This episode focuses on leadership skills and style - in particular the crucial role of feedback which can sometimes be seen as mainly about staff performance and a less comfortable or even fear-inducing aspect of any kind of leadership or supervisory role. Our guests today are keen to discuss and demonstrate how feedback is a much broader part of developing your own leadership style and something that can help build trust, transparency and supportive culture in your team or particular context. ...
Jun 27, 2025•34 min•Season 1Ep. 6
Season 1, episode 5. This episode is about how to safeguard children with special educational needs and disabilities from sexual exploitation. We’ll be discussing recent research and findings related to modern slavery and the heightened risk that children with SEND are at across England and Wales, as well as the importance of early identification and working with the whole family. Our expert guest is Sarah Goff – associate researcher at Manchester Metropolitan university. Questions are asked by ...
May 30, 2025•29 min•Season 1Ep. 5
Season 1, episode 4 This episode focuses on dealing with change and loss as a result of becoming physically disabled as an adult, and how practitioners can support individuals who are coming to terms with the impact of disability on their body and their lives. The guest is Rebecca Regler, a lived experience worker. Rebecca qualified as a social worker 10 years ago but didn’t get the chance to put her training into practice because soon after graduating she was diagnosed with the connective tissu...
Apr 15, 2025•27 min•Season 1Ep. 4
This episode discusses perinatal mental health. Approximately one in five women in the UK experience mental health issues during pregnancy and up to one year after birth, and if left untreated they can lead to long-lasting effects on mothers, infants and the wider family. In recent years, significant funding has been invested in specialist perinatal mental health services but there are disparities in access to these services and experiences with health and social care professionals. This episode...
Mar 28, 2025•47 min•Season 1Ep. 3
This episode discusses domestic abuse within young people's relationships. It explores the intricicies around age and statutory and voluntary support services available for young people. This episode provides practical tips on how practitioners can address risks with young people and their parents/carers - such as how to structure conversations, and the key indicators of risks that shoud be considered when working with young people who are at risk of, or who have experienced abuse. Multiple asse...
Feb 28, 2025•25 min•Season 1Ep. 2
This episode discusses the issues around mental capacity and suicide, and what has been called the ‘you’ve got capacity to choose to kill yourself phenomenon’. The guest is Alex Ruck Keene, an experienced barrister, writer and educator. His practice at 39 Essex Chambers is focused on mental capacity, mental health and healthcare law, in which he has appeared in cases at all levels up to and including The Supreme Court and the European Court of Human Rights.Alex is the creator of the website Ment...
Jan 28, 2025•29 min•Season 1Ep. 1
This episode of Learn on the go is about domestic violence and abuse. It covers what domestic violence and abuse is; the various forms it can take, and how to risk assess and make referrals. This episode explores a domestic violence risk assessment tool called the CAADA DASH, as well as the purpose and importance of multi-agency risk assessment conferences known as MARAC, and how these are used to bring professionals together to support victims of domestic abuse. The expert guest is Jenifer Lama...
Oct 31, 2024•30 min
Ethan’s in his early 30s now. He was in foster care from the age of five and then in children’s homes from the age of 11. In this conversation we speak about staying in touch with and seeing family members while in care. You'll hear the word ‘contact’ quite a bit - the word that was very much in use when Ethan was young. We hope this makes sense when you listen, while we know practitioners today increasingly recognise the importance of using language that suits the individual child, whether that...
Jun 14, 2024•33 min
Welcome to Learn On The Go, the podcast from Community Care Inform where we discuss research, theories and practice issues and look at what they mean for social care practitioners. In this episode we talk to Jenny Molloy, motivational speaker, trainer, care leaver and bestselling author of three books with a fourth about to be published. Her first book, Hackney Child, written under the pen name Hope Daniels, describes Jenny’s childhood and how at the age of nine she walked into Stoke Newington p...
Mar 26, 2024•39 min
In this episode, Helen, a facilitator of The Freedom Programme which supports victms and survivors of domestic abuse, and two other mothers with lived experience spoke to Jenny Molloy, bestselling author, motivational speaker and care leaver about their experiences with children's services and what support is most helpful for people in abusive relationships. The conversation was recorded on location at Trevi, the charity that supports women and children . As well as community support for women a...
Feb 08, 2024•19 min
In this episode, Helen, Vicky and Hannah, spoke to Jenny Molloy, bestselling author, motivational speaker and care leaver about their experiences of children's services as mothers using, and in recovery from, drugs and alcohol. They share what did and didn't help them, and what they would like social workers to understans. The conversation was recorded on location at Jasmine Mother's Recovery Centre, part of Trevi, the charity that supports women and children. Find out more about the centre and ...
Feb 08, 2024•47 min
In this episode, two expert guests discuss media coverage, blame and shame of social workers. The guests are Dr Liz Frost, associate professor of social work at the University of the West of England, and Dr Maria Leedham, senior lecturer in applied linguistics at the Open University. They discuss Maria’s research into mentions of social workers in UK newspapers and TV dramas, why media coverage almost entirely focuses on child protection, and whether there are signs that this negative bias might...
Dec 13, 2023•36 min
In this episode, we discuss the social work role in working with girls and women affected by female genital mutilation (FGM) and safeguarding children at risk. Our two guests bring their perspectives from both practice and research to try and help increase practitioners’ knowledge and confidence. You’ll hear about ways to keep anti-oppressive and anti-racist practice, personal reflection and supervision central to your work – both to avoid stigmatising and causing further harm to affectees, and ...
Oct 20, 2023•35 min
Welcome to Learn on the go, a Community Care Inform podcast where we discuss the latest research, practice models and policy guidance and what they mean to your practice. This episode looks at the Care Quality Commission's new duty, under the Health and Care Act 2022, to assess how local authorities are meeting their Care Act duties. The assessment framework has nine quality statements mapped across four overall themes: working with people; providing support; how the local authority ensures safe...
Sep 11, 2023•15 min
Welcome to this podcast from Community Care for our campaign Choose Social Work. The purpose of the campaign is to champion the profession, encourage the next generation of social workers, and counteract negative media coverage. As part of this, we’re talking to those with lived experience of care about the impact that good social work can have. Our guest is Luke Rodgers, founder and now director of strategy for The Care Leaders, a social enterprise that works with children’s services providing ...
Aug 29, 2023•36 min
In this episode, we spoke to Dan about his experience of the care system and transition to adulthood. He gives his perspective on what being 'ambitious' for children in care should look like, reflections on use of language and practical support for young people going into adulthood. He also shares his thoughts to how professionals view supported accommodation and 'independence' and changes that he feels could make a big difference. Dan spoke too about his positive experiences of social work and ...
Aug 03, 2023•47 min
Welcome to Learn on the go, a Community Care Inform podcast where we discuss research, theories and practice issues, and look at what they mean for social care practitioners. This episode is about personality disorder, in itself a controversial term because many people find it stigmatising. Guests are Keir Harding and Hollie Berrigan from Beam Consultancy which provides training, consultancy and intervention for those living with complex mental health issues. They discuss why personality disorde...
Feb 20, 2023•31 min
Welcome to Learn on the Go, a podcast from Community Care Inform, where we discuss research, theories and practice issues, and look at what they mean for practitioners in social care. This episode is about the menopause and the discussion focuses on some of the less well-known symptoms and the impact they can have on women at work; why understanding the menopause and supporting women through it is particularly relevant for the social care sector; and the difference between a statement of intent ...
Oct 14, 2022•27 min
Welcome to Learn on the go, a Community Care Inform podcast where we discuss what the latest research, practice models and policy guidance mean to your practice. This episode is about restorative practice in children's social work. It covers what restorative practice is, what it looks like in practice with children and families and in an organisational culture, and what it might mean to implement it as an individual practitioner as well as at a service-wide level. The guests are Mark Finnis, fou...
Jul 26, 2022•35 min
Welcome to Learn on the Go, a podcast from Community Care Inform, where we discuss the latest research, theories and practice issues, and look at what they mean for social workers. This episode is about safeguarding and homelessness. It covers key lessons from safeguarding adults reviews and gives practice advice for social workers working with people who are homeless and have complex needs, experience multiple exclusions, and/or are self-neglecting. Discussing these questions are Michael Presto...
May 25, 2022•57 min
Welcome to Learn on the go, a Community Care Inform podcast where we discuss what the latest research, practice models and policy guidance mean for your practice. This is our second episode looking at approaches to practice around children’s networks. We discuss the Lifelong Links model with: Pam Ledward, principal social work advisor at Family Rights Group (the charity that developed the model); Eathan, a young person who has built relationships with his uncle, cousins, sister and other family ...
May 20, 2022•50 min
Welcome to Learn on the go, a Community Care Inform podcast where we discuss what the latest research, practice models and policy guidance mean for your practice. This episode, which follows subscribers' requests for resources around children's networks and connections, is about the Family Finding/Family Seeing model which hails from the US but is now being used in other countries, including by several local authorities in the UK. We spoke to Kevin Campbell, the model's author who has over 30 ye...
Mar 18, 2022•33 min
Welcome to Learn on the go, a Community Care Inform podcast where we discuss what the latest research, practice models and policy guidance mean to your practice. This episode is about attachment-based trauma and parenting. Dr Alice Loving, an independent parenting assessment and intervention practitioner, interviews two practitioners, one local authority team manager and one children's social worker about their professional experience of working with parents who have experienced childhood trauma...
Feb 09, 2022•36 min
Welcome to Learn on the go, a Community Care Inform podcast where we discuss what the latest research, practice models and policy guidance mean for your practice. This episode is about sibling sexual abuse. We spoke to Anna Glinski, deputy director, knowledge and practice development, at the Centre of expertise on child sexual abuse (the CSA Centre, for short) and Stuart Allardyce, a director of the Lucy Faithfull Foundation with responsibilities for Stop It Now! Scotland, who is one of the auth...
Jul 13, 2021•28 min
Join Community Care Inform's head of content and UNISON's national secretary as they discuss the social work impact of Covid-19, and launch a new resource to support social workers' mental health.
Mar 15, 2021•8 min
In this episode, we discuss anti-racist social work in the context of the Black Lives Matter protests that have swept the US and the UK in response to the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis at the end of May. In the UK over the past ten years black people have accounted for 8% of those who have died in police custody, while accounting for only 3% of the UK population as a whole. Black people are four times as likely to be detained under the Mental Health Act as white people. And research has...
Jul 09, 2020•37 min
Welcome to Learn on the go, a Community Care Inform podcast where we discuss what the latest research, practice models and policy guidance mean to your practice. This episode in our mini series about practice during the coronavirus pandemic is about fear and social work. It covers how fear can impact on practice, what helps social workers maintain concerns at a manageable level, support from managers and particular sources of fear during the pandemic such as lack of PPE, whether vulnerable child...
Jun 25, 2020•24 min
We know social workers are working harder than ever in the challenging conditions brought about by the Covid-19 pandemic. To help meet your need for information and guidance we’re developing a mini-series of podcasts and webinars about coronavirus and how it’s affecting social work practice. Our expert guest was Claudia Megele, chair of the Principal Child and Family Social Worker Network. The episode covers: - When it's appropriate to conduct an online visit, rather than a home visit. - Best pr...
Jun 11, 2020•24 min
Welcome to Learn on the go, a Community Care Inform podcast where we discuss what the latest research, practice models and policy guidance mean for your practice. This episode is on contextual safeguarding. We talk about what the approach entails, what it looks like in practice, and also discuss how work with young people been affected by the Covid-19 pandemic. Discussing these questions are Dr Carlene Firmin who developed the contextual safeguarding framework and leads the contextual safeguardi...
Jun 04, 2020•38 min
We know social workers are working harder than ever in the challenging conditions brought about by the Covid-19 pandemic. To help meet your need for information and guidance we’re developing a mini-series of podcasts and webinars about coronavirus and how it’s affecting social work practice. Our expert guest was Dr David Wilkins, senior lecturer at Cardiff University with a research focus on good supervision in child and family social work. The episode covers: - How supervision can be effective ...
May 28, 2020•21 min
