transforming health and care. The event was held in the World Museum in

Liverpool. It was great being back in a city that has so many historic buildings.

Did you know infact that after London, Liverpool has more grade one listed buildings and museums than any other city in the United Kingdom?.

The event was opened by the Chief Executive of Tameside Council, Steven Pleasant and was well attended by a range of strategic and operational officers across the public sector.

A number of presenters discussed the challenges around health, care and integration of services. The role information sharing played was also seen as key for earlier intervention and providing coordinated services.

The Improving Information Sharing and Management project had a table and as you can see we decorated it well with our latest newsletter and pop ups.

We had a lot of interest at the stand with a number of delegates having a go on the laptop and actually looking at the toolkit on the website. www.informationsharing.co.uk

Importantly though we were at an event organised by an existing public sector network, i-network  http://i-network.org.uk/

The project has tapped into existing appropriate networks to support information sharing and management. This has without doubt significantly helped inform people about the project, and should significantly support the legacy of the project and overall appropriate information sharing.

The post Moving forward with networks appeared first on .

Mark Fisher (DWP) introduced the day

Earlier this week, the IISaM project team continued their mission to spread word of what the project has achieved by holding a dissemination event in Birmingham.  The aim of the day was to bring together some of the people who have been key to the project’s success with others who are interested to explore the impact of information sharing on their work, and to consider how we move forward from here. Attendees heard from a range of those involved in the project’s development, but the project team then asked them to get involved themselves, during two workshop sessions.

Charlotte Piper (DCLG) talks about information sharing in the context of Whole Place Community Budgets

First up was Mark Fisher, who chaired the project’s Board during the first twelve months.  Mark provided an introduction to the project, outlining the way in which information sharing has grown in importance to government, and giving an insight into the impact it has on the social justice team that he leads at the Department for Work and Pensions.  Stephen Curtis, member of the IISaM working group and Strategy and Policy manager at Leicestershire County Council followed, giving delegates a sense of what IISaM has learnt over the course of the project, and how that has influenced the tools that are now available to support others addressing similar issues.  Liz Clark, Assistant Director for Information and Technology, followed on with a more detailed look at the Multi Agency Information Sharing Hub designed and developed in Leicestershire.  Afternoon speakers included David Evans (ICO), who gave a view on the role of legislation in shaping and facilitating appropriate sharing; and Charlotte Piper (DCLG), who shared the lessons learnt during the Whole Place Community Budgets pilot, as well as reiterating her department’s commitment to seeing the work of IISaM continue and evolve.

The group discuss the role of their organisation in information sharing

During the workshop sessions, attendees were challenged to consider the role of their own organisation, and to suggest how each organisation could support the ongoing work to resolve information sharing issues.  Delegates then considered what success in improving information sharing would look like, thinking about the perspectives of central and local government, those involved in delivering public services, and the service user themselves.

Groups hard at work discussing the issues

We are in the process of gathering together the conclusions reached during the workshop debates, but some early thoughts include:

• An aspiration is that programmes of work such as IISaM are no longer needed; information sharing is part of business as usual;
• This would be aided by all those involved in gathering, analysing and using information having an understanding of the importance of better information in improving services;
• That progress in highlighting the importance of information sharing is made when those at the top of an organisation are convinced – IISaM could have a role in reaching out to those individuals;
• And that there are a few ways in which a case can be made – both by better understanding the benefits of information sharing (perhaps reduced cost, or better service delivery), and by sharing stories of where it works in practice.

Many of the comments on the day pointed out that, although progress has been made, it will take a concerted effort over a longer period of time to start the process of cultural change that will be needed.  Everyone in the room has a role to play, particularly when it comes to sharing the stories of how information sharing can be done; if you have a story that you think could make a good case study for the IISaM website, please get in touch!  We can help you turn your experiences into something that’s of benefit to others.

The post Transforming services and improving information sharing: next steps for IISaM appeared first on .

State Library of Queensland

In a recent IISaM working group meeting the phrase ‘lets not reinvent the wheel’ was used eight times in the space of 2 hours.  Not only lazy but also untrue, if the automotive industry had not spent over 100 years redefining and reinventing the combustion engine we would all still be driving around in Model-T Fords with wooden wheels. 

So what is the answer?

Pick your reinventions carefully.  Leicestershire County council had a perfectly serviceable ‘wheel’ in their overarching information sharing protocol.  At 70ish pages it covered every eventuality but on careful inspection didn’t actually ask anyone to do or take responsibility for anything.  The result of the reinvention is that they are now moving towards a four page protocol that sets out what partners are asked to do as part of the protocol and charges the signatory with making sure it happens.  A successful reinvention I think.

What about training?  There is so much training around and we have reinvented the way we deliver it to give so much on line training in information management and security that no-one need ever stand up and give that training ever again……or do they?  At a recent IISaM event, practitioners bemoaned the loss of face to face training where you could ask questions and explore nuances with a well prepared and knowledgeable trainer. Has the time come to reinvent this particular wheel again? 

People at the North West IISaM event

Surely on line annual training will keep regulators happy and put a ‘tick in the box’ (did you see what I did there!!) with follow up face to face training every couple of years to make sure that people have the opportunity to ask questions and engage properly with the subject.

As we all prepare for the European Union Data Protection Directive to reinvent the wheel that is the Data Protection Act lets hope that someone also helps to sow the seeds of change in our information sharing culture by calling this new improved wheel The Data Sharing Act or renaming the Caldicott Guardians as Caldicott Providers.

Well I think I’ll ‘box this off’ for now and hope this discussion has allowed you to ‘push the envelope’ or ‘think outside the box’.  If you want to talk about this further maybe we should ‘take this off line’ and ‘touch base’ some time soon.

TTFN……..

The post Mind your Language! appeared first on .

“You show great heart, you get knocked down and you get up and try again, that is the most important thing.  The rest will come with time and practice”.

This is so like information sharing, we keep asking if people will share information with us and they keep knocking us back.  “We need your legal justification in writing”, “You need to get consent”, “That’s the wrong consent form”, “Your email address isn’t secure”, “We don’t trust what you will do with the information once you have it”, and so it goes on…..

To be clear, these are all important things that need sorting out but it can seem like the world of information sharing is full of barriers and some times it is easier to give up after you have been knocked back but it is well worth the effort to keep trying. 

Keep your goal in mind be it better services for children and families, better value for money, improved outcomes or any number of other positive and valuable reasons for sharing information and communicate that goal to your partners with passion and belief.  Listen to your partners and try to understand their culture and processes, build up the trust and understanding that may be lacking and push forward.

Above all learn from the process so that it will be easier next time and you will present your partners with less opportunities to knock you back and more opportunities to say yes…….show great heart and the rest will come…..

The post Show great heart and the rest will come…. appeared first on .

On 22 March, the Government announced the a new multi-agency network to help transform services at the local level:. https://www.gov.uk/government/news/community-budgets-inspire-new-nationwide-network-of-public-service-revolutionaries

Leicestershire have agreed to my part time secondment to the network, which along with Leicestershire acting as the ‘Hub’ for the IISaM legacy, brings information sharing to the centre of local transformation.  Information sharing is fundamental to local partnership working.  Solving information sharing supports new ways of working!

The post IISaM, and the public service transformation network appeared first on .

Practitioners from a range of different agencies across Bradford District came together to discuss information sharing in practice and more importantly explore the differences in different agency and professional approaches.

The day started with exploring the different influences on the way in which we all make decisions in our working lives. In particular the group were asked to think about how they may have different identities that align with their profession, their organisation or service, these identities may not always align and may compete but they will affect the way in which decisions about sharing information are made. 

In the afternoon the group were given a scenario to consider and were asked to think about the information sharing that could take place and what could have happened earlier. Differences in approaches were discussed and one key theme that came out was the way in which complex issues can go unnoticed because individual and seemingly isolated incidents do not meet thresholds for intervention or may be addressed by a single agency but are not shared with other interested parties. 

Over the time that I have been involved in IISaM I have come to realise that the sharing of information never fails to stimulate discussion, and yesterday was no different, participants were fully engaged in the process and there is always value in bringing different agencies together. One suggestion from the group was that the next session should include a focus on intervention thresholds so participants can gain a fuller picture. As early intervention is increasingly the focus of service redesign, gaining this broader understanding across practitioner boundaries will be important including a better understanding of why information may or may not be shared. 

The next event in Bradford will be on the 16^th of May and has the promise of being an extremely stimulating, practical and valuable session.

The post EASI Does it appeared first on .

IISAM Newsletter Spring 2013

The post Improving Information Sharing and Management newsletter, Spring 2013 appeared first on .

The workshops ran for the members of Solution Design and Strategy and Policy teams in the council’s Strategic Information and Technology function.  The aim was to introduce the project’s outputs, and to demonstrate how the tools could be used by working through a scenario.  The benefit of partnership working became evident as we used a real-life situation in Greater Manchester to make sure that the scenario had a ring of truth!

The first part of the day focused on introducing the concept of an information sharing journey, together with examples from the case studies on the project website to bring things to life.  Many of the workshop attendees commented that they found this gives their own work a useful context; often, the Strategic Information & Technology function gets involved once a vision has been agreed, and works primarily in the designing and planning and pre-implementation stages, before handing back to another part of the council once implementation is underway.

In addition, many of the real-life examples came from my observations of the Leicestershire Multi Agency Information Sharing Hub.  Amongst the attendees were those who are closely involved in the project, who found it interesting to hear how the model is described and understood by those standing outside.  They were also able to spend some time during the session reflecting on the progress of the MASH, which is a luxury often denied them in the pressures of everyday work.  The examples were also useful for other team members, who are aware of the development of the MASH, but who may have had very limited involvement with it.

Both Jill and Anne were able to attend and provided a vital perspective during the day.  They could both bring their experiences and reflections to the session, and could be objective about the questions and issues being raised, rather than simply seeing everything through the lens of the county council’s work.  It gave a more in-depth understanding of the project’s work to everyone who participated, and also gave me a chance to flap about and make sure everything was running to time (it wasn’t.  Does it ever?)

In the next couple of weeks, I will be going back to both teams, and asking them to reflect on two things:

• How did they find the training session itself?  It was designed to be intense, fast-paced and rooted in reality with the chance to think about lots of different aspects of information sharing.  How did that work in practice?
• Having had a few weeks to consider things, what are their views on the toolkit?  What particularly struck them on the day, and what has stayed with them?

You can find all the instructions on how to run a similar training session in the site index.  There’s an agenda, scenario, examples of each stage of the journey, plus ‘bingo cards’, detailing the key facts about each stage.

The post Preaching to the converted: information sharing in a local authority appeared first on .

Last week I was in a workshop held by the Local E-government Standards Body (LeGSB) www.legsb.gov.uk . The workshop looked at Local and central government priorities and policies where data standards are key.

You may ask why are standards around data important for successful data sharing???

Anne’s Patchwork Quilt

Well lets just say overall how we collect, and classify data is commonly not clearly set, or when set it is usually only mandated by individual government bodies or departments.   Does this ring any bells? The same is very true for information sharing guidance which often is sector based, piecemeal and not cross cutting even when multi-agency work is key.

Clearly a pan government strategy around Information sharing and supporting data standards that brings things together is a MUST.

This adhoc approach also means that a receiving organisation may reuse data legitimately and appropriately but inappropriately interpret its meaning which impacts upon services provided to the Community.

Interestingly, culture, senior management buy in, and overall skills around of information management were all raised at today’s workshop, and what was really useful was just hearing a number of central and local government officers talking about what their priorities are.

Paul Davidson

The key lead in the field of standards is Paul Davidson who lead the session has posted some work that he has undertaken with colleagues at Trafford Council to understand their Troubled Families program. Published on the Troubled Families LGA Knowledge Hub, Paul has suggested how data standards could add value at each step from operational data, through to evidencing policy.

Here is a link to the paper Paul has produced which visualises differing relationships around the data sets and service delivery within the context of Troubled Families . 

Opportunities for applying Data Standards to a Troubled Families Programme (pdf, 720KB)

The post A patchwork quilt of information sharing and information standards appeared first on .

I quickly enlisted the help of my colleague Nicola and together we decided we would focus on communicating the idea of the information sharing journey, illustrated by the real life Leicestershire MASH case study, and then give the group an opportunity to think about which IISaM tools might support each stage. On the day the session worked really well and we received lots of great feedback. Those that attended were from across Bradford Council so hopefully they will take the knowledge back into their respective departments and spread the word to support the use of the IISaM toolkit in the future. 

One issue that comes up regularly when information sharing is being discussed is that of different organisational cultures, and in particular different practices that apparently create problems when wanting to share information. As part of the ongoing legacy for IISaM we are supporting a programme of EASI (Effective and Appropriate Sharing of Information) practitioner development days – a project delivered through Bradford University School of Management and funded by the ESRC, IISaM and Bradford Council. The programme will aim to support practitioners and their managers in understanding differences, and recognising when it is appropriate to challenge those differences and when not. Planning for these sessions is underway and the first will be delivered in Bradford on 11^th April. Have a look at our Events page to see what else is happening in your area! 

So we continue to build the future and legacy of IISaM and with the Midlands and Yorkshire & Humber events on the 8^th and 22^nd May there is still a lot to look forward to – lunch included!……

The post No such thing as a free lunch appeared first on .