Business Plan Year 2010/2011

Aims for Service Delivery

• To offer people supported by the Trust a consistent good quality and value service in accordance with their needs
• To act as a caring, fair and responsible employer offering choice, rights and furthering independence for service users
• To encourage the development and training of all employees and individuals
• To encourage a philosophy where dignity and respect are fundamental in our everyday lives
• To encourage participation, involvement and integration within the community in line with the nationally accepted O’Brien principles
• To manage the Trust business effectively and efficiently
• To maintain sufficient surplus funds within the Trust to ensure its continued development
• To act at all times with honesty and integrity and within legislative and regulatory requirements
• To work in partnership with Social Services, care agencies and housing providers to ensure quality standards are continuously achieved and improved upon

Background to Coquet Trust

Coquet Trust was established in January 1995, receiving registered charity status in May of that year. The Trust's aim is to provide good quality day and domiciliary care and support in the community for people with learning disabilities.

Coquet Trust currently provides a domiciliary service to people within their own homes, located within Tyne and Wear, North Tyneside and Northumberland and outreach support for a number of individuals within those areas. This has been made possible through the recruitment of experienced Support Team Managers, who, along with the Trust Senior Management team , select a team of multi-skilled support workers, who enable individuals to have a worthwhile and enjoyable life within the local community.

To support this effort, the Trust currently employs 270 staff in direct support, a Trust Manager, 3 Operational Managers, 1 Area Service Manager, Outreach Manager,  Outreach Co-ordinator and an Admin Team incorporating Human Resources, Finance and Payroll. The management team are fully committed to the ongoing provision of a service which, whilst providing ‘best value’ is also needs led.

Trust Expansion and Growth

Now into its sixteenth year of operation, the Trust has continued to expand and develop. From its first contract to provide 20 hours per week support to a client in 1995, the Trust now supports more than 100 people living in the community within four local authority areas. Support is provided with Independent Supported Living, outreach services and short break holiday and respite services.

The Model of Care

Coquet Trust believes in order to implement and maintain an effective service for individuals, the following factors are essential:

An ethos in which the experiences of the individual is paramount, and any systems of quality assurance will be linked to such experiences.

The experiences of the individual must never be overlooked, and the person centred plan is the starting point which will ensure this.

A model of service provision based on the O’Brien Five Accomplishments. This will ensure the service provided by Coquet Trust will always strive to achieve:

• Presence in the Community
• Promoting Choice and Protecting Rights
• Developing Competence
• Promoting Dignity and Respect
• Community Participation - growing in personal relationships

The employment of high quality appropriately experienced first line managers i.e. Support Team Managers.

The employment of support staff who will be able to acquire, through formal and informal training, the essential concepts and skills necessary to provide the effective support for people with learning disabilities. A problem solving approach is actively encouraged.

The employment of staff who believe that people with a learning disability have the same rights, needs and responsibilities as others.

The Trustees

The Trust currently has a board of four trustees who all have  background in the learning disability field

Malcolm Johnson RNMH Dip TMH , Chairman
Former NHS Manager and Trust Founder

Paul Smith MA Msc PhD,
Clinical Psychologist

Susan Welsh MBA LCST, Secretary
Speech & Language Therapy Managerp

Janet Bewick BA, Treasurer
Teacher - Adult Basic Education

David Rowland HR Consultant

The Trustees meet on a regular basis to discuss future development of the Trust. Each trustee possesses a wide range of skills and experience that can be called upon to ensure the Trust's objectives are successfully achieved. The trustees are committed to ensuring the quality of the service and welcome advice from local authorities or independent organisations on quality issues and measuring the effectiveness of services provided by the Trust.

Training Plan for 2010/2011

The implications of Valuing People, Supporting People and the Domiciliary Care Standards have all brought training implications with them. However, because the Trust has continually trained its employees to a high standard, these requirements will be readily met by the Trust.

Priority areas of training for Coquet Trust Staff include:

1.0 Learning Disability Qualification. The Coquet Trust wishes to help new employees settle down and develop their potential as swiftly as possible and to this end has developed an internal induction process which will be carried out by employees’ own line managers. This induction complements the Learning Disability Qualification training.  If possible, a mentor will be selected to be responsible for the employee in the early weeks of employment. Induction will be carried out using an Induction package for new employees.

All staff will receive instruction in the mandatory training:

• First Aid/Health and Safety
• Food Hygiene
• Fire Safety
• Safe Moving and Handling

2.0 Care NVQ - National Vocational Qualifications

Coquet Trust currently has five managers qualified as NVQ assessors, and two managers as Internal Verifiers.

During the last three years 170 staff have achieved an appropriate NVQ qualification and a further 30 staff are progressing in the relevant NVQ. Coquet Trust will continue to support this level of training to ensure we meet the Government National Training Targets and fulfil any training requirements from the newly formed National Care Standards Commission.

All staff will be appropriately trained in Person Centred Planning and Advocacy as recommended in ‘Valuing People’.

3.0 Management Qualifications

Eighteen managers have achieved the Registered Managers Award, 3 have NVQ Management Level 5. The Trust will continue to support two managers per year to join the programme, to ensure we continue to have appropriately qualified managers employed throughout the Trust.

5.0 Personal Development Portfolios

All employees have a personal development portfolio which includes annual performance reviews. Employees' training and development needs are identified within this review process and this determines, along with the Trust Mission Statement and Business Objectives, the annual training and development plan. Examples of this include:

• Bereavement
• Managing Challenging Behaviour
• Literacy
• Drama

6.0 Before setting up any new services the staff team will receive instruction in the following

• The Aims, Values and Direction of Coquet Trust
• Person Centred Planning/ Care Planning
• Team Building
• Communication Skills and Speech Therapy programmes
• Challenging Behaviour
• Drug Administration
• First Aid, Health & Safety and Fire Safety
• Risk Assessment
• Food Hygiene
• Values/Normalisation
• Observation and Assessment
• Safe Moving and Handling

All staff training needs are identified through the individual Training and Personal Development Plan which incorporates a pre and post training review system.

The Trust has enough resources to ensure that training is responsive, as well as planned. There is an expectation that there may be some significant training requirements from the National Care Standards Commission, and this has been included within the training budget allocation.

Resource Plan 2010/2011

The Trust supports and promotes staff training and development and is a recognised 'Investor in People', a prominent National Award.

The process required to become and remain an 'Investor in People' reinforces the importance of staff contribution and development; pre-requisites to successful, expanding organisations, and this is reflected in Coquet Trust’s staff development and support strategy which involves:

• Reviewing existing training and development within the Trust
• Planning training and development to ensure the Trust meets its business goals
• Implementing the training to agreed, objective standards
• Evaluating the training and modifying goals and priorities
• Continuously improving the quality of training to ensure staff and householder needs are met

The individuals, their care managers, relatives and advocates are encouraged to become actively involved in the process of appointing staff, especially recruitment of Support Team Managers. These appointments are paramount to the service, so job and personal specifications are carefully designed to address the types of qualities required.

Before any new Independent Supported Living service is established all concerned parties are involved in the detailed planning.

Prior to each person relocating, a professional multidisciplinary approach is pursued in the development of a comprehensive programme of staff training. Training includes:

• Team building
• Self-awareness regarding personal attitudes and values
• Principles of behavioural support
• Observation and assessment of people
• Goal planning
• Principles of accomplishment
• Task analysis
• Risk taking
• Drug administration
• Health and safety; first aid and fire drill procedures
• Food hygiene
• Management and staff development
• Person centred planning
• Advocacy
• Tenancy support

The effectiveness of the service is maintained by regular reviews in which individuals, care managers, relatives, advocates etc are involved.

The introduction of a staff personal development and training portfolio will ensure all staff’s training needs are provided effectively.

Some of the resources required to fulfil these needs are within the current management team’s portfolio of expertise. We have 2 rooms ‘in house’ which are available to be used as a staff training venue, along with associated training aids. The budget allocated to identified training needs which arise from the personal development and training portfolios for the current year, outwith mandatory requirements, is £60,000. This budget will enable the Trust to fulfil these training requirements by the use of external training sources.

Targets 210/2011