Foreword

One of the most beautiful gifts in the world is the gift of encouragement. When someone encourages you, that person helps you over a threshold you might otherwise never have crossed on your own (John O’ Donohoe 1956-2008). We were very privileged to receive many gifts of encouragement for this project and we are delighted to include their voices as the foreword to this e-book.

Bernard Gloster (Chief Executive Officer TUSLA Ireland’s Child & Family Agency, previously a social care worker and health services manager).

In late 2020 I had the pleasure of writing the foreword for a special edition of the Irish Journal of Applied Social Studies (IJASS) all of which focused on the competencies and development of the social care profession. In that journal, I had the pleasure of reflecting on a book preview as follows; “If you want to engage more on the 80 proficiencies, then the book preview by Denise Lyons and Teresa Brown is a snapshot of what is up ahead. This is an e-book with a chapter on each proficiency (that’s a lot of reading), but it has all the hallmarks of being compelling because of the style of capturing the voice of social care workers with their understanding and experience of the proficiencies now set out to be achieved. That e-book might well be the basis within which the proficiencies, when they are reviewed, and no doubt they will be in the future, will be considered against that lived experience of the worker. The worker has so much to achieve in this new set of proficiencies…” I am delighted now to welcome that same e-book available for all to consider and reflect on. The format and style approach is particularly attractive as each domain has its own book within a book and that certainly means that social care workers and students can go to and indeed go back to specific parts and reflections. Written by social care workers, it is for social care workers and educators a unique opportunity. With 75 contributors, the base of experience and reflection is wide and rich. Enjoy Reading.

Mark Smith (Professor of Social Work University of Dundee Scotland, esteemed author, academic, and keynote speaker).

I am delighted to have been asked to provide this brief endorsement for this project and the five e-books that constitute it. I know both Denise and Teresa having served as external examiner for both their doctoral viva voces and it is great to see them bring their manifest commitment to and wide knowledge of social care to this project. The results of their labours are both comprehensive and impressive. They have taken the five CORU generic domains of practice and their associated proficiencies and have prevailed upon a host of experienced professionals to customise these for social care in a series of freely available e-books. It is a vital task the editors have taken on. Practice standards are of little use if they exist only in some codified and abstracted form. They only achieve any utility if they are grounded and contextualised in the messiness and ambiguity of social care practice. And this can only be done by those who have encountered and negotiated this complexity in their everyday practice. So, these volumes are, avowedly, written by social care workers for social care workers – each proficiency is explored and considered though a social care lens anchored in practice. Being anchored in practice, the books provide a rich and credible resource for practice educators in their work with students, but they will also generate discussion and reflection in staff teams. What struck me in perusing the list of contributors is just how broad a base social care is developing in Ireland – it is a profession coming of age. There are eighty chapters between the volumes and while there is rightly some overlap, most are written by different authors. This exercise will itself enhance the status, confidence and identity of the profession. Each of the contributors, but most especially Denise and Teresa, have given the profession a gift that comes from within the profession itself and is all the more valuable for these origins.

Pat Brennan (Director of first social care programme (childcare) in Kilkenny 1971-1981, child care consultant, author).

There is no way I could do justice to this 2021 publication ‘Guide to the Standards of Proficiency for Social Care Workers’. It contains eighty contributions from highly qualified and experienced authors. The range of knowledge, research, qualifications, experience and education/training is quite stunning. This guide is a huge compendium, starting with the key term: Social care is … a profession that requires an in-depth understanding of and interest in people. Practice is centred within the relationship between you and another person. Social care work places an onus on the worker to constantly reflect on her/his attitudes, physical and mental health and ongoing ability to focus on and be present with the service user(s). The work is emotionally and physically challenging because you use your self as the ‘tool’ (Lyons 2013). Every possible aspect of the work of social care is essayed with added examples, key terms, cases, tasks, tips for educators, references and biographies. All the time rooted in best practice, in accordance with legal and statutory requirements, underpinned by social justice and human rights. The emphasis is on human relationships with clear and principled explorations of what can be a fraught area of endeavour and task. In the long run, education and training are central, enabling students to move through knowledge to wisdom so that they do not work ‘to the book’, but to the reality and the needs of their clients. The main tool being the ‘Self. It is an astonishing, comprehensive articulation of the work. It will surely remain the fundamental text with regard to social care for many years to come. This then should give all those in anyway involved in social care great confidence in themselves and in their profession. It must also give substantial standing within the whole welter of professions concerned and involved with the citizens and agencies of this State. An outstanding achievement, heartiest congratulations to all concerned (Pat Brennan, Kilkenny 2021).

Noel Howard (First Social Care Ireland Media Spokesperson, Editor of the CURUM, Leader in the professionalisation of social care work, to name a few of his many roles within social care over his long career).

The editors of this work took on a gargantuan task. Not only did they succeed in that task, but the results are foundational for those who are and will become part of a profession faced with another gargantuan task – making a difference in the lives of those with whom they are privileged to work. Social care workers simply have their own personalities, forged by their past and influenced by their experiences and training, to bring with them to do what they do each day. Denise and Teresa have delivered a rich, comprehensive touchstone, covering the myriad aspects of what that is all about. Moreover, it is written by the real experts, who know in their hearts and souls the loneliness of despair, the stultifying jargon of bureaucracy, the humbling lived experience of misery and failure as well as the uplifting light of the small steps of success. The editors and contributors are to be congratulated and thank you for the touching dedication.