a Lifeways Area Manager. In recent months, Nikki’s been busy training 26 individuals to become Quality Checkers.

The training process equips Quality Checkers with 49 questions to ask other individuals about the standard of support they receive, and additional guidance to help them perform the role. Answers are then recorded and acted on, where relevant, by Lifeways’ teams.

“Supporting individuals in the training process of being a Quality Checker is something I feel really passionate about,” says Nikki.

“Recruiting more Quality Checkers, where appropriate, is something I really want to move forward with,” she adds.

“After all, there’s no better experts than the individuals who live in their services!”

‘Meaningful change’

“Lifeways makes sure that people are at the heart of everything we do,” says Gareth Roberts, Lifeways’ Head of Quality, Health and Safety.

“Having experts by experience in the form of Quality Checkers that we work alongside collaboratively is one way of demonstrating this.

“Nikki Noble is leading the way in the organisation and ensuring people are driving meaningful change within their homes – having 26 trained Quality Checkers in such a short space of time is a fantastic achievement,” adds Gareth.

“Having experts by experience in the form of Quality Checkers that we work alongside collaboratively is one way of demonstrating this and results in meaningful change across Lifeways.”

About Lifeways:

Lifeways is the UK’s largest team of support professionals providing support for adults in the community.

Our 11,000 colleagues currently support almost 5,000 individuals who live in our 1,500 supported living and residential services across England, Scotland, and Wales. 

Find out more about how we change people's lives at: www.lifeways.co.uk  

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