Networking is essential for sharing best practice and improving standards

Rachel Cole is the registered manager at InSafeHands Healthcare and chair of the Cheshire East registered manager network – one of over 150 registered networks across England. The network is open to all registered managers across Cheshire East and has a strong focus on sharing best practice.

I strongly believe that better trained and better prepared managers lead to better outcomes for people. I therefore actively encourage other managers in my network to support the development of an aspiring manager in their organisations to assist with business continuity.

Members of our network group have started to share best practice by visiting one another in their different establishments. We work hard to use evidence-based practice. This approach is one way for us to share information and drive up quality and standards. As a registered nurse I know only too well about the importance of information sharing.

Many of the managers attending our network have benefited from being mentored by more experienced registered managers and are now more aware of the services that others provide. This allows us to tap into these and think about how joint working can benefit the experiences of our service users. For example, we have domiciliary care service users using salons and activities in residential care homes and care home service users accessing activities in the local community.

We’re looking to build on this all the time and we have plans to grow the work we are already doing and forge further relationships between providers and encourage various ways of joint working. One practical step for us is to set up an online forum for the network this year.

The networks’ ethos of information sharing and collaboration isn’t limited to care providers. At the request of managers we have invited representatives from the CQC and the police to attend future network meetings. We have very positive working relationships with these parties. Managers at the network felt that in order to clarify some of the important questions, in particular the safeguarding agenda, personal assistants (PAs) being unregulated and the new inspection regime, it would be useful to have these parties present.

Ultimately, the networks approach benefits everyone involved, from service providers, the CQC and the police; and most importantly it provides better outcomes for service users and their families.

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