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GO Online: Inspection toolkit

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Freedom to speak up

Well-led will look at the support you put in place to create a culture where people are empowered to speak up. This will apply as much to your staff team as the people you support.

The following film provides a summary of this area of inspection. It can help you and your teams learn about what will be inspected and what is important to demonstrate to deliver good or outstanding care.

Introducing Freedom to speak up

Duration 01 min 59 sec

Well-led will look at the support you put in place to create a culture where people are empowered to speak up. This applies as much to your staff team as it does to the people you support.

There is crossover here with other elements of CQC inspection looking at the culture of the service, how you listen to and involve people in their care, and how you encourage people to express their views and raise concerns.

What the CQC is hoping for, is that you can evidence though is how you create a positive culture where people feel fully empowered to speak out, knowing that they are supported to do so and that their voice will be heard.

The CQC inspection focus is likely to look for practical examples of how you have supported individuals to raise issues and concerns, both within your service and potentially to other audiences in the wider community.

Inspectors may also look at how you respond to issues that have been raised by people speaking up, and learned from them. Again, there is crossover with elements of Safe and Responsive inspection focus, but the Well-led focus will look more at the effective systems and support you are expected in place.

The CQC may also want to know how you use ‘Freedom to speak up guardians’ or similar support to help empower others to voice their concerns.

CQC interviews will focus on people and staff teams primarily, but may also involve managers and external individuals and groups such as guardians, advocates etc.

A review of documented evidence might look at your investigations, staff support and supervision records, complaints, and more.

To learn more about how you can meet this area of CQC inspection, take a look at GO Online.

Watch the film here: https://vimeo.com/790356891

Practical examples

The examples below provide insight into how other Good or Outstanding rated services are succeeding in this area of inspection. Use the filter to choose different types of examples or select based on related prompt.

If you have an example you would like to share, please e-mail employer.engagement@skillsforcare.org.uk.

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1 example(s) found

Helping communities to speak up in multiple forums

In this one-minute audio clip from the Care Exchange podcast, Aeon Anderson talks about how focusing on environmental sustainability can help attract caring staff.

You can listen to the full podcast here. Access our whole Care Exchange series here.

Read more about this service here.

Care provider: African Caribbean Community Initiative

  • Audio

Date published: May 2023



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