Maggie Atkinson Consulting Ltd

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All together in a merry dance.

Posted on April 18, 2017 at 10:30 AM
Have you ever been to a barn dance? You know, where somebody at the front calls the dances and you stumble all over the floor until suddenly it comes right and you dance round once more smiling, just as the music winds down? It feels a bit like that this afternoon. I'm not sure why we're dancing, let alone what the tune is meant to be. And I can't help wondering if we actually have the time to dance right now. Somebody called out to me around 10 am when I was deeply embroiled in something. The voice sounded excited. Said the PM would make a statement outside 10 Downing Street at 11. And she did. Strike up the band, bring the caller forward, let us at least - at last - begin. Contradicting strongly expressed avowals we were not going to the country, with equal sincerity, we now learn with great solemnity that there will be an election. Arising from what precipitous events, we may never know. We have been told over and over since last summer that what was announced this morning was categorically not going to happen, as it would knock us off our stride and get in the way. We must assume there was something, some change in the mood music, to prompt such a volte face as today's. You do the hokey-cokey and you turn around. That's what it's all about. Apparently. As the band assembles for the dance to come in the next 7 weeks, we might best assume anything we thought was going to happen in Parliament before the Summer recess may not. Or, we could expect one of those messy mosh pit frenzies that gets some things through but clears other draft legislation off the table all together: either never to be seen again, or to be revisited, peddled as a new policy, a new tune, once we have a government from June 9th. More likely than not, such a new thing will not start until the autumn given the recess will by then be a month away. So: place your bets as to what - please, something, ANYTHING - other than Brexit will feature in manifestos and pre-election debates. For those of us working in or with public services, there could be any number of things. Here are some starters for 10, to add to the 20 or so other things you may already be juggling in your work for other people. All of these will carry both policy implications and practical resonance. Many could leave us with sleepless nights wondering which way things will go once whoever gets in, gets in. We might expect the development of new grammar schools - sold as schools for everybody when given a grammar school is a grammar school is still a grammar school they can't be - will be in the Conservative Party manifesto. The assumption, if so, would be that any resulting law would be driven so hard, at such speed, as to leave the dancers breathless and exhausted, so that resultant legislation would be passed early, no matter what. We can no doubt expect every manifesto to concern itself with adult health and social care, the crises in both, urgings for change and new ways of thinking that seem to be starting now in practice, patchily and tentatively at best. First to put up their hands and say "we will fund all elements of the system properly and in the long term, based on changed mind-sets and really new ways of working" will be lauded. We will then wait to see if what they promise is put into effect. But will the same passion be shown for helping children and young people, in early intervention and prevention not only in crisis-driven social care? Everybody in the system knows breaking point awaits, not far away. Will anybody be brave enough to stem the rising tide and insist on partnership working, getting to families ahead of crisis, really changing both the dance and the destination? What of the Children and Social Work Bill in progress now? Will it stand or fall? What are the implications of either result? What of Brexit fall-out and follow-through? If this is really the reason for this election being called, "vote for us then get out of the way so we can seal the deal" sounds seductive. But this afternoon after the announcement, as much as this morning before it was made, saying such brisk things still ignores the fact that we are not going into a room to talk to ourselves and come out having agreed with ourselves. The other 27 EU nations, and our partners world wide, are all dancing in this same circle dance where, as the music changes, the partners also change. EU citizens working here, from fields to hospital wards and everything in between will need to decide whether leaving has been brought closer or pushed further away by today. Trade deals will not be sealed as this dance ends and another begins. By June the 9th we can hope we will recognise the tune. We can stumble our way through the steps until we know where we should be facing, who we're dancing with, what steps these are, what will happen when the caller yells "gentlemen, move on". We may be at a point where we can hope the poor and the vulnerable are not going to be stepped on by dancers in better shoes, with greater energy and a spot on the dance floor closer to the caller of the tunes. Who the piper is that calls that tune, what our progress round the floor will mean, the language and purpose of the dance? I doubt they will be any clearer on June the 9th than they are now. And before you vote for utopia, sold to you as a merry dance by any of them: you can rest assured that if your name's not on the list, you still won't be coming in

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Ah, to live in interesting times!

I'm sure that, like me, for many contacts and colleagues, working days are running in anything but the usual order, anything but the usual way. For me, business has stopped for the time being, all bar finishing off some vital tasks to conclude a great assignment with a client whose people gave, gave and gave again as I worked to help them problem solve and solution find. I am still adjusting to the fact that, the diary being on hold (not closed!) there is, for the first time in my working life, no rush.  No urgency in getting that domestic business done around my business and the people who seek to use it. I can take my time in the kitchen and the garden, at the piano or in my permitted outside exercise a day.  This is not my style, and it makes me a bit jumpy.  It's a struggle to believe it, let alone let my clock run slower than usual.  For former colleague DCSs and their staff and partners, whilst some of the everyday clutter might have set itself aside, their days are very full, their sleeves rolled up and their heroic efforts focused on ensuring the people they serve are as safe as possible, for as long as possible, with as much dignity and support as can be afforded them. I salute them, as ever.  I do remember what single community crises were like when I did the job.  But then there was simply nothing of the scale, or the likely longevity, of the current massive challenge facing them, and society, right now.   


This period of enforced introspection has got me thinking, mostly in the researcher part of my brain.  What I see on a daily basis is that, beyond the muppets who don't think Covid19 is serious or could affect them and won't modify their conduct beyond getting mad and behaving badly, thousands of people are just doing good. Volunteering, offering simple help like dropping off shopping on a neighbour's doorstep, going a LOT further and putting themselves on the line, offering free online support to parents whose children are not at school so everybody may be feeling the strain.  The observer in me is starting to hatch some ideas that would bear scrutiny when this is all over.  Here are some research questions you might help me think about!


Will the economy recover? Or will we have to grow to being, by necessity, a more socially aware nation that seeks out and supports our strugglers rather than blaming them for their own situations then getting on with our own lives?  What will a national workforce look like when we are through the other side?  Will we stay connected, or are we likelier to go back to being frantic, self-absorbed, as our pre-crisis behaviour tended to make us?  Will the memory of when people pulled together, stayed local, formed bonds via Zoom or Skype or WhatsApp linger?  Will we mark when we realised that "We don't need that meeting" was an actual thing?  When people found both altruism and skills they didn't know they had?  When all this is over, can we harness citizen research as well as that done in academia to explore the phenomena we are witnessing as people turn towards others as well as addressing their own concerns?  Or does it take a serious crisis, another Covid19, to make us step into a shared mental and emotional space and capture what it teaches us rather than staying in our own, meaning we will forget? I'm working on some approaches to research bodies on all this, given this is a truly remarkable, as well as a sad, scary, deeply unsettling and uncertain - an "interesting" - time.


If you would like to co-explore what I ruminated on above, or if like me you are watching fascinated as people stop buying what they don't need and concentrate on what they and others do need? Together?  Please get in touch!  


And in the meantime? Stay safe.  Good luck. And if you are in an organisation that's keeping us all going, thank you.

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