Consultation
Consultation to Teams, Organisations & Speaking Enagements
“We do not learn from experience, experience has to be arrested, examined, analysed, considered and negotiated in order to shift it to knowledge”
(Aitchison & Graham, 2004)
There are no 'industry standard' models, language or levels of expertise when it comes to service user involvement. There is no professional body to regulate CPD and supervision, and certainy no homogenous opinion that all survivors of adverse mental health subscribe to. When employing a consultant to work in this area, an organisation may struggle to navigate these complex waters.
Tamar combines experiential knowledge of living and openly working with a complex mental health condition alongside both commercial and mental health training relevant to strategy, service design and consultation. In addition to this, she is part of a regular supervision group of Lived Experience Practitioners who are leaders and academics in their respective work areas. Tamar is also a member of several 'survivor-led' groups and actively keeps up with current issues within the survivor movement. The essence of her work involves ensuring that processes work with rather than to people with mental health conditions, modelling this by providing consultation whilst openly using a Lived Experience Practitioner lens.
Below are examples of the types of consultation that Tamar can offer:
CONSULTATION WITH TEAMS & ORGANISATIONS
Tamar can provide consultation on issues that teams and organisations face using a Lived Experience Practitioner lens. Like other consultants who work in a process driven way, she may use a combination of conversation, communication, reviewing data, observation, group sessions and work with emotional data. This approach will be combined with internal experiential knowledge and an understanding of the wider issues and environmental impacts faced by people living with mental health conditions. Tamar has necessary contacts in academia and various working disciplines to provide the necessary input, collaboration or supervision to undertake this type of work. She has also completed a Masters module on consulting to teams & organisations whilst using a Lived Experience Practitioner lens.
Contact Tamar to see if your organisation would benefit from this approach
SERVICE DEVELOPMENT
Tamar can provide organisations with a resource for undertaking service design and development in collaboration with someone who actively works with a Lived Experience Practitioner lens.
Tamar is experienced in working within service design and development in NHS settings, and has worked on various aspects of this as well as led on Service User Involvement within the develoment of Personality Disrder Pathways within her NHS role. She has presented in commissioning bids and at board level meetings.
Additionally she has successfully completed a Masters module that required a multidisciplinary team co-designing a forensic pathway service for people with personality disorder and presenting it to a commissioning body.
Contact Tamar to see if your organisation would benefit from this approach
COMMITTEES & STEERING GROUPS
Tamar can provide membership of a committee or steering group for your organisation that will benefit from her combination of networking resources, experiential knowledge, training and research skills. In particular, she will focus on maintaining the lens of a Lived Experience Practitioner during meetings.
Contact Tamar to see if your organisation would benefit from this approach
CO-PRODUCTION
Co-Production is a word that is often used in Service User Involvement. Tamar can help your organisation to work from the understanding of this being a partnership model, where lived experience shares decision making within a project or organisation. True levels of co-production are hard to achieve, but Tamar can help you to map where your organisation currently is, agree to levels of co-production it wants to work towards, and think aboout how it can get there.
Contact Tamar to see if your organisation would benefit from this approach
SPEAKING ENGAGEMENTS
Tamar enjoys sharing knowledge of Lived Experience working and communicating ideas that can make real difference to the services people with mental health conditions recieve, or reduce the stigma surrounding living and working with the 'difference' a mental health condition may present.
Tamar has experience of speaking at national and international conferences and was part of a Birmingham Salon debate panel that included Luciana Berger MP and 'Mental Health Cop' Michael Brown.
PEER WORKER MENTORING & SUPPORT
Tamar has worked in service user involvement since 2010 and has a good experiential understanding of the challenges that face both organisations and Lived Experience Practitioners when working together within multi-disciplinary teams. Difficult dynamics can lead to burnout, sickness and high staff turnover rate. However, when adequate preparation and support is provided to both the team and the Lived Experience Practitioners, a unique and additional resource is provided that benefits both the staff team and the people they are providing a service to.
There is very little research published within this specific area, however Tamar was able to explore this phenomenon and link this to existing theories and understanding of group dynamics and the particular positions that Lived Experience Practitioners will often take up within a staff group. Tamar can provide a resource for mentoring and support for both Peer workers and the teams they work in. She is passionate about developing better support for people, and is actively working with her peers for change within this area.
Contact Tamar to see if your organisation would benefit from this approach
CLIENTS
A selection of organisations who have recieved consultancy or public speaking enagements. Click on each image to find out more:
