Gill Phillips 00:11
My name is Gill Phillips and I'm the creator of Whose Shoes a popular approach to coproduction. I was named as an HSJ 100 Wild Card and want to help give a voice to others talking about their ideas and experiences. I'll be chatting with people from all sorts of different perspectives, walking in their shoes. If you are interested in the future of healthcare, and like to hear what other people think, or perhaps even contribute at some point, Whose Shoes Wild Card is for you.
Gill Phillips 00:45
Today, I'm delighted to talk to the person who helps bring our Whose Shoes events alive and ensures they have lasting impact. Our combined approach to coproduction has been described as magic, it's definitely a case of one and one equals more than two. So I wanted to take the opportunity to kick off the new year by talking to my long term friend and partner in crime Anna Geyer, Director of New Possibilities, looking back at what we've achieved together, and looking forward to what the future might bring. It’s always such a fascinating and sometimes unpredictable journey together. Not least with everything we've had to change and develop during the pandemic. I'd like to offer huge congratulations to Anna and her team who are celebrating 20 years of New Possibilities. What a fantastic achievement that is for a micro business. When I first invented the Whose Shoes board game and jumped ship from my day job back in 2008, I never knew that I'd find a partner who would add so much to what I was trying to achieve. Visual recording enables people to hold on to the conversations and ensure they lead to real action and positive change. So let's hear a little bit more about Anna as a person. Welcome Anna, can you tell us a bit more about yourself and what's important to you?
Anna Geyer 02:10
I certainly can do thank you that's... I like being your partner in crime. I like the fact that we've been on a journey together. That's really nice and lovely introduction. So tell me a bit about me. I'm an outdoors person. I love being outdoors and paddleboarding and cold-water swimming at any available opportunity. But we're probably supposed to be talking a bit more about me as a person at work.
Gill Phillips 02:33
It's all part of it, isn't it your paddleboarding? Putting your mum on the back of the paddleboard
Anna Geyer 02:39
and having adventures and not knowing where the journey will take you. So there are parallels. So I do visual, I'm a visual practitioner, is how I would describe myself these days. But like you say New Possibilities is 20 years old. So we came about offering training and facilitation to staff who are working with people with learning disabilities, predominantly. And that is going back to 2001 There was a launch of a white paper called Valuing People. And within that there was a bit about how do you ensure that people with learning disabilities are respected and valued and are encouraged to lead the lives they want to live outside of institutional care. So that's where we came from. And part and parcel of that was doing visual minuting of their meetings. And it was a way of engaging people and making sure that their voices were heard, and gathering different perspectives. So I guess that's what's important to me in the work. Now that's carried right through to today. So being able to represent people voices, is what's important to me. And in order to do that, it's that bit of listening, and really taking care of making sure that you're representing people's voices in a way that supports them to be heard, but also supports people to be able to take some action as a result of hearing it. So yeah, I think that's, that's how I would describe what's important to me.
Gill Phillips 04:15
And that's... I can't actually think when we very first came together, but that was coinciding with my journey at the time working for social care within a council, sometimes using New Possibilities as a provider and getting involved in those sort of events. And definitely when I came to move on and create Whose Shoes, it was exactly around that it was around getting really passionate about personalisation and personalised approaches. And then obviously becoming two small businesses together and creating our story together over it must be about 10 years now. I think.
Anna Geyer 04:50
I think it must be at least 10 years and I do remember, I remember the first time I met you and it was it was in BVSC which is Birmingham Voluntary Service Council. There was a room there. And I think it was Janita that introduced us.
Gill Phillips 05:04
Okay. So Janita was our partnership board lead for learning disabilities at Coventry City Council, where I was working a very passionate, special person.
Anna Geyer 05:14
Yeah. And I think that's what's happened, actually, you know, during our journey is about connecting with people who are passionate about making a difference in various different ways. But you're absolutely right. In your introduction, you talked about the combination of the board game, your board game, which brings people into a room and completely changes the atmosphere and the environment, puts people at ease in order to be able to have some really difficult conversations and really hear what people are experiencing in terms of service delivery, both from a staff perspective, and for people that use the services. So that in combination of creating that great environment for people to have good conversations, and then for the visual minuting, or the visual recording, to capture those conversations, real time, and then feed it back to people is incredibly powerful. You know, there's something that happens, I think, when you spend some time in a room and you have conversations, and you know that they've been really good conversations that you've had, but to have that reflected back to you. And to see it, there is a record so that you can see what's being taken away at the end of that session, one it leaves people feeling that they've been really quite productive, because they can't believe that they've just filled a whole three metre length of paper
Gill Phillips 06:36
and produce an avalanche of post-its for you.
Anna Geyer 06:39
Absolutely an avalanche of post-its of thoughts. So that there's that bit of productivity, wow, have we done all of that? And then there's something about being able to identify their own voice. So the number of people that come up and point at the visual that's been created and say, that's what I said, we said this, that's our conversation, you know, so that bit of validation is really important, isn't it for people, particularly for people who've used services, for them to be able to feel that they've been heard? And I think that's what the visual record does. They can see it makes it tangible. It makes a physical artefact, really I think, that they know that they've been heard, and they can see it, and then, you know, it then takes on its own life, doesn't it? Really?
Gill Phillips 07:26
Yeah, it really does. And I think we talked together about creating the conditions for these conversations. And I suppose, you know, we can be a bit naughty together can't we in terms of you must come along, you must have open, honest conversations now because we need it for the CQC. It's not how it works, is it and people can tell if you actually value them. I mean, some of the work we've done, I remember a really early workshop with a domiciliary care provider, who had never met their actual clients, a small company, who were keen to actually meet the clients and the work that went on behind the scenes, not just to invite people, but to nurture them, to encourage them to, to offer transport, to set it up in conjunction with a little gardening display to make it really fun and enjoyable for people so that they want to be part of it, and they feel their voices are valued. That's an experience, isn't it? I think that's the word I'm looking for. Because when we were talking before, Anna, I realised the challenge of our podcast is people say to me, what's Whose Shoes? Well, it's a highly visual, it's an experiential thing, really. And obviously, the visual recording by definition, all the more so. So to try and describe something as an audio is quite a challenge, really. And we say to people to come along to an event and actually experience it in practice, and then they get it.
Anna Geyer 08:48
Yeah, that's right. So I'm just thinking that maybe in my introduction, I should have said something about what is visual minuting, because there'll be lots of people who won't know that won't know what a visual practitioner is. So it might be worth me just trying to explain a bit of that for those people that are thinking, what on earth's all that about then?
Gill Phillips 09:06
That'd be good. Yeah.
Anna Geyer 09:08
So as a visual practitioner, I come to events, usually they're engagement events, where people are having conversations anywhere, really where people are having conversations and trying to work out what needs to change, is a good forum to have a visual practitioner. And so I work with Carrie Lewis, who's an associate that works with me and the two of us will pitch up to events, and will listen to those conversations and capture them in words and images and colour to bring to life, the conversations that are taking place, and that all happens on a large sheet of paper that's three metres in length. And we start with a blank canvas. And by the end of that session, it will be full. I'm talking just even an hour and a half to two hours, and it will be filled with people's comments. and experiences. So that's what my form of visual practice is predominantly about, capturing engagement events. And I think that's the bit that's important to me. It's engagement events that really feed me in terms of being able to do a good job because it's about representing people's voices.
Gill Phillips 10:20
And I think that's what I love about the way you do the recording. It's so authentic, and to literally start with a blank canvas, because sometimes people have got pre-set themes that they think you might want to put as huge words on the blank canvas at the beginning. But although they might have I mean, in the case of the work that we do together, we have scenarios and poems, and it's very much within the design of Whose Shoes that people choose the actual scenarios and poems to some extent that are relevant to what their event is about and what they're hoping to achieve. But it doesn't necessarily mean, and it shouldn't mean, that all the conversations are around those set topics, the conversations need to be around what people need to talk about. And that's the genuine coproduction.
Anna Geyer 11:04
That's it, absolutely. And I think that that's fascinating, because you're right, you know, there will be conversations about so what should the focus of this workshop be? And let's think about the cards that might help those conversations to happen. But what you know is that when people step into the room, it doesn't matter what the scenarios are, if they have something that they need to tell you, they'll find a way of weaving it into whatever card is turned. If they've got something that they need you to hear. They'll say it, regardless of whether or not it fits into your themed scenarios or not, you know, it's the conversations that need to happen, happen.
Gill Phillips 11:42
And that's what we try and describe to the people running the event, that there's no such thing as going off piste, you know that you don't come back to the scenario and say, oh, hang on a minute, we've gone a bit off track, let's go back to what we're meant to be talking about. It's not meant to be that sort of approach, it's like you say, pulling out the conversations that need to happen.
Anna Geyer 12:01
And so that bit of people trying to say, okay, so we're going to have these themes, so it'd be really great if we could organise the information around these themes. And I know, in my heart of hearts, that with the best intentions, we can try and shoehorn them into those themes. But actually, other themes might come out. And then they're telling you things that are important to people. So it's that voice that kind of comes through, it's the power of that voice that comes through the post-it's that I've learned over the years to be much more fluid and relaxed about actually, the themes that come out will be the things that are important to this group at this time around these tables playing this particular game.
Gill Phillips 12:46
And I think that can be a real challenge to people in terms of real coproduction, because they might have their pre-written draft strategy that they're hoping to use the Whose Shoes event to try out. But it's far better if they get involved in coproduction when they're putting together their strategy and use those conversations to shape what the strategy is going to be.
Anna Geyer 13:07
Absolutely, absolutely.
Gill Phillips 13:10
So I think in terms of when we get involved. And that's the other thing I wanted to reflect on, really Anna, just the different organisations we see, all the different topics, at what stage they're involving us, why they're involving us, how the kind of culture in the room feels, whether people feel able to speak out, whether they're used to speaking altogether, different voices, no hierarchy, just people with all the people who either are or should be involved in their topic. It's fascinating.
Anna Geyer 13:39
It is fascinating. And you know, when it comes to events that we do together, that where people have gone the extra mile and are feeling quite nervous about whether or not this is going to be good that it's usually they've got the right ingredients,
Gill Phillips 13:58
Yes.
Anna Geyer 13:58
because they've put an awful lot of thought and effort and energy into it. And that shines through, right from the buzz that's in the room to the messages that come through, and an openness because, you know, sometimes I'm recording some really hard-hitting experiences that you can't ignore, really important that they're captured. And I always find it interesting hearing some of the stories about where some of these big records are displayed. And I know that one CCG, who had a copy of a visual minute from one of the Whose Shoes workshops, had put it up on the wall outside their office. And it's nice because you know there are times when you keep going back to organisations or like that you say that partnership. So there might be a hospital that's working with the CCG that's working with local providers. So there's a real network of partnership in the way they're working. But anyway, this CCG has their poster up on the wall outside the office and people were stopping and looking at it and wanting to know what it was about. And the one time I went back to this organisation, they said, it's been brilliant because we've been trying to have a conversation with education and children's services for as long as I can remember. But now we've got that record on the wall outside. Somebody from that department was walking along and was interested and asked some questions. And it was the first time we've had a conversation. And I've been trying to have this conversation with them for ages. But this was my opportunity. So there's that kind of impromptu spontaneous conversations that can come out of an event, but also of the record itself, that enables people to continue. So you have great conversations in the room. And then they see the record, out of context. And they're intrigued, and they ask questions, and before they know it, they're sucked into having some really deep and meaningful conversations and thinking, oh, yeah, we need to do something about that. So there's the breadth of people that you can connect with. But then there's also the breadth of subjects that we talk about, for Whose Shoes you've got subjects that range from dementia care, to maternity care, to bereavement support to ... which I mean, it's just, it's huge, isn't it?
Gill Phillips 16:21
It is huge.
Anna Geyer 16:22
Covers all sorts of boundaries there.
Gill Phillips 16:24
And then all the common themes that come through, regardless of the topic that we're talking about, because it's all about people and united by vulnerability, and who is it who doesn't want to be listened to, who is it that doesn't want to feel valued to feel their voices being heard, and the whole thing around, you know, I never wanted to make a complaint, I just wanted to be listened to and for my experience to help somebody else, so that it doesn't happen, whether it's a big thing or a smaller thing. So many... , it is really fascinating, what we discover, I think
Anna Geyer 16:56
That just really wanting to be listened to has just reminded me just looking back again, and I guess my experience and knowing how powerful visual minuting is. So when I worked in the local authority, we were asked to do some person-centred planning, which involved using visual minuting to record the meetings. And often, we were called in when things were getting really difficult. And in one situation, we were called into work with a family who were... the case itself was going through a judicial review. And one of the things that the family said to us while we were going through the process was do you know what, this is the first time we've ever been listened to. Well, in all of our experience, this is the first time people have actually listened to us. And I knew that that wasn't the case, because they'd had a stream of social workers in and out of their door. And it needed to be a new social worker. And then there was another social worker, and this family was badged as being really difficult. But I think that it was more that they hadn't actually felt that they had been heard. And it's that bit of being heard and being listened to, you know, the listening is the making meaning of what you've heard. And I think that when people experience having really being listened to, just can help move things forward. If you can just say, yeah, I understand what you've just told me, I've heard what you've told me, This is what I understand reflecting back to, and that's what we're doing with the visual minute, isn't it? We're, we're listening very carefully. We're not engaging in a conversation. But we're listening, and we're reflecting and making meaning of what it is that is being said and presenting that back to people to demonstrate that they've been heard and listened to. And I guess it's that bit. It's all that bit of magic that happens in visual recording.
Gill Phillips 18:50
And I think it's the combination, that feeling works every which way. So combining it back with the Whose Shoes approach for people to understand different perspectives. So that kind of you can almost see the body language change and that sigh, that relaxation, that you've come together as people and you didn't understand that, you know, perhaps the system that people are working in, and the fact that the midwives, for example, might not have had a break, just understanding different people's struggles. And then working together, that's the coproduction bit, to come up with solutions, and then combine with the pledges for people to realise that it's not about what they must do, that actually they can take individual ownership and responsibility.
Anna Geyer 19:34
Yeah, that's right. And I remember one Whose Shoes event where there were some young mums that had come and they were sitting together, they didn't want to separate themselves out. They weren't happy with the experience that they had. And they said at the end of the session, I really didn't feel that I wanted to be here. You know, there was this group of mums and their babies that were kind of tight together. And you would have expected if they really didn't want to be there that they would have come and done their duty and left as soon as the session had finished. But they hung around and they said, Do you know what? That was just the best experience. You know, I came thinking that I wouldn't have my voice heard and you wouldn't understand. But now I actually understand hearing what staff have to say, I understand. And you could just feel that the wind had been taken out of their sails a bit, you know, they were just like, Oh,right. Okay. I get it. There's more than one perspective here. And actually, I understand more now, why I experienced what I experienced, having listened to somebody else's perspective,
Gill Phillips 20:33
Which you'd never get from something like friends and family where you just write on a piece of paper. And that's it, and it just goes into some kind of box or something and then you may or may not hear what happens. I was going to say what happened as a result. I think in terms of coproduction, the very best people are involving people, right the way through the whole process. So in terms of what the event's about, and certainly the people that come back and do repeat Whose Shoes events, if you like, which I think Lewisham and Greenwich hold the record, I think is it 14?
Anna Geyer 21:05
I don't know. They've done a huge number of events definitely.
Gill Phillips 21:10
And Cornwall with their regular annual events, other people perhaps using it a little bit more creatively as an imbedded approach to quality improvement, it's quite fascinating how people use the tools, and then how big an event it has to be, you know obviously, you can have a small group of people around a board game, and you wouldn't necessarily need or realistically be able to always bring Anna down from Birmingham. But then I was thinking it's funny how thoughts jump around that event that we had with Catherine with just one copy of the board game in Birmingham. Possibly, for me, one of the most powerful, moving events that we've done.
Anna Geyer 21:47
That was incredible, wasn't it? And again, you know, that some such hard-hitting messages that was about people who were falling through the gap, wasn't it? It was Nobody's Patient's materials,
Gill Phillips 22:00
It was.
Anna Geyer 22:00
that you were developing. And hearing people's experience of baby loss and at the different stages throughout pregnancy. Was very emotive isn't it? And, you know, there's a worry that people won't want to open up. But actually, people really value the opportunity to talk about their experience, particularly around childbirth, because it's a lifelong experience, isn't it? You know, it's something that it stays with you. So actually listening to people's experiences where they may have lost a baby or had a really difficult pregnancy and lost their baby during pregnancy. They're hard subjects to talk about and hard subjects to listen to. And so you have this real sense of responsibility of how do I, how do I do this justice? How do I make sure that people's voices are being heard. And if you haven't seen visual minuting, and you have an image of words, and images and colour, you know, you might think that that has a risk of doing disservice to people's voices. So it's not about cartooning or... I think very carefully about the way in which I represent things. And I use a lot of speech bubbles, and use people's words, and use a representation of a person rather than trying to do a caricature. But it feels like it's really important to capture the words that people use themselves to describe something because there's nothing more powerful. I think that quite often what happens when you have a huge volume of content. It's quite easy, when you're typing up that kind of information, to sterilise it.
Gill Phillips 23:51
Yes.
Anna Geyer 23:51
And group things together, and sanitise it
Gill Phillips 23:55
Yeah.
Anna Geyer 23:55
maybe, you know, they're all quite harsh words, aren't they? But there's something about capturing something that's live in the moment, trying to capture the energy and the mood and the emotion that's in the room with that. That is incredibly powerful. And I think I've had people come and ask me to write some things into the graphic that if they haven't seen it there, maybe they haven't felt able to write it down on a post-it note, they might have come up to me afterwards and said, This is my experience. And I've said, so would you like me to write it using those words? And they've said, Yes, that's exactly how I want it to be written.
Gill Phillips 24:32
Yeah.
Anna Geyer 24:33
So I know that being a visual practitioner, I'm in a very powerful position, because I'm the one holding the pens
Gill Phillips 24:38
Yes,
Anna Geyer 24:39
but I really want to be channelling people's voices. And this isn't my voice. I don't change the words. I try to group things together and connect things to give meaning. So that might be about connecting opposites. contradictions in what's being said,
Gill Phillips 24:55
Yes.
Anna Geyer 24:55
or it might be about giving the balance of two different perspectives. But whatever I'm doing, I'm trying to use their language and also trying to feed in some of the energy through the shapes and the imagery that's used, but never getting graphic about stuff... stuff from bereavement loss, dying, serious violence, drug abuse, I'm not going to be depicting. I don't try and draw
Gill Phillips 25:26
Yes, yeah.
Anna Geyer 25:27
things that represent that, it's much more about the words and the, the shape of that, and some of the energy that goes with that, that will capture it, rather than trying to imagine what that looks like in someone's head.
Gill Phillips 25:40
Yeah, yeah. And I think what I find really interesting is how it can uncover things that say, take a very powerful term, Nobody's Patient, it was about people falling through the gaps. Well sometimes the experiences and the way that they're told to us come out in a very negative way. For example, I'm going back to that event in Birmingham, again, that perhaps someone had to go back to work. And they'd had something like spontaneous abortion or medical abortion, that word written on their discharge note, to go back to work, which gives all the wrong impression of their much loved lost, baby. And actually, it was because the doctor had to choose words from a pre-scripted form about what the reason for discharge was, well, who can alter that, and you suddenly get like deeper and deeper into, the doctor wouldn't have wanted to tick that inappropriate box, but that was the only one available. And it just goes like deeper and deeper in terms of well who can make these changes, to make sure that people's experiences are as good as they can be.
Anna Geyer 26:56
And language is just one of those themes that come out time and time again, the language that is used in the medical profession, and how alienating that can be for someone who's experiencing services being described in a particular way, or having had a particular procedure that suggests that it was about their fault, or their blame, or their choice to have something done to them is just as incredible, isn't it? And I think that yeah, if you look back, that's the other thing you mean, you can look back over these records. They're a snapshot in time, aren't there?
Gill Phillips 27:30
Yeah.
Anna Geyer 27:31
You know, you can look back over them and guaranteed around maternity experiences around dementia experiences around the experience of bereavement, that language, language will come out through, you know, the way in which words are used to engage with people, and the impact, the lasting impact, that that leaves for people is massive.
Gill Phillips 27:54
And I think, you know, on a more positive side, if you like, in terms of the impact that we've made in terms of changing that language, you know, that we get these lemon lightbulb moments where someone thinks, Well, I didn't mean it to be heard in that way. I never realised that the words that I learned at medical school, you know, don't have to be the words that I use with the patient, actually it's a person standing in front of me.
Anna Geyer 28:15
Absolutely. And you get that from the pledges. Don't you, you know, all those pledges that come out? And they often say, right, I'm not going to use that language anymore. I'm not going to say you're allowed to do this, or you're not allowed to do that? Because that's not my... I don't have the right to allow you.
Gill Phillips 28:31
Yeah.
Anna Geyer 28:32
And that changes the relationship, doesn't it? So all those kinds of conversations that people have that are around their experience, and often coming back down to the communication and the language, people can do something about that. That's not about resources,
Gill Phillips 28:47
No.
Anna Geyer 28:48
that's about attitudes and behaviours. And I think that that's what people see quite clearly from the records that are produced from a Whose Shoes workshop that it's so much about behaviour, attitudes, language, communication.
Gill Phillips 29:04
And then in terms of what people can do as a result of it. So it might be a pledge, or it might be something like a team challenge. So Leeds, for example, did a language challenge and had a bit of like a swear box if people were using the words that they decided that... it's not somebody external, telling them what to say it's their team, deciding we need to do something about this, and it can even lead to clinicians writing poems, because... it can indeed, because FabObsFlo, so Florence Wilcock, wrote on a train her poem for our mind and body perinatal mental health project, 'Reassured' because she'd suddenly realised that when she explains things to the women who come in front of her and oh, actually that's a problem but medically that's okay, you know, this is how your body works. And then she writes, 'reassured' on her clinical notes, and possibly the woman goes home and says, What the hell was that about, I didn't know what she was talking about, she realised that it's not up to the medical profession to decide I've reassured someone, it's up to that person to decide that isn't it really?
Anna Geyer 30:13
And they're not necessarily going to say, Here, let me just write in your notes that I feel reassured.
Gill Phillips 30:20
But those things, and then that's such a fantastic resource, and then being able to use that, that was written up as a proper poem for our Whose Shoes resources to be able to use that then in a future workshop, and then for someone to perhaps read that and have a reaction that then feeds through to your graphic record from that event and makes people think, that's how the cycle of improvement and impact happens. I think.
Anna Geyer 30:42
But there's not only the visual records that are captured at the end of each event, there's what happens to that. So the number of people that I've spoken to they've said, Oh yeah, I've seen your stuff. It's all over Twitter, isn't it? And I know that you're partly responsible for that, Gill.
Gill Phillips 31:00
I do. I do tweet quite a lot.
Anna Geyer 31:03
But I also think there's something about people just being able to take a snapshot of something that is relevant for them and being able to... so for me, there's something in the value of communicating with a wider audience and finding a way that's kind of dynamic and live and in the moment. And so being able to come up to a record and just take a photo and then tweet that this is what we've been talking about. It works really well for social media, particularly where there's stuff around, you know whether or not people want to have their photos posted all over social media and whether or not they want their comments with their name by it banded around, you know that this was something that I want to be able to say, but I want to say it in a safe environment. And it's similar to the scenarios that you write that give people a voice. So you write a scenario on a card, that gives people a voice, it says what they're wanting to say, but don't have to own it, because it's written on a card. I think the same is true for the visual record, that people can go and take a photo and anonymously say, this is a really important message that came out, it might be their message. But actually it does... they don't need to own it. They can communicate it in a way that gives them anonymity, but allows them to say this is something that's really important and close to my heart.
Gill Phillips 32:27
Yeah, I think that's an aspect of Whose Shoes that a lot of people don't appreciate, really, that all the scenarios are crowdsourced. So they are actually a statement made by a real person in that actual role. And by kind of like starting the conversation with that actual person there. Obviously, they can't argue the point further, but you're hearing first-hand really, what they wanted to say. And you can again, see people just relaxing, we're having a conversation and perhaps a healthcare professional sitting there and thinking, well, this... what's all this about? This isn't even realistic. It doesn't reflect my reality. And then one of the scenarios pretty much says that. One of my clever friends so Murray, Professor Murray at the London Southbank University, calls it a nonhuman actor. So it's as if that person is there, but it's in a safe way with it coming from a board game. And people can perhaps play or get distracted by moving the little shoes or playing with the foam squares and so on. But it's enabling these very, very deep conversations to happen.
Anna Geyer 33:31
Yeah, absolutely. And that's the magic isn't we started off talking about this combination of the game and a visual record is just something that I think it takes coproduction to a different level.
Gill Phillips 33:45
I think it does.
Anna Geyer 33:46
You know, it's, it's much deeper than gathering some people together and having a conversation and having some people write some notes up and engaging people through a process. It's the whole experience, isn't it, of having open and honest conversations, but also having that then captured live, you walk out of the room, and you know what it is that's being taken away from that event.
Gill Phillips 34:09
And I think in terms of us developing our joint virtual offer, one of the reasons that I was initially reluctant was thinking, this is about an experience where people come together, there are hugs, there's cake, there's bunting, it's fun. If we're doing a sensitive event, then we'd have set it up very, very carefully. Possibly a bereavement midwife or a specialist, you know whoever it was there to look after people, a space to go outside during the meeting. So I was scared really taking the approach online to begin with, but we've ended up doing some incredibly sensitive events. And sometimes, obviously, we've all discovered all of us through the pandemic what's possible, but in terms of perhaps couples being able to be there be part of the event with their camera turned off without having to go back and physically get themselves to the place where perhaps they had a very hard experience. And I think the way that you've brought your visual offer online, Anna, with your studio lighting and flipping your camera around and so on has been absolutely extraordinary.
Anna Geyer 35:15
Yeah, absolutely. And I think so it's interesting, isn't it? Because I did both an in the room event, that was the same subject matter that we did online, so that online offline experience, and I think that the in the room event was probably one of the last events that I did before lockdown, and the pandemic,
Gill Phillips 35:36
It was March 2020 wasn't it, I remember,
Anna Geyer 35:39
Think it was actually the last event that I did before lockdown happened. And you're right, you know, there is that experience of being in the room. But that session online. Yeah, people experienced it differently. The outcome of it, you know, with the conversations that took place, and like you say, people were having their own experience there, they didn't have to be contributing, but they could be having a conversation, off camera, off mic, about their experience, and just observing and seeing how that panned out in terms of the session as it ran. But the result in terms of those records, it would be interesting, actually, to have a look at those two records side by side. I think they're both incredibly impactful in their own ways. Because yes, there were conversations that they were having. But we know that the online event has led to some fantastic outcomes for people don't we.
Gill Phillips 36:31
Yeah.
Anna Geyer 36:31
I think the other in the room event, it might be a bit more difficult to judge that because like we say, we hit the pandemic. And so that kind of shut things down in terms of trying to move things forward. But I'm sure that they will have things that have come out of that event, too.
Gill Phillips 36:46
So in terms of different events that we've held, and what the impact has been, what do you think are the ones that we're most proud of? Or just some different examples or some quotes, possibly from people?
Anna Geyer 37:00
So I think the one, the most recent one that we've done together stands out. And that's not just because it was the most recent one, but the one for Demelza.
Gill Phillips 37:10
So we were in a new subject area weren't we, a children's hospice and a face to face event after such a long gap during the pandemic.
Anna Geyer 37:20
Yeah. And the whole thought that had gone into how can we bring people in and create a safe environment as well as a relaxed environment to have some really difficult conversations around children's hospice care. So the room was all set out and well-spaced. You know, everybody was wearing masks, everyone followed the guidance in terms of wearing their masks and being respectful of their proximity to people and all that kind of thing. And anything that might have had an impact on how people were going to engage with it. So the reason that it stands out, I think, was, obviously it was a very emotive subject to be talking about, and lots of emotion was in the room. I know the person that organised it was feeling really nervous about whether or not she'd done enough. And you always know that, like I said earlier, the people that are worrying about how have I done enough, have gone over, above and beyond. And they just need to settle back, relax, and trust the process will be fine when they've put that amount of energy into it. Because the ingredients are all there, aren't they?
Gill Phillips 38:25
Yeah, all the little touches that she'd thought through and just that energy and that attention to detail. Amazing.
Anna Geyer 38:33
Absolutely amazing. And the conversations started, and it was all quite quiet. And I remember her saying to me, oh they're all very quiet, is it going to be okay? And I said, Just give them 10 minutes or so. They just need to settle in. And once they start talking, and there was laughter and there was tears, and there was noise and there was energy in there that was just palpable, really wasn't it?
Gill Phillips 38:56
It really was. Yeah. And then I think when they saw your graphic record, and you always report back, and I think it's an incredible skill, Anna, because you've got to switch, I've realised, that you've got to switch from a mindset of with a pen and post-its and recording to suddenly being able to verbalise what you've done and talk through live, the key points that have come through. So I don't know how you felt reporting that back to them, and then the emotion in the room and the reaction and the ownership.
Anna Geyer 39:24
And I think that that was the bit that stood out to me. One of these events that was a standout event was because when it came to that point of feeding back, I felt this wave of emotion kind of hit me. I mean, I have to say I struggled, being able to keep my voice together just to feed back to the room. I think everybody who stood at the front was met with this, and I really think that there was something about the conversations that they had. I was met with this sea of faces of we've just had really difficult conversations. You've just heard what we've said and you've just fed that back to us. Now we need to get on and do something about this, that kind of energy that was there to make something happen. And people were really appreciative, what they saw recorded on the graphic. And they came in, they had conversations with me, and it was great. I feel when that happens, I really feel part of the process with them. And that bit as I was saying, being a channel for their voice,
Gill Phillips 40:22
Yeah, is huge. And I felt really emotional, managing the pledges and we get people to... there's never any pressure, hopefully, we never like go round the tables and ask someone from each table to tell us their pledge. It's more, is there anyone who's so passionate about what they want to do that they want to share their pledge. And then you hear the most incredible things. I mean, obviously, we've all got, as leaders of the event as facilitators, we've got our own feelings and emotions to handle as well in terms of perhaps any personal experiences. And it was just so incredibly powerful, and you can feel people wanting to do something. And I think what I've found with Whose Shoes is very often, it's the organisations who are already very good. But they're the ones who want to hear from their people. They want to be able to find out extra things that they didn't know that they can improve, and there was that atmosphere there wasn't there.
Anna Geyer 41:17
Yeah, absolutely.
Gill Phillips 41:19
And in terms of unexpected outcomes, I think one of my absolute favourites was… wasn't there a woman in early stages of labour, and she came across, I think it was actually one of Carrie's graphics. And she was so fascinated by looking at that visual record that she said it was acting as pain relief.
Anna Geyer 41:37
So it's actually I think the story was that it was Carrie's friend
Gill Phillips 41:40
Oh, was it?
Anna Geyer 41:41
Yeah so it was Carrie's friend who had said to her while she was in labour, early stages of labour, I saw this record and I think it was one of mine, it might have even been one of the Lewisham hospitals. So she was there. And she saw this record on the wall. And she was just completely drawn into reading everything that was on it, that it took her mind off any kind of labour pains that she was experiencing. Obviously, graphic recording reaches the parts, that other analgesic can't do,
Gill Phillips 42:13
Clearly. So unexpected outcomes.
Anna Geyer 42:16
Unexpected outcomes. Absolutely.
Gill Phillips 42:18
I think one of my other favourites that I quote quite a lot, and the fact that it literally all came from a woman, you know, you think of only healthcare professionals, only senior leaders, people with positional power can make change. So the changes that happened at Liverpool was a direct result of Helen Calvert, a mum who wanted things to improve in various ways, and literally ultimately leading to a successful bid for a new neonatal unit, because they use coproduction and they used your images, Anna, to go back. And I remember, Jo Minford, the fantastic paediatric surgeon who led the work, saying we decided to unite behind those graphic records. And that inevitably, when things get difficult, you're trying to move forward. And people start to argue and say, Well, I think this and I think that, she said we'd all agreed that we'd say, well, it's no longer about what you think or what I think it's about what we said. And they'd go back and they revisited the graphic records, and use those, use that coproduction to think through what people had actually said and make it happen.
Anna Geyer 43:25
It's amazing, isn't it, and you just think it's so powerful, isn't it, and what a result, you know, to have that proposal agreed and to have a new neonatal unit built. And what you could see there were the rationale behind the need to have that Neonatal unit built where it was, was about keeping families together, it was about improving communication, because there were two sites that were involved. And so if you're able to remain on one site and receive the right kind of care and support just in one place, stop that to-ing and fro-ing. So you could see that the rationale behind the need for that neonatal unit to be built was very much about keeping the mother and baby and family together.
Gill Phillips 44:13
Together.
Anna Geyer 44:13
And staff supported to be able to provide the best kind of care. And if they were using the graphic to keep reminding themselves of the fact that that's because those are the voices that were coming through loud and clear. Yeah, that's just brilliant, isn't it?
Gill Phillips 44:27
It's huge. Yeah. And I think just perhaps, to finish, I was thinking of that event that we did for young parents in Birmingham, so again, an innovative event and quite a courageous event around young parents and with the focus on people who've been in care, and using your graphic record. And I think at the end of the event, somebody came up to you, was it, and said, and I wrote down the quote at the time, it would have taken 600 meetings to get to the point that we reached today.
Anna Geyer 44:56
Absolutely. And you're just like, Isn't that brilliant? And so that's the beauty of the Whose Shoes workshop bringing people together because the room was full, wasn't it?
Gill Phillips 45:05
Yeah, it was packed.
Anna Geyer 45:06
The room was full. And they hadn't had that long to organise it. And they didn't have a budget either, did they? But what they made happen in that moment was amazing. And the fact that they've had some feedback immediately from all of the conversations that have been happening in the room through that visual record, that feedback that happens at the end, feeling that and then making their pledges, to leave feeling so accomplished that you've achieved more than you would do in 600 meetings. That's pretty awesome, isn't it?
Gill Phillips 45:42
So one of our lemon light bulbs - meetings are overrated.
Anna Geyer 45:45
That's it? Absolutely.
Gill Phillips 45:50
So hopefully, that's given people a snapshot of what we do together, what we get up to. I think, if I put into the notes for the episode, some links to your website so that people can actually see the graphics and some of the visual stuff that we do, that will explain it a lot better, but hopefully, we've whet people's appetite, Anna.
Anna Geyer 46:09
Let's hope so, yeah. I've really enjoyed talking to you, Gill. It's been great.
Gill Phillips 46:13
And, you know, Anna, we haven't really talked about this being a New Year addition and Janus and looking backwards and forwards. I don't think we've looked forwards at all so perhaps that's another podcast. We'll do that one soon - part 2.
Anna Geyer 46:27
Let's do that!
Gill Phillips 46:28
Okay, that's brilliant. Thanks, Anna.
Anna Geyer 46:30
Thank you, Gill.
Gill Phillips 46:32
I hope you have enjoyed this episode. If so, please subscribe now to hear more of these fascinating conversations on your favourite podcast platform. And please leave a review. I tweet as @WhoseShoes. Thank you for being on this journey with me and let's hope that together, we can make a difference.