Know Your Role (Part One)

Standard 1: Know Your Role

Your Role can be defined as Tasks, Behaviours and Standards of your work. 

Your role will have a job description. This tells you what your main duties and responsibilities are and who you report to. Ask your employer for a copy if you do not have it. You should know what is expected of you but also what is not included in your role.  It will be almost impossible for a job description to list every task you will do but it should give a good overall picture of your role.

The kinds of duties that might be in your job description are:

• providing care and support, working in a person-centred way, communicating well,  building relationships and promoting equality and diversity
• working as part of a team, being a supportive team member and developing your skills to improve your work
• contributing to activities in a safe way, keeping and filing clear records, keeping to regulations, following the agreed way of working
• respecting confidentiality by not discussing any personal information on individuals or staff with unauthorised people, and storing records securely.

Regulations are rules that come from legislation or laws. The legislation establishes the general ‘laws of the land’. Regulations provide the specific ways in which those laws are interpreted and applied. The skills and knowledge you need to carry out your role competently and the ways in which you should work are set out nationally. You can find these in:

• the Care Certificate that is the shared health and social care training covered by this workbook. It is expected that new healthcare support workers and adult social care workers will complete the 15 Care Certificate standards (shown in this workbook) before they work without supervision in any workplace.
• the Code of Conduct for Healthcare Support Workers and Adult Social Care Workers in England. This has the moral and ethical standards expected of all health and social care workers. The Code can be found at either: www.skillsforcare.org.uk/code-of-conduct or www.skillsforhealth.org.uk/code-of-conduct

Competence can be defined as having the ability and expertise to understand an individual’s needs in order to deliver effective care.

As you develop in your role you will continue to build on your knowledge and skills. You may be asked to take a qualification during or after completing induction. Employers should invest in their workers’ learning and development beyond induction.

Experiences, attitudes and beliefs

Your experiences, attitudes and beliefs are part of what makes you who you are. They affect how you think, what you do and how you do it. Your background, upbringing, education, experiences and relationships will all have played a part in the way you see things. These attitudes and beliefs may have led you to choose to work in health or social care but sometimes they could lead you to assume things about people that are not right. It is important that you develop self-awareness so that you can learn to check that this does not happen. You should take time to learn about and understand the different attitudes and beliefs of others so that you can work with individuals in a way that takes these into account.

Beliefs can be described as things in life that you feel strongly about, that guide you in your daily life and are linked very closely to your morals and values.

Attitudes are the approaches, opinions and mindset that you have developed through your upbringing and life and learning experiences.

Values, aims and objectives

It’s important to understand what your employer wants to achieve as it will help you to understand your own role. Your organisation will have values, aims and objectives.

Values are the beliefs or ideals that should be evident in all aspects of the service you provide.

Aims are the general goals that an organisation hopes to achieve throughtheir activity. The purpose of your job will be to contribute to achieving these.

Objectives are specific things that must be in place in order to achieve the aims. If you find that your employer does not have these written down ask your manager to tell you what they are.

Rights and responsibilities at work

There are many pieces of legislation that exist to protect us from harm as workers and to make sure that everyone is treated fairly.

Health & Safety

The Health & Safety at Work etc. Act 1974 sets out your rights and responsibilities in the workplace. You have the right:

• to work in an environment that is safe
• to be provided, free of charge, with the equipment that you need to keep you safe at work.

With those rights come responsibilities. Your employer will set down policies and procedures or tell you about the agreed ways to work in ways that are safe for you, those you work with and the people you support.

• You must work in the ways that you are told by your employer.
• If you have concerns about safety in your workplace you must talk to your manager.

You can find more information about the Health & Safety at Work etc. Act 1974 here: www.hse.gov.uk/legislation/hswa.htm

Confidentiality

The Data Protection Act 1998 protects people’s rights to confidentiality. It restricts how personal and sensitive information can be used, stored and passed on. Personal details must not be passed on unless the person gives their permission. These laws give you rights as an employee but also require you to treat individuals’ information responsibly. You should only pass information on in line with your employer’s procedures and for the purpose of providing the best care. You can find more information about the Data Protection Act 1998 here: www.gov.uk/data-protection/the-data-protection-act

Working conditions

There are many pieces of legislation that demand that terms and conditions of employment are fair. For example, the law states that you do not usually have to work more than 48 hours per week, although you may choose to do so. Exactly when you work will depend on your contract. You can find out more about working contracts and conditions here: www.gov.uk/employment-contracts-and-conditions/overview

The Equality Act 2010 gives all people in the UK the right to be treated fairly and afforded equality of opportunity. This means that people must be paid ‘equal pay for equal work’ regardless of ‘protected characteristics’ or differences. The amount that your employer pays you for your work must meet the National Minimum Wage (until April 2016) or National Living Wage (from April 2016).You can find more information about the Equality Act 2010 here: www.gov.uk/equality-act-2010-guidance

Protected characteristics

The Equality Act 2010 identifies nine protected characteristics or groups that are protected under equalities law. The protected characteristics are:

1. age
2. being or becoming a transsexual person
3. being married or in a civil partnership
4. being pregnant or having a child
5. disability
6. race including colour, nationality, ethnic or national origin
7. religion, belief or lack of religion/belief
8. sex
9. sexual orientation

Agreed ways of working

Your employer will tell you the safe and agreed ways in which you are expected to work. This may be shared with you as part of a policy or provided in person by your manager or another colleague. Agreed ways of working with each individual will be detailed in care plans. They ensure that you are working within the law and providing care and support that meet the needs of the individual. If you don’t follow the agreed ways of working, you could harm yourself or others without meaning to. You are responsible for your own work and could face disciplinary procedures if people come to harm as a result of your actions. This could lead to dismissal or even prosecution.

You have responsibilities to the people that you provide care and support for. You must ensure that:

• their safety and welfare is protected by ensuring that their care plan is followed and carried out in agreed, safe ways
• the care that they receive meets their needs by involving them and their carer or support network in the planning, review and delivery of their care
• they are treated fairly and that their rights are upheld by working in ways that promote equality and diversity and uphold their dignity and human rights.

‘Carer’ can mean different things in different places. Officially, including in this workbook, it means a family member or friend who provides care, as distinct from a care worker or volunteer. That’s the same as the meaning in “carer’s assessment” and the Carer’s Allowance. Unofficially though, some workplaces refer to care workers as ‘carers’. As a care worker, you must never allow anyone to be confused about what your caring role is, so it will usually be better to describe yourself as a ‘care worker’ or to use the job title given to you by your employer.

Not all of the individuals you support will be confident or able to speak out. If their care is inadequate or they are treated in ways that do not uphold their rights you must support them to make a complaint, or raise concerns yourself.

Reporting errors

We are all human and mistakes sometimes happen. When mistakes are made it’s important to be honest and identify where errors have happened. This will allow: action to be taken that may reduce the impact of the mistake lessons to be learnt through thinking about and agreeing what went wrong. 

Whistleblowing

Your employer should provide or explain their whistleblowing policy. You have a responsibility to report things that you feel are not right, are illegal, or if anyone at work is neglecting their duties. This is known as ‘whistleblowing’. In most cases you should discuss your concerns with your manager. However, if you felt that it was not appropriate to speak to your manager for some reason, you should follow your employer’s whistleblowing procedure and ways of working.

Working in partnership

Your role will involve you working with many people who have a variety of roles. This is known as ‘partnership working’. Developing good relationships will help to improve the quality of care provided. The main working relationships in health and social care can be categorised in four ways:

• individuals and their friends and family
• your colleagues and managers
• people from other workplaces, including advocates.
• volunteers and community groups.

Advocate can be defined as someone who provides support by speaking for an individual on their behalf. 

For example, an individual’s carer may provide support by visiting or providing food to them in their social care or health setting. You should be helpful and make sure that this is built into the care plan and routine, and is understood by other workers. You might also support the individual to share their wishes with the carer

Other workers might provide a service to someone you provide care and support to. For example, a dietician might advise the individual about their weight and help them agree a plan for their meals and snacks, taking into account any preferences or special dietary needs. As the worker likely to see the individual most regularly, you could encourage them to keep to the diet and support them to report back how the diet is working or if it needs to be changed. If the individual was not eating or unwell as a result you would arrange for the diet to be reviewed  quickly. Very often health care support workers or adult social care support workers are in a position to play an important role in making observations and links with other workers because they are in regular contact with the individual. They are very important partners in the overall health or social care provision to an individual.

All working relationships should involve mutual respect and should value other people’s skills and knowledge with a focus on working together in the best interests of the individual receiving care and support. The importance of people working together should not be underestimated as serious case reviews, which are the reviews carried out when a vulnerable adult dies or comes to significant harm, often identify failings in partnership working as being a key factor in what went wrong.

Effective partnership working

Good communication between everyone is essential. Health and social care workers must trust, value and respect one another, having belief in everyone’s ability to work together to achieve shared goals.

Effective communication is central to a successful workplace for both individuals and staff alike.

For communication to be good and effective it must be open, accurate and understandable. Ways of communicating and language must be right for the individual so you can be sure that they understand what is being said. Workers should avoid using jargon which can be misunderstood.

When working with people who have communication needs, it may be necessary to consider translators, pictures or communication boards to support them to communicate well.

Jargon or complex terminology must not be used by social care or health workers with individuals, or with their friends and family. Be mindful that jargon may be familiar to you and your colleagues but not necessarily to the individuals you support.

Accurate records must be kept to ensure that all those involved are kept up to date on the individual’s progress and care. If an incident occurs, information must be shared efficiently and safely. All records must be up to date, understandable and stored securely. 

Trust is important to all good working relationships and is essential if partnership working is to be open, honest and successful. Everyone involved in partnership working, both the person receiving care and support and the workers, must be confident that they can rely on the people working with them.

It is important to work in ways that promote respect. You should understand and respect the contribution that each individual plays in planning and providing care. This applies to every person being supported, their carers and support network, as well as to other Workers.

Advice and support

There may be times when there is disagreement between workers from different agencies or between the person receiving care and support and those who support them. Conflict that is not resolved can affect the quality of care. You should ask for advice about partnership working and resolving conflict whenever you face any problem. You can ask your manager or other workers who are familiar with your workplace and have the skills and experience to advise you.