DoWith – an exciting and important new movement

On Wednesday (26 March) members of the It’s All About People Personalisation Programme Team joined 824 other participants for the first meeting of DoWith, a new ‘movement’ of people and organisations calling for a radical shift in the way the public sector works with the people it serves and supports.

Launched by The King’s Fund earlier this year, DoWith is neither an organisation nor a formal campaign. Instead, the intention is to consolidate and grow a grassroots movement, and mobilise our collective voice to effect a radical and urgent shift in the way public services work – from ‘doing to’ to ‘doing with’ people. 

So, what happened?

The event started with a passionate panel presentation, hosted by Adam Lent of The King’s Fund and featuring key figures in the world of person-centred and strengths-based approaches:

• Samira Ben Omar, Co-Founder, Community Voices and Community Champions
• Clenton Farquharson, Associate Director, Think Local, Act Personal
• Katie Kelly, Former Deputy Chief Executive, East Ayrshire Council, and Chair, New Local
• Cormac Russell, Managing Director, Nurture Development
• Mark Spencer, GP, Mountview Practice, Fleetwood

Watch the panel discussion: Do With: Making The Movement Happen

We then hopped into breakout group discussions, with themes including: 

• Movement building
• The use of technology
• Training and skills development
• Local politics and decision-making
• Tackling health stigma
• Creating neighbourhoods of care
• Services shaped by communities
• System change.​​​​​​

Key takeaways and learning

Here's what our team picked up during the presentation and subsequent breakout group discussions:

Positive change is already happening

We heard about great examples of positive change that are already happening across the country - change that: 

• is enabling individuals, families and communities from many backgrounds to work as equals alongside frontline workers in the health and care sector, and also councils, schools, the police, and other services. 
• shares power and resource, opens up decision-making, and improves the places where we live. 
• taps into the power of our communities and human relationships to prevent illness, rather than just respond to it.
• directly addresses, through collaboration, the growing pressures being placed on the public and voluntary sectors that are driving up waiting times, reducing service quality and pushing public finances to breaking point.  
• most fundamentally, does things with rather than to people and communities while also freeing and resourcing them to do more for themselves on their own terms. 

DoWith in Lincolnshire

The It’s All About People Personalisation Programme Team is already driving this work in Lincolnshire. It was therefore both exciting and encouraging to meet teams and programmes from across the UK that are as passionate and committed as we are.

So, lots of new connections were made and, as we become more involved in this national movement, we’ll keep you up to speed with both Lincolnshire-based and national developments.

Peoples' stories are so important

Many of the participants stressed the importance of sharing peoples’ stories. The It’s All About People Team is leading this work in Lincolnshire through our Community Reporting project and other work we are doing to capture, communicate and utilise people’s experiences of health and care.  

Resistance to change

On the flipside, we also heard about resistance to new ways of working across the public sector - a resistance that:  

• leaves those who work in or with public services feeling powerless and frustrated. 
• deepens the excessive hierarchy and the discrimination that silences the voices of frontline workers and the people and communities they work with. 
• maintains the overwhelming focus on top-down performance targets and financial ‘efficiencies’ rather than actual improvements in people’s health and well-being. 
• keeps public services siloed and often in competition with one another rather than providing holistic, seamless care and support through collaboration.  
• and, most importantly, sustains a culture that strongly favours doing things to rather than with people. 

Stand out quotes

Throughout the session, we picked out a large number of key quotes from participants, including:

• "DoWith doesn't start with doing, it starts with listening."
• “How do we create a more hopeful future when our communities feel hopeless?”
• “We need to have the courage to lead with curiosity and not control.”
• “…genuinely enable people and communities to work out what matters to them.”
• “It takes kindness and love to raise hopes and dreams.”
• “We need to consider how our services can meet the needs of the communities rather than building the communities around our services.”
• “Once frontline staff are involved in work like this it can be transformational and motivational.”
• “The future isn’t something we inherit but something we build. We are architects of our own future.”

And our favourite quote - one that the team are considering using as a strapline going forward -  “Be willing to make good trouble!” 

As a team of Personalisation Pirates, we truly try to do this, advocating both for people and our workforce. 

And we'll be getting more deeply involved in the DoWith movement, so stay tuned for updates.