Re-imagining services

Scottish Social Services Council

• Successful engagement of a wide range of stakeholders
• Several new work streams for change

The Scottish Social Services Council (SSSC) is responsible for registering people who work in social services in Scotland and for regulating their education and training. The Scottish Parliament has asked them to increase local engagement but also recognise the significant funding constraints that all public services are under. The SSSC realised that to do this effectively they would have to re-imagine their services and how they are delivered.

SSSC asked Glasgow School of Art, where I am an external examiner, to explore this and facilitate workshops with a wide range of stakeholders – from education, the voluntary sector, the care sector, government and within the SSSC. Journey Associates completed the initial research and then I was asked to facilitate 10 workshops across Scotland, involving nearly 200 invitees. The workshops were held from Stornoway to Edinburgh; each was a one-day event with a cross-section of stakeholders. They were asked to comment on the initial research, then to imagine the ideal outcomes before we explored together how they might be delivered in the future.

The document that captured this work was incredibly well-received. The SSSC have accepted the report and the aspirations it contains; their response has been to plan a series of work streams, short-term and long, to address the issues we’ve identified.