Essex County Council: Capturing the Lived Experience of Adult Social Care Users 2021-28

In 2021 Essex County Council commissioned us to conduct some pilot research with recipients of adult social care (and their families if appropriate) to explore their lived experiences of adult social care. The commission is set in context of ECC identifying co-production as an area for development, to ensure the lived experience of adult social care users feeds into performance management and continuous service improvement work. ECC is committed to delivering a long-term approach to Lived Experience resulting in an extension of original contract arrangements.

The work involves 100-200 CATI interviews being completed each month by a small team of experienced telephone interviewing staff within our Contact Centre. We have target quotas by workstream each month. Those being interviewed have accessed various sources of adult social care support, from direct payments to rehabilitation services through to safeguarding matters. Our interviewing team all have DBS clearance and have undertaken safeguarding training due to the vulnerabilities involved. An online version of the survey is also hosted by us and the link distributed by the client in their regular communications.   

We supply the raw data back to ECC on a rolling monthly basis. The insights we capture are regularly fed into ECC’s performance management and continuous service improvement structures and have demonstrated the value of consulting adults with Lived Experience.