Rachel talks us through the quirks of social work practice in the Square Mile, the importance of pan-London working, and the borough’s unique role in shaping national policy for England and Wales.
“I always wanted to work in social justice and to help people since I was a kid. I always liked listening to people and helping people, so I was interested in seeing how I could help people as a job.”
Having considered the prison service or supporting children with special needs, she opted to study Law and Welfare initially. Rachel’s desire to help others lent itself to advocacy work, working on behalf of vulnerable groups including asylum seekers and refugees. While working for a large UK charity which supported refugees, her experiences in the legal space led her to consider a switch social work:
“I spent a lot of time challenging councils, asking them to do better. I felt frustrated and started thinking, “Can I do this myself? Can I make it better? Can I make really great services for children?”
The career switch proved to be a good call, as Rachel now heads up Children’s Services for a unique local authority. City of London may be small in terms of resident population and geographic area, but a huge daily footfall and status as the centre of the UK’s financial industry create a social work environment that isn’t found anywhere else in the country:
“There are only three authorities this small geographically in the UK. One is Rutland, one is the Isles of Scilly and one is us. It means our team is very small – I have seven social workers to run our whole service, so we have to lean on each other and learn from each other a lot.”
Another unique aspect of Rachel’s position at City of London comes from the special historic status the authority holds in the UK Parliament. A representative of the City has a right to observe Parliamentary proceedings, which means Rachel is afforded a sneak preview of upcoming legislation around children and families and helping her to plan strategically around future policy:
“Every time there’s something to do with children’s legislation, it comes across my desk, which I really like. I get to review it, think about it, and write back my views, which is fun.”
A key advantage to the smaller scale of children’s services in the City is continuity for service users. Rachel’s team are able to work closely with families they support through their entire journey, rather than involving multiple practitioners and departments. There are similarities between this and City of London Police, a much smaller force separate to the Met. Being on first-name terms with colleagues in the police enables a level of close partnership working which would be harder to coordinate between large organisations. The senior leaders of other services within the Borough are just as accessible to Rachel:
“The thing I like most about working here is, I sit in a room with our Head of Homelessness, Head of Adults and Head of Education. If we have a family in need, we can get around that family collectively, and really quickly support each member of the family.”
Collaborative relationships with other local authorities are critical for City of London’s social work service. Their Youth Justice service is delivered in partnership with Tower Hamlets, and they operate a joint Partnership Board and Safeguarding service with Hackney. While there are clear operational benefits to working with City’s larger neighbours, Rachel was also keen to highlight the social and professional benefit of working closely with the wider London network of social workers. For such a small social work team, maintaining an influx of new ideas and drawing on the wider pool of experience helps to avoid stagnation:
“We don’t want to become too insular or inward-looking - we could become weird quite quickly with just a few of us! We encourage people to be part of pan-London groups because we need to be outward-looking, and learn from others who have a higher volume of casework. Between that and doing a lot of training, it keeps us energised and fresh.”
A focus on high-quality training is a key part of Rachel’s recruitment and retention offer. The combination of strong training and development options and pan-London relationships means City is a great place for aspiring social work leaders:
“We invest very heavily in leadership training and systemic training. We love the Frontline programme [recently rebranded and now known as Approach Social Work] for all of our leaders. It’s about growing people up and out, or up and together. We view ourselves as developing people to work with us, but also to flourish outside as well.”
For anyone looking into becoming a social worker, Rachel highlighted the variety of options and flexibility offered by the career, and the need for prospective social workers to hold values that match the ethos of social work practice:
“Social work is a really broad career and you can do all sorts with it, go in different directions. Make sure you’re in it for the right reasons, and that you like people! I really enjoyed seeing love and care in the latest national review. Love and care is really important in our ethics and values, and it can keep you going.”
Find out more about working with Rachel in City of London, and what makes it different to London’s other 32 Local Authorities.