Talk by Dr Simon Duffy for Social Work Students, Sheffield Hallam University, 12 December 2014

What does personalisation really mean?

• Where did ‘personalisation’ come from?

• 4 reasons to be cynical

• 4 Reasons to be hopeful

• What does it mean for social work?

Where did personalisation come from?

Self-Directed Support developed by In Control

Converted to personalisation by Demos

Sanctioned by Department of Health

The emergence of the term “personalisation”

Reform of disability support or social care oscillates between giving resources to people or to services.

This is part of a much wider international movement

The challenge is to stop buying things for people that they wouldn’t buy for themselves…

…instead, let people exercise their citizenship, as part of their community,

and armed with their entitlements.

This involves a fundamental change in how social workers

enable to people to get support. We need to stop

‘placing’ people and

instead enable people to exercise freedom.

4 reasons to be cynical

Personalisation from Personalise: Personify; embody in a person; make (an object) more obviously related to, or identifiable as belonging to, a particular individual, esp. by marking with a name etc. e.g. Times Educational Supplement: “This has the benefit of personalising the software because the pupils' favourite pictures can be used.” [OED]

1. Personalisation is the wrong word

In other words: ‘personalisation’ is something we do for other people to make the standardised seem ‘more personal’. This completely misses the point.

People don’t ‘personalise services’ - they set about building themselves a better life

2. Government is making people poorer

3. Bureaucracies undermine control

• Complex systems of resource allocation

• Controlling people’s plans

• Clawbacks that undermine good management

• Rules that limit flexibility

• Lack of peer support

• Lack of information or connections

• Burdening people inappropriately

• Onerous accounting systems

4. The local is becoming weaker

The UK is the most centralised welfare state in the world; and the problem is getting worse as local government is targeted for cuts.

4 reasons to be hopeful

“Know how to take things. Never against the grain, though they’re handed to you that way. There are two sides to everything. If you grab the blade, the best thing will do you harm; the most harmful will defend you if you seize it by the hilt.”

Baltasar Gracian

Cynicism may help you understand things; but it doesn’t inspire action

1. It works

2. It promotes citizenship

3. It is much more efficient

4. It is more fulfilling

• Professional power can easily be abused

• But there is a positive role for professionals

• Professionals can foster wisdom

• Professionals can enable citizenship

What does this mean for social work?

• Social work is about social justice

• This demands that we enable others

• not do unto others

Hope is like a path in the countryside when many people take it then it becomes reality. (Chinese proverb)