Research issues | Health & Social Care Workforce:

by Martin Stevens

This question has bothered me since I started as a social services research officer in 1992. Attending the NIHR School for Social Care Research (SSCR) Workshop: Maximising Research Impact in Adult Social Care last week was a chance to ponder this question and, more usefully, to hear other people’s ponderings. The event was very well attended, with a mix of academic (including Jo Moriarty, Jess Harris and me from the Social Care Workforce Research Unit) and local authority staff, with a small number of people who use services and carers. First up was a panel discussion, in which Martin Webber (York University); (Chris Rainey (West Sussex Social Services Research); and Deborah Rutter (Social Care Institute for Excellence – SCIE) gave short introductory accounts, followed by a long question and answer session. Three presentations followed: Sarah Carr (SCIE) emphasised the roles of service users and carers; George Julian (Research in Practice for Adults) gave some practical aspects using research evidence; and Jonathan Grant and Molly Morgan Jones (RAND Europe) presented various approaches to measuring research impact in social care.

Naturally, in the presentations and discussions, there was a sense of frustration about apparent lack of change over the years. Best metaphor of the day was from the Unit’s own Jess Harris, talking about the need to ‘bite people on the bottom’ when trying to encourage the use of research in policy. These feelings are understandable, the issues and barriers raised by all speakers – time, resources, attitudes of practitioners, managers and policy makers, levels of training, understanding of research methods, lack of good quality research presented in easy to understand formats, seem to have been around during my whole career as a researcher.

More positively, there was a welcome emphasis on dialogue and engagement of different stakeholders. This is valuable as there has often been a somewhat mechanical view of research evidence as a lever to change practice. This simplistic approach ignores important contextual factors, such as practitioners’ low level of discretion, making the direct application of research problematic. A focus on the need for dialogue and engagement, together with the idea of co-production, suggests an acceptance of the complexity of linking research evidence with policy and practice change.

However, I was left with three questions that need more attention in order to optimise the impact of research in policy and practice:

What is the most appropriate and proportionate impact we can expect from research compared to that from other influences (politics, values, professional and user knowledge), given the necessary uncertainty and contestability of research evidence in this sphere?
How should different kinds of evidence, which often arise from different assumptions about the nature of social world, be combined to make changes in policy and practice?
How can policy making be changed in order to make best use of research (in terms of timescales, but also increasing the influence of people using services, carers, practitioners and researchers)?

Dr Martin Stevens is Research Fellow at the Social Care Workforce Research Unit at King’s College London. With Jess Harris he is currently writing the final report for the evaluation of Jobs First (an initiative encouraging the employment of people with learning disabilities) for the Department of Health. He is also Principal Investigator in a study examining the vetting and barring of workers in the sector.

by Jo Moriarty

It seems strange to begin a blog suggesting that face to face meetings are an important way of sharing research findings, but that was the conclusion I reached after our joint seminar between the Social Care Workforce Research Unit at King’s College London and researchers from the Welfare, Inequality and Life Course (VUL) work group based in the Department of Sociology at the University of Bergen, Norway.

The aim was to share our ideas and experiences. Academics are sometimes accused of working in ivory towers. This could not be said of Liv Johanne Syltevik, Kjetil Lundberg, Ann Nilsen, Bo Vignes and Karen Christensen who arrived at the Unit hotfoot from a visit to Hounslow Job Centre Plus. Liv and Kjetil explained that the visit was part of their research looking at the impact of the merger of former employment and social insurance services into a single Norwegian Labour and Welfare Administration (NAV). Martin Stevens and Jess Harris then spoke about the Jobs First project which looks at how people with learning disabilities can be supported to enter employment.

University of Bergen

Our offices at King’s

The two presentations highlighted how different terms can reflect deeper differences between welfare regimes. In Norway, where most citizens would expect to receive support and assistance from the NAV over the life course, people in contact with the service are described as ‘users’. In the UK, people using Job Centre Plus are described as ‘customers’ although, for many, paid work is a form of consumption they will not experience. In a further irony, we heard how Norwegian unemployment rates are much lower compared with the UK.

Prof. Karen Christensen (left), who chaired the seminar at the Unit on 26 September, is Visiting Research Fellow at King’s. With Prof. Ann Nilsen

We talked about similarities too; in the use of mixed methods in research about transitions to adulthood and family carers and how older migrants in both countries often face similar issues. Karen mentioned the possibility that people might take up transnational care careers, working in the sector in different countries. As Shereen Hussein explained her analysis showing how some care workers in England earn less than the national minimum wage, I started wondering how average care worker wages compare across the European Economic Area.

Kjetil Lundberg and Bo Vignes; Prof. Liv Johanne Syltevik in the background

You can learn a lot about the ways in which different countries organise care and support by reading journal articles and attending conferences. However, at conferences, time for discussion is often limited. This is generally because of the need to negotiate labyrinthine venues. I once attended a conference where you needed to be a time traveller to go to the place where refreshments were served and return to the building where presentations were taking place in time for the next session. We’re increasingly aware of the potential for researchers and practitioners from different countries to use social media for discussion. However, there is something about meeting face to face that promotes dialogue. It’s also much nicer to eat real homemade cake and muffins than to experience them virtually! We are all looking forward to keeping in touch and building connections between the two units.

Jo Moriarty is a Research Fellow at the Social Care Workforce Research Unit at King’s College London and tweets as @Aspirantdiva. Jo’s study of family carers, which she introduced at the seminar, has started reporting.

Bo Vignes, Kjetil Lundberg, Prof. Jill Manthorpe (Director of SCWRU), Prof. Liv Johanne Syltevik, Prof. Karen Christensen and Prof. Ann Nilsen

Health & Social Care Workforce:

Welcome to the blog of the NIHR Policy Research Unit in Health and Social Care Workforce at King's College London

Category Archives: Research issues

How should research evidence be used to improve adult social care policy and practice?

Why face to face meetings still matter