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So Who Cares Anyway E31 Whose Shoes? Bringing my creativity to work · SoWhoCaresAnyway

• 0:04
  Hi, I'm Ruth Germaine, and this is, so Who Cares? Anyway, a podcast shaped by my deep curiosity about who cares, what do they care about, what do they do, and why does it matter? My aspiration is to build a community that listens with intention and explores care from every angle, from the North Yorkshire malls to behind clinical doors.
• 0:27
  Each episode invites people to share their stories, their ideas, and talk about what matters to them together.
• 0:35
  We reimagine what care could be and how we might shape health and wellbeing through the assets, values, and the lived wisdom of our communities.
• 0:44
  And why does it matter? Because for too long, health and care have been treated as things to be delivered, often depleting systems and the people around them.
• 0:54
  And it's time to rewrite the narrative to center everyone as a contributor, not just a recipient, to offer joy, hope, and meaningful belonging to invite each of us to shape the future of health and wellbeing with courage, with creativity, and with care.
• 1:12
  So who cares? Anyway, hi.
• 1:16
  It's Ruth here, and I just wanna ask, what if a ball game could change healthcare? To find out? Listening to this episode where I'm joined by Jewel Phillips, the creator of an amazing game called Whose Shoes, A colorful, poetic, radical tool for co-production where people can really think about what it's like to see in somebody else's shoes.
• 1:37
  We talk about creativity, courage, and what happens when people feel truly heard.
• 1:42
  So this one's full of goosebumps.
• 1:44
  I think it's amazing.
• 1:46
  I hope you enjoy.
• 1:49
  Hi, and welcome to the next episode of, so Who Cares.
• 1:52
  Anyway, and I'm really delighted today to, I always am, but yeah, especially delighted today to have Jill, Jill Phillips, um, join me.
• 1:59
  So the first time I met Jill, Jill came along when I was a Darcy fellow to introduce, um, US to, so, uh.
• 2:06
  Game that Jewels created called Who Shoes that we used for co-production.
• 2:11
  So yeah, I'd really delight to have you on, Jill.
• 2:14
  Co-production is one of those things that I think is just so important, um, not always understood, and I think your game is just such a creative way of approaching it.
• 2:23
  So I'm gonna pass over to you 'cause I know that's a really short introduction and just ask you to introduce yourself please.
• 2:28
  So, thank you, Ruth.
• 2:29
  Thanks for it's, it makes a change, doesn't it? To be a guest on somebody else's podcast because I'm a Yes.
• 2:34
  I didn't say that, did I? That you have your own podcast.
• 2:37
  I do.
• 2:37
  Called whose shoes as well.
• 2:39
  Yes.
• 2:39
  Yeah, so my podcast is Wild Card whose Shoes, which has been an extension from the, the whose shoes work that I do, which is about looking at things from different perspectives.
• 2:49
  So as Ruth said, I'm the creator of this rather Ma Maverick tool and um, I absolutely love it.
• 2:56
  So, and one of my favorite pieces of work ever has been working regularly with each cohort of Darzi Fellows.
• 3:04
  So I've stayed in touch, obviously with Ruth and I'm proud to say with many other Darzi fellows.
• 3:10
  And I just think they're, um, a special breed of people that somehow during that DARZI program, people really seem to get co-production.
• 3:20
  The importance of listening to people lived, experience, collaborating, thinking differently to solve what Tom Holiday likes to call, and Becky Melby likes to call Wicked Problems, and I've just found it the most amazing network.
• 3:36
  So Ruth and I came together again in person recently, when, sadly it's the end of the Darzi Fellowship program as we know it.
• 3:44
  And we had really quite an amazing get together and celebration, and it was so lovely to see people.
• 3:50
  I didn't, I, I didn't, I was surprised at how many people I knew, like from across all the different cohorts, and it was just really lovely to, to re-connect with so many of them.
• 4:01
  Yeah, it was a great event, wasn't it? I mean, it was sad because the darzi program was ending, and as you say, it's been so important, but it was also just great to see everybody there and the passion and everything in the room.
• 4:13
  And um, yeah, Rebecca Melby, she's, she agreed to be on the podcast at some point, so Ah, yeah, she's been on mine.
• 4:20
  Yes.
• 4:21
  Yes.
• 4:21
  And I think we've had a few podcast guests that are the same, haven't we? Yeah.
• 4:25
  Angela Catley definitely being one of them.
• 4:27
  Yes.
• 4:27
  Who is absolutely fantastic, you know, with her when I get old and all of that sort of thing.
• 4:32
  And I think inevitably when we both, um, cover quite similar areas, don't we, we're both looking to basically chat to inspirational people, people who inspire us and we hope will inspire others around some kind of healthcare improvement.
• 4:46
  That's the common ground, isn't it? I think it is, yes.
• 4:49
  I always say if I find it inspiring and if I've enjoyed the conversation and found it interesting, then hopefully other people will too.
• 4:57
  And I think that is that thing, isn't it sort of inspiring, challenging, thinking differently.
• 5:01
  And I think being creative is such an important thing, which certainly your game really sort of helped with me to sort of think about it actually.
• 5:09
  We don't just have to do set things.
• 5:11
  We can think about it in different ways.
• 5:13
  So, yeah.
• 5:14
  I just wanna ask you your, oh, you are gonna say something? Go on.
• 5:17
  Well, I was just gonna say in terms of serendipity and like as one door closes, another one opens.
• 5:23
  It's obviously a big cliche, but it's also true.
• 5:25
  And literally when I was on the train going down to the Darzi event, quite sad that it was all finishing.
• 5:31
  I got a very exciting invitation to go and run.
• 5:35
  Whose shoes Sessions for the session? Current.
• 5:37
  N-H-S-G-M-T-S trainees.
• 5:40
  So the NHS Graduate Management trainees.
• 5:43
  And that was last week.
• 5:45
  So you know it, it's funny, isn't it? And I'm sure you're gonna find the same Ruth with.
• 5:50
  With, you know, with working for yourself and doing your own thing, you, you plant seeds.
• 5:55
  This was a seed going back to, I think, AP March, 2022, and you've planted a seed.
• 6:02
  I did a session for them, then a virtual session, and then suddenly, what was it, like three and a half years later, you know, acquired a big opportunity came, comes along, and I absolutely loved it.
• 6:13
  It was really good fun.
• 6:14
  And I was on the panel as well.
• 6:15
  Ruth, you were on the panel.
• 6:17
  So what did that involve? Well, it involved, so our workshops, we did a a, I took my, um, friend and colleague Lisa Edwards I've been working with at Midlands Partnership Foundation Trust, doing a new who, she's project around children and families.
• 6:32
  So that's another story we'll perhaps come onto, so we'd gone.
• 6:36
  Um, together, we've been invited to run these two whose shoes workshops, and then they said to me, well, Bing, as you're coming anyway, will you be on the panel? So, um, I found myself.
• 6:47
  Now again, I think in terms of knowing what to expect, um, I was thinking we'd be probably sitting behind some kind of table and then there'd be an opportunity to write notes.
• 6:57
  Because if they're asking a question, they had somebody asking a question to three of us on the panel, and the other two were brilliant.
• 7:03
  One of them, um, was Dr.
• 7:05
  Seaver, who, a again, I'm looking there.
• 7:08
  So hands off Ruth, I'm, I'm thinking she might be a podcast guest at some point.
• 7:13
  And, um, Jill Rook from NHS England and basically asking us questions in term.
• 7:20
  But if you are.
• 7:22
  My age and also the third person being asked the question, you perhaps kind of want to make a note of what, what's been said or what you might say.
• 7:31
  And it was just like, it felt quite exposed in a way.
• 7:33
  And it was, it was great.
• 7:34
  It was more like a kinda fireside chat, if you know what I mean, where we were just sitting and answering questions and I really enjoyed it and I thought to bring my, you know, experience perhaps and rather more, less conventional approach.
• 7:49
  Um, and storytelling approach I think was hopefully what I could perhaps bring to the panel.
• 7:55
  So, um, we had an hour, I think with, um, someone introduced it and set out the key.
• 8:01
  The key aspects of the 10 year plan and then put various questions to each of us.
• 8:07
  And then there was a question and answer session at the end.
• 8:10
  So yeah, life life's interesting.
• 8:13
  Yes.
• 8:14
  Yeah.
• 8:14
  Sounds it.
• 8:15
  And I like that bit of planting seeds and Yeah, seeing what happens, you know, and they, they come up when you least expect them to then.
• 8:22
  And from your point of view of hands off the podcast, I think what's interesting is actually because I've listened to some of your podcasts and I know you've listened to some of mine, Uhhuh, I think they're probably quite different.
• 8:31
  And I think we probably draw out different things for people.
• 8:33
  'cause I think so often these people that come on, I mean, we've spoken already about how long we do our podcast for Mo both of us have said sort of just over an hour maximum.
• 8:43
  And, um.
• 8:44
  But actually when they come on, I'm sure that these people, I could talk to them for ages.
• 8:47
  Yes.
• 8:48
  So I don't think it really matters 'cause there's so much more that these people have got to say.
• 8:51
  Absolutely.
• 8:52
  But what I'd like to know, Jill, I'd like to know a bit more about you.
• 8:55
  Okay.
• 8:55
  And what led you to whose shoes, sort of that drive that passion, which I feel every time I'm around you, you know, what, where did that come from and, and why did it? You in that direction, and then we can go onto what shoes in whose shoes is later on maybe.
• 9:11
  Okay.
• 9:12
  Thanks Ruth.
• 9:12
  I obviously that, that's the key question in a way.
• 9:15
  So a, a sort of potted version is, my background was in social care and I worked for 30 years, um, in local government.
• 9:25
  So quite an unexpected background probably in a way, and I'm surprised that.
• 9:32
  Now looking back that I sort of stuck with it for that long, but I was pretty happy.
• 9:36
  I was bringing up my three young children and I was given a lot of, um, scope, if you like, to, to be myself, you know, certainly in, in the context of that time ago.
• 9:48
  And to bring my creativity to work for most of the time.
• 9:52
  And then as I think it happens with a lot of people's stories, different people come along, different management things change.
• 9:58
  You get closed down, you're perhaps a bit too creative.
• 10:02
  Um, and while this kind of transitional period was happening, and also I'd been off work for 16 months with cancer and I think that very much for me made me stop.
• 10:16
  And I think I already.
• 10:19
  Didn't want to be wasting time and was quite a positive person, but I really wanted to like, make the most of what I could do and what I could bring.
• 10:28
  And I became, the story really was, I became very passionate about personalization, which was what, what, um, was happening at social care, at the, in social care at the time.
• 10:39
  So this was sort of building for two or three years.
• 10:42
  I was part of a really exciting project with country university.
• 10:47
  I was well regarded, my ideas were being listened to.
• 10:51
  And um, we found ways of, of storytelling with people who'd got very complex learning disabilities, um, to really have to, to listen to their stories authentically through all sorts of different media and storytelling.
• 11:09
  And I loved it and.
• 11:11
  We were one of, I think it was 13 pilot sites around individual budgets.
• 11:18
  And it was, it was new at the time in terms of, um, wanting to develop more personalized approaches for people so that they could spend their own, they'd be given a, a budget and able to buy the support that they needed rather than the council just providing a service for them.
• 11:40
  And honestly, I became excited about this because I thought it was real in terms of services starting to fit around the person rather than people going from pillar to post, getting what was available or not, and nobody talking to each other, which fast forward to the MHS 10 year plan now is quite an interesting concept.
• 11:59
  And what happened for me was that I realized I was being asked to, I was working at the time in a.
• 12:05
  A sort of performance context.
• 12:07
  I was sort of quality improvement and I was being asked to deliver on outcomes and personalization.
• 12:16
  And basically I, I became very convinced that nobody knew what it was and we needed to kind of go back a step to really discover what these words meant so that they didn't just become a good idea, but a buzz word.
• 12:29
  So I started to do some thinking, um, around say, a care home setting, and you want to deliver, everybody wants to deliver personalized care.
• 12:40
  So I've always got the assumption that people come to work because you know, they're good people and they want to do their best.
• 12:46
  So in a care home context, if you want to deliver personalized care.
• 12:52
  What does that mean and what does it mean for the people who live there? What does it mean for their families? What does it mean for the care staff? What does it mean for the manager? What does it mean for the catering staff? What does it mean perhaps for people who come in and provide activities, volunteers? What does it even mean for the people who designed the place in the first place? So the environment, and it was absolutely fascinating and I'd read Community Care in particular, was the journal at the time about this emerging agenda of personalization and, um, the, the idea of kind of looking at things from different perspectives.
• 13:32
  Um, fast forward to now we're using the analogy of a beach ball.
• 13:36
  If you look at a multicolored beach ball and you only see the red stripe or the blue stripe.
• 13:42
  We are encouraging people to turn that beach ball around and see the other perspectives.
• 13:46
  So if that makes sense, that's where, whose shoes was born in a way.
• 13:50
  Um, developing a board game that genuinely had scenarios from different people's perspectives.
• 13:57
  Real people, all of them have always been a hundred percent.
• 14:01
  Somebody's real.
• 14:03
  Experience put into a little scenario card, and then right from the beginning we've used poems and we've always found that poems kind of reach people in a way that perhaps other approaches don't.
• 14:16
  You know, a poem from the heart is difficult to ignore.
• 14:20
  So that's been the basic who choose concept from the beginning.
• 14:24
  I got the idea of developing a board game, and I didn't, I mean, I, I'd had all this time working for a local authority.
• 14:32
  I wasn't, um, equipped in any way really to know what to do or how to do it.
• 14:38
  But I think passion can carry you a long way and reaching out to other people.
• 14:43
  So as I think I mentioned, I got support from Coventry University who were amazing.
• 14:47
  They're a very entrepreneurial university.
• 14:50
  And the techno center in Coventry basically helped me with business mentoring, um, design of the board, ga game design of the board game from the hub, um, the design hub that was next door.
• 15:04
  And it was literally, it was crazy, like doors opening all over the place and there was a, um, health design institute over the road.
• 15:14
  It was just.
• 15:15
  As, as I needed the various different bits, I was finding the people to help me with it, even manufacturing.
• 15:21
  Um, the board games originally came, were printed in Estonia.
• 15:26
  The little crock shoes come from China.
• 15:29
  The dice were locally made in England.
• 15:32
  Um, the, the cards were printed up the road.
• 15:34
  It was, you know, I was way, way, way outta my comfort zone.
• 15:38
  But it was incredibly exciting and, um, I, I started off and I was selling this board game and I, at the beginning, I did sell it as a board game, as a tool, but not in the way that it's sort of evolved since in terms of a licensed facilitated package.
• 15:56
  It's become more sophisticated and, and bigger really.
• 15:59
  But in the early days, it was just sold as a board game.
• 16:03
  And I had this business mentor who said to me.
• 16:06
  Jill, who are you gonna sell this board game to? And I said, well, other, other social services departments obviously.
• 16:13
  And he said, how many of those are there? And I said, I think they're about 150.
• 16:19
  And he said, how many of them are gonna buy it? How many are you gonna sell it to? And I said, well, all of them, 'cause they need it, you know? And then who else are you gonna sell it to? And I couldn't think of anybody.
• 16:32
  So it was that level of naivety in a way.
• 16:35
  And actually my second customer was Ally Gardner, who was a, a senior lecturer at Manchester Metropolitan University.
• 16:44
  So the journey was so different from what I expected, but I think, you know, I just wanted it to happen and really went with the flow in terms of taking opportunities and trying to network with people and just reach out really.
• 16:59
  And then the recession hit.
• 17:01
  So I, so I set up in 2008 wasn't the best time to be setting up a business really.
• 17:07
  And I had, you know, looking back, I had a, a really successful first year, you know, considering and certainly got the money back that I'd put into the business.
• 17:17
  I'm like given up my job.
• 17:18
  Um, I hadn't been made redundant or anything, so my salary just stopped.
• 17:23
  And, um.
• 17:24
  I say, obviously putting some of your own money into developing anything, really.
• 17:28
  I, I think I had more help at the time than you get now.
• 17:31
  You know, there was more help with say business link and one or two services that were available, but then it felt as if everybody I built contact with lost their job or got redeployed or didn't know what they were doing.
• 17:46
  And that was before social media really.
• 17:49
  And then Twitter kicked off.
• 17:50
  And honestly, I used Twitter to build the whole thing and to kind of build the relationships and keep in touch with people when they moved from one place to another.
• 17:59
  It was, it was really transformative.
• 18:02
  I think all that social media and Twitter was just so useful, wasn't it? I think we spoke about Twitter and what it is now, so I, I know some people still use it and I completely understand, but for me, um, I don't so much now, but I think listening to your story there, I mean, there's a few things I'm just gonna pick up on that I really, really like.
• 18:20
  I mean, one was about bringing my creativity to work and I think that is something that, you know, we struggle with because actually so often we go to work and it's just so busy and listening to people now, I think it's busier than it's ever been.
• 18:33
  Yeah.
• 18:33
  So there isn't room.
• 18:35
  For creativity, either in the minds of the people in the organization.
• 18:39
  'cause you talked about people allowing you that, but also in the minds of the individual because we're just going to work.
• 18:44
  We've got so much to do at home, at work.
• 18:47
  It all is almost that get that job done.
• 18:50
  So even if you've got those creative ideas, are you allowed to do them? And then the other bit was about passion can carry you a long way.
• 18:57
  So actually trying to tune in from that creativity into that passion is obviously something that, that you use to drive you and I think is.
• 19:06
  Just so important.
• 19:07
  I mean, you've said lots of things there, Jill, I wonder if at this point it's worth asking you to describe whose shoes and certainly we can put a link in the chat so people can perhaps see it in action.
• 19:17
  I know you've created some brilliant videos and things, so we can put those links in.
• 19:22
  But um, for people listening now, it'd be nice to have a little bit of a picture about.
• 19:27
  What it is, um, what it does.
• 19:29
  I mean, I've seen the board.
• 19:30
  It's great.
• 19:31
  It's colorful, it's red and yellow and blue and green I think, if I remember right.
• 19:35
  That's right.
• 19:35
  That's right.
• 19:35
  Which top my head, it was back in 2019.
• 19:37
  As you say, there's the little crocs that you move around.
• 19:40
  There's the cards.
• 19:41
  But perhaps you can just give it us a little bit more of a picture.
• 19:43
  I'm getting excited now.
• 19:46
  No, you remember it very well and that, that's nice.
• 19:48
  I mean it is, it is colorful and memorable and it's really, really simple.
• 19:53
  I mean in terms of describing it to people when they're playing the game, if you like, or using the tool to use a bit more management speak.
• 20:01
  Um, and that's been an interesting story in itself.
• 20:04
  You know, Jill, you'll never get anywhere.
• 20:06
  This was the early days.
• 20:07
  If you call it a ball game, you need to call it a learning and development management facilitation, quality improvement methodology, and many more words, you know, and for me.
• 20:19
  The, the joy of it really is, it, it is simple.
• 20:21
  It really, you can play it in different ways.
• 20:24
  It's a flexible tool, but the look of the board is, you've got four packs of cards and like you say, with the, um, blue, which represents and means that the scenarios in that pack of cards are sourced by the people.
• 20:44
  So you might call them, depending on what, what the context is that you are using the tool in, um, patients, it could be, I've done a lot of work in maternity, um, women families.
• 20:58
  It could be informal networks.
• 21:01
  It could be your sister, your extended family, but they're like your gang.
• 21:07
  That applies pretty much across the board.
• 21:10
  And then you've got, um, yellow scenarios, which another pack of cards.
• 21:16
  So you've got four brightly colored packs of cards on the board.
• 21:18
  Visually.
• 21:20
  Um, yellow scenarios are frontline staff, so.
• 21:24
  They're in some kind of paid capacity to look after people.
• 21:28
  So in maternity, that could be the midwives, the obstetricians, the obstetricians, the doctors, uh, sorry, say that again.
• 21:37
  That, that could be the midwives, the obstetricians, the gps, um, people who are in a, a paid capacity, community midwife, all sorts of people.
• 21:48
  And then you've got the red cards.
• 21:51
  Now, probably if you wanted to make a really significant change, money's involved.
• 21:56
  And these are the people you perhaps need to influence.
• 21:58
  So it could be the chief exec, it could be a policy maker, it could be a commissioner.
• 22:04
  But the kind of people in power, really, the red pack of cards and then the green pack of cards is, um, basically anybody else who, depending on what the subject area is, is or should be involved in the topic.
• 22:20
  And it could be, I mean, it's trying to.
• 22:22
  Get people, um, to realize that perhaps being a finance officer in an NHS trust, it's still all about the patients.
• 22:31
  Whatever job you've got, it's still all about the patients.
• 22:33
  That's who you are serving.
• 22:35
  It could be someone who's developed an app.
• 22:37
  It could be somebody from the community, it could be a volunteer, but it doesn't really matter too much about that from the point of view of anybody using the game.
• 22:47
  Because what they do is they come along and they throw a dice and they've got these brightly colored little, um, little croc shoes as counters, and they've got foot footsteps on the board as spaces, and they throw the dyes and they land on a footstep of a certain color, and they pick up the card that corresponds to that color and they read it together as a group, and then they talk about it.
• 23:13
  Yeah.
• 23:14
  So who comes to the events? Anybody and everybody.
• 23:17
  So it's very, very inclusive and.
• 23:22
  I mean, even the sessions that I did for the Darzi Fellows, the Darzi sessions were great because we had citizens came along.
• 23:30
  Whereas the GMTS session as I did last week for the graduate trainees, it was just for them.
• 23:36
  And I, I warned them that it was like a, a different type of experience of hoshi because unless you're sitting around the table with a really mixed group and listening to each other every which way, so people think who shoes is about listening more to the patients, which it is, but equally for me, and it really is equally the staff need to be listened to.
• 24:00
  If, if you want, say, say, take the example of maternity services.
• 24:03
  If you want a good birth, it's not all about the woman and the baby because unless the, the staff looking after her have got capacity and.
• 24:14
  Get recruited into that profession in the first place and want to stay there and want to get out of bed in the morning and do a good job, then, you know, if they're burnt out.
• 24:24
  And so it is trying to bring all these issues to the fore.
• 24:28
  So when you mentioned, um, earlier that people are too busy and that, you know, in, in the current climate and the NHS, it's really hard to make room for creativity.
• 24:40
  And you are right Ruth, but my goodness, it's exciting when they do.
• 24:46
  So last week I want to give a shout out to the maternity team in Bury.
• 24:50
  So in Buckingham, she.
• 24:53
  And they'd been planning a whohoo maternity workshop for months.
• 24:59
  And that's what it takes sometimes.
• 25:01
  'cause originally they wanted to do it quite quickly and I said, no, it'll be too quick.
• 25:04
  It won't be good enough.
• 25:06
  You've got to use that planning time to build relationships, to get the right people in the room to think of a theme that's really gonna work and and be special to you.
• 25:16
  Anyway, fast forward to last Wednesday.
• 25:19
  So this is the 17th of September.
• 25:21
  The room is packed.
• 25:23
  It's oversubscribed.
• 25:24
  I've made the mistake of telling them.
• 25:27
  You can invite more people than you've got seats around the table, because some people won't come.
• 25:32
  But I think they pretty much all came, which, you know, it's like a nice problem to have the energy in that room.
• 25:38
  So their, their theme, which I absolutely loved was it takes a village so around someone having a successful experience of pregnancy, birth, postnatal care, going home, et cetera, et cetera.
• 25:51
  It takes a village.
• 25:53
  But what I loved about it, 'cause I'd sort of given them a challenge, like the best workshops will be something that the local team have really got behind, done something special themselves, done something creative.
• 26:07
  I've given them examples of music and all sorts of different, um, creative.
• 26:14
  Approaches that people have brought.
• 26:16
  And when we had, we've had various planning meetings and they said, oh, we've come up with our theme.
• 26:21
  It takes a village.
• 26:22
  But honestly, with, they made it like a village fate.
• 26:26
  So this is the NHS at the moment, and the tables were named after local villages and they got little pictures on them.
• 26:34
  Um, they've got the whose shoes bunting around the room, so very colorful, but they put their own bunting up as well.
• 26:41
  All the little name badges had got houses on them.
• 26:44
  And during one of the planning calls with them, um, Nick, who was the, I think like the PA to the director of midwifery suddenly popped up really excited.
• 26:56
  And while we'd been on the ca the call she'd sourced these large post-its in the shape of houses.
• 27:03
  Oh, wonderful.
• 27:04
  Yeah.
• 27:04
  So when we came to do our pledges at the end of the workshop, because who she's is all about.
• 27:09
  Action focused and, and what can you do individually to make a difference? We can perhaps talk about that a little bit more, but she'd sourced these large pledge cards in the shape of houses that then they could collect up and make it look like a village with all these different pledges.
• 27:28
  So it was just extraordinary.
• 27:30
  And someone came up to me at the end and she was going to join the Maternity and Neonatal Voices partnership.
• 27:37
  She was buzzing with it.
• 27:39
  She was wanting to use her, um, quite difficult experience to help others, and she hadn't expected, I think, to come along with that outcome.
• 27:50
  But.
• 27:51
  Now, I think if you just, I think my message would be if you just create the conditions for people to feel that they're honestly valued and listened to, then magic can happen.
• 28:02
  But you can't just do it by saying, we want to do that co-production, that who shoes thingy because it seems to be working somewhere else.
• 28:11
  It absolutely doesn't work like that.
• 28:13
  It's, it's the opposite of a tick box and you, you've got to genuinely set out to listen to people, and I think people can see straight through you if you don't.
• 28:24
  Yes.
• 28:25
  Yeah, I, I can completely get that and it's not the easiest thing to, to do.
• 28:29
  But Jill, you've obviously been doing it for a long time and what you've not only managed to do is to create that yourself, but you've managed to create the conditions listening to that, where the people that are actually going to be doing this work that you are working with, that they've learned how to create that as well.
• 28:45
  I just wanna go back one bit just to the, um, 'cause you talked about the blue, the red, you know, the green, those different things and all those different people, because I'm just trying to remember, when we were doing this at the Darcy event, were they, are they preset or is it at that point you've got the stories and poems or that you've got things there? Or do they happen outta the event? So are they written on those cards or are those cards set so that when you are playing that game, there's something there and then that person on the table starts to share That? Just remind me.
• 29:15
  Yes.
• 29:16
  The, the cards themselves that I've described are like mini scenarios and that.
• 29:22
  Almost always a statement rather than a question.
• 29:27
  So I think that's what people need to kind of take a moment sometimes to get their head around.
• 29:32
  You know, I think so many tools will say, this is the problem, what's the solution? And it kinda like narrows things down for me.
• 29:39
  Whereas the who shoes scenarios have got, it's a bit like, I mean, definitely Twitter helped me a lot in the, in the early development.
• 29:48
  If you, if you think of Twitter and somebody just says something, a statement and other people agree, disagree, say all that happened to me, or this is what we did, or whatever.
• 30:00
  So who, she is very similar in that you've got a statement genuinely by somebody.
• 30:05
  I mean, for example.
• 30:07
  One of the maternity scenarios that, that's been really quite impactful.
• 30:12
  Um, would two that come, come to mind? You know, know that my mind goes off everywhere, but, um, a midwife, for example, saying, well, this is all very well, but I don't even get a chance to go to the Lou or to, to, you know, to have a break.
• 30:28
  And Murray from Darcy, so, oh, Murray Anderson, MOIs Murray used to say that whose shoes was like, I, I'm not sure I'm gonna get this right, but you'll get the gist of it.
• 30:40
  An inanimate actor.
• 30:42
  So the fact that that scenario.
• 30:45
  Came, you can imagine someone sitting there bottling something up and thinking, this isn't real.
• 30:51
  You know, this person, this game has no idea what my life's like.
• 30:55
  And the scenarios are really deliberately quite provocative.
• 30:59
  So that just the thing that someone's thinking about comes out as the next scenario.
• 31:05
  And you can almost see this sort of sigh of relief that, yeah, um, people are listening, you know, this is the, the real deal.
• 31:12
  We're actually talking about real things, not sanitized, you know, management kind of things.
• 31:18
  And I think the, the pinnacle for me really, if that's the right word, was a workshop we did in Nottingham and it, you know, whose shoes has got dragged into, no, say that again.
• 31:29
  Whose shoes has, has grown into more and more sensitive topics Sometimes.
• 31:35
  And, you know, I've got nervous sometimes like.
• 31:38
  Ultimately, I'm advocating fun and humanity and a board game.
• 31:44
  And the game itself varies according to what topic you're discussing.
• 31:52
  So for example, we've had a whole set of cards about dementia care, dementia friendly communities, maternity care, more recently children and families.
• 32:01
  So it's always about crowdsourcing real perspectives from real people.
• 32:09
  And as I say, over time, it's become a.
• 32:13
  More and more sensitive topics.
• 32:15
  So for example, we've done workshops around baby loss.
• 32:19
  Um, we've done workshops around the experience of people from black and ethnic minority communities in maternity care, where it's known that the outcomes can be a lot worse.
• 32:31
  And so I was starting to say that the, the pinnacle for me was a workshop in Nottingham where we were using a, a specific set of cards around, um, the experience of people from black and ethnic minority communities, which actually Ruth, I'd first developed with Rosie Murphy.
• 32:51
  A Darcy fellow? Yeah.
• 32:53
  Oh, okay.
• 32:54
  So Rosie Murphy, um, she, she came with me actually to the, the Darcy Celebration event.
• 33:01
  Absolutely lovely.
• 33:02
  A very, um.
• 33:05
  Insight for midwife who was working Croydon at the time as part of her darzi fellowship and in terms of ripples.
• 33:12
  So Rosie was there at the beginning, and then I was doing this work up in Nottingham and the thing that really, really stayed with me, that several of the women were texting their friends during the day saying, get on down here.
• 33:27
  This is the real deal.
• 33:29
  This is, you know, these issues.
• 33:31
  Somebody's listening, and it caused a problem because you've got so many, you know, it is a board game and you've got tables and you've got chairs, and you start to get extra women turning up who weren't on their table plan, um, hadn't signed up for the event, and bringing their babies and their buggies, and it wasn't a very big room.
• 33:52
  It's a problem.
• 33:53
  But my goodness, was it an exciting problem to have? It was just brilliant.
• 33:57
  Wow.
• 33:58
  Taking that particular event.
• 34:00
  I mean, one of the most difficult things for me with Ish really has been how do you measure the impact? You know, it's a, there's a lot of, um, ripples, what I call lemon light bulbs where people understand things in a different way, but that Nottingham.
• 34:15
  Maternity event that the, um, maternity team were doing in close collaboration with Nottingham University.
• 34:24
  And they were doing it as a bit of a research exercise.
• 34:26
  So it was, everything was written up, analyzed, reported on in a way that was.
• 34:33
  Exciting in terms of evidence because everybody's looking for evidence.
• 34:37
  Yes, yes.
• 34:37
  That's always the hardest thing, isn't it? And I, I totally agree with you.
• 34:41
  When you're doing something like this, it's a bit different, bit creative, trying to get that evidence of impact at the end.
• 34:47
  And I think, um, I don't know so much for social care 'cause it's not my background, but I think it is the same, but certainly in the a HS, you know, it's always, you know, key performance indicators, those KPIs, and sometimes you just feel like, well, actually we are measuring the wrong thing.
• 35:01
  So trying to evidence the outcomes and the impact that actually matters to people is so hard because then, as you said, you talked earlier on about all those sort of people that you're trying to influence and they want to know about pounds and pence maybe, or they want to know about, you know, uh, numbers.
• 35:18
  But actually a lot of this is really quite, you know, what's called quant, uh, qualitative data.
• 35:23
  It's, it's what people have said, it's what people feel.
• 35:25
  It's what, what happens.
• 35:27
  So it doesn't always give you those numbers in the same way that are perhaps being looked for.
• 35:33
  Yeah, I think, you know, that's been one of my bug bears really, and, and my sort of long term, kinda slight run in with say NHS England, that they like to count things that you can count, which by definition, as you've just said is, you know, it's not this kind of softer ripples change of behavior.
• 35:54
  It's hard to measure.
• 35:55
  So sometimes I, I think something I I'd like to mention is like in terms of my journey and how it's evolved and the different topics and so on, I have what's called my golden people, and they're just the people that come along and believe in you or give you an opportunity.
• 36:12
  So say for example, in the early days of, of whose shoes.
• 36:18
  I dunno if you've ever seen the, um, the cartoon whereby someone's getting really excited about something that's innovative, but then obviously you can't do it because it's never been done before.
• 36:31
  Yes.
• 36:32
  Yeah.
• 36:32
  And, and that, that's exactly my journey, you know, that people really like the idea, but to actually find the people who are prepared to invest in it a bit, to take a risk a bit, it can be a bit of a, a can of worms who she is, because you don't know it is genuine co-production.
• 36:50
  You don't know what's going to come out from those conversations.
• 36:53
  And it's deliberately aiming to do that so that, you know, we invite people to go off piece from the scenario.
• 37:00
  Whatever conversation they're having is the one that needs to be ha to be had.
• 37:04
  So in the early days, um, someone called Kath Evans was a.
• 37:09
  A fantastic facilitator.
• 37:12
  She's, um, she was at the time the patient experience lead for maternity and children's services at NHS England.
• 37:20
  And she's now, I think, chief nurse or chief Children's nurse, I'm not quite sure at Barts, um, in London.
• 37:26
  But Kath, I, I called her.
• 37:28
  So again, with Twitter you get, I, I've been big on hashtags.
• 37:32
  I've got Fobs Flow, who's my big maternity pal and can do Cath, so can do Cath was working at the time in a position of influence and basically said, let's do it.
• 37:43
  You know, I've seen this in action.
• 37:45
  It works.
• 37:46
  Let's give it a chance.
• 37:47
  And we developed, um.
• 37:49
  Through a whole project across five hospitals in London, the original maternity scenarios, and those who choose maternity scenarios are now being used in a hundred NHS trusts.
• 38:03
  So it's been an amazing kind of journey.
• 38:05
  So anyway, coming back to, 'cause I'm, I'm sort of aware that I'm going off on one a bit, but hopefully, um, no, it's all interesting.
• 38:11
  It's fine, Jill, hopefully.
• 38:13
  Okay.
• 38:13
  But we were talking about evidence of impact, weren't we? Yes, yes.
• 38:17
  Now, so, and then I was talking about Golden People and Lisa Edwards at Midlands Partnership Foundation Trust has been amazing to work with.
• 38:28
  So I've worked with Lease and with that trust over the last four, almost five years, and.
• 38:35
  We met in a breakout room for a liberating structures session.
• 38:41
  Liberating structures is just all sorts of creative ways of making meetings and events more engaging, more exciting, um, more, more relevant, more impact.
• 38:53
  So.
• 38:55
  We met there because we're both interested in creativity and we've now been doing a properly funded, long-term project developing new issues, resources around children and families.
• 39:07
  So I'm hoping it's going to have the same kind of scope and the same kind of impact as the maternity work.
• 39:13
  And it's, it's had everything that it needed to have in terms of, you know, I've just said it's taken like four or five years to develop it.
• 39:21
  It's not a quick fix.
• 39:23
  It's taken that long because we've had to go out, we've, it's taken that long because we've gone out and met with real people and found out what the issues are and developed, co-produced the scenarios, the poems, we've got 45 new poems and it's.
• 39:40
  It's been very, very exciting.
• 39:41
  We've done work around joining things up for children and families.
• 39:45
  I've learned so much mental health, um, care experience, children and young people, and special educational needs, disability and neurodiversity.
• 39:57
  So it has been huge.
• 39:59
  And it got to this summer and we were sort of finishing the formal project and finalizing the resources and can you believe we had something called a celebration event? Yes.
• 40:11
  Wow.
• 40:12
  Like, again, like I say, it was, you know, like the maternity team I mentioned, and it takes a village.
• 40:17
  You know, I think that's courageous, you know, to call it a celebration event, not a evidence sharing it.
• 40:23
  It, do you know what I mean? You can take all, you can knock all the, the, you know, the fun out of it.
• 40:28
  It was a celebration event and it felt like a celebration.
• 40:31
  And part of the challenge was how do we share the impact? How do we share the story and how do we share the impact of what we've been doing? So.
• 40:40
  We've, we've actually got, um, a who shoes YouTube channel and my poor husband.
• 40:47
  So the long suffering Mr Who shoes comes along to these events.
• 40:51
  He, he loves, um, like filmmaking and, but he also loves on a sunny day, 1st of July, going, wandering around the grounds and, you know, listening to the birds or whatever.
• 41:02
  And I said.
• 41:03
  We need to film this event and everything about it because it's like a unique opportunity to come up with evidence.
• 41:11
  And the th the three things that stood out for me from that event were, we wanted to tell the story of what we'd been doing.
• 41:19
  And instead of somebody standing at the front and telling the story, a ball of wool got passed around the room with the people in the room grabbing it when it got to their part of the story.
• 41:29
  So, you know, all we've got to, um, the mental health events, all that was the mental health part participation.
• 41:36
  That was the mental health participation team.
• 41:38
  That was all, that was you, Tori, that was you, Marie, that was you, Shiro.
• 41:43
  And so they were taking the ball of wool and standing up and telling their part of the story and then passing it on to the people.
• 41:50
  So that brought you in, didn't you? That that's how we got into, and the project naturally evolved and.
• 41:58
  Brought more and more people in it, and we had these planning meetings whereby.
• 42:03
  In a more conventional way, I think the people who'd finished their module might be glad to leave and, you know, get back to their day job.
• 42:11
  We couldn't get rid of them.
• 42:13
  I mean, like the, the nicest possible way they all wanted to stay involved and that's, you know, it's been this massive snowball project of energy.
• 42:22
  So at the celebration event, we had the ball of wool to, um, tell the whole story.
• 42:29
  And we also had, um, okay, let's try and not make this confusing and we'll probably have a video for people to click on afterwards if they are confused.
• 42:39
  Okay.
• 42:40
  So if people are confused, we've actually produced two videos and we're working on the third one from this event because as say it was just so rich and so lovely in terms of people coming up with it and sharing their joint experience rather than one person standing at the front and, you know, telling us what happened.
• 43:00
  So the other main part of it was.
• 43:03
  Because the last topic, send special educational needs and so on, was so complex and the needs of the people involved in it was so different.
• 43:15
  Instead of having one workshop, we'd had a roadshow.
• 43:19
  So we'd had the Send Roadshow and all the people in our project group took it upon themselves.
• 43:25
  This Maverick growing project group.
• 43:27
  Yeah.
• 43:28
  Took it upon themselves to say, well, I'll take it.
• 43:31
  I'll take the HOO resources out.
• 43:34
  To a school.
• 43:35
  I'll take it to a secondary school.
• 43:37
  I'll take it to a special school, I'll take it to a parent's forum, I'll take it to a professional forum.
• 43:43
  So we'd had all these different people going out and basically testing out the new resources, not in one big workshop to bring everybody together, because that would've been too big, too overwhelming.
• 43:55
  You know, we were aware of the, the needs of the people we were serving.
• 44:00
  Um, Yvonne Newbold, who's been an amazing part of the project, I could talk all day about Yvonne.
• 44:05
  She and I ran a virtual session for some of the parents who, by definition wouldn't be able to come to a face-to-face event because of their caring responsibilities.
• 44:16
  So we basically try all sorts of different methods to, to reach the people who perhaps aren't normally heard.
• 44:22
  And it's exciting.
• 44:23
  It sounds really exciting to be honest.
• 44:26
  And even if people haven't quite visualized it right, I think what's coming through Jill is, A, your passion, but BI think enough that people can pick up and start their own mind, you know, that imagination, that creativity and, and start to think, and as we said, you know, people can definitely click on the links, but there's enough there I think for people to really understand.
• 44:46
  What I'd like to ask you now, Jill, is, is, is there, we've talked about that outcome bit actually, before we do that, I just want to say, um, just go back to the bit that you spoke about that um, people like to count the things that you can count rather than not matters and that innovation and people are told, well go off and be innovative, be creative, and then show me the evidence that it's going to work.
• 45:10
  And by that very fact, and Adam Lent, who was on my second podcast who was talking about do with, he said exactly the same thing.
• 45:16
  If you're doing something that's innovative and he creative it, probably you haven't got any evidence.
• 45:22
  It will work.
• 45:23
  Sometimes we just have to be allowed to go rogue and give it a go.
• 45:27
  And I can't tell you what it is.
• 45:29
  I'm gonna count at the end because I don't quite know what's gonna happen.
• 45:33
  But what we're doing at the moment isn't working.
• 45:36
  So actually we just need to try something else out.
• 45:40
  So I was just wanted to come back to that because I thought it was a really important point that you brought out there.
• 45:44
  And I really like that, Jill.
• 45:46
  So I dunno if you've got any response to that before I move on to my next bit.
• 45:50
  Yeah, I think that's exactly right Ruth.
• 45:52
  And I think we say to people if, if they, if they put the, the work into the preparation.
• 46:03
  It doesn't just happen if they put the work into building the relationships, getting the right people in the room, making it feel fun, creative, making people feel that they really are not just being told, we want to hear your voice, but they, they're valued, they're listened to, they're part of following it through afterwards.
• 46:24
  If they want to be with the pledges, they can make their own pledges to what they want to do.
• 46:30
  If all those things happen, then the magic will happen.
• 46:33
  I can promise you something will happen.
• 46:36
  Something really good will come from this, but I can't tell you what it's gonna be, and people have to believe that.
• 46:44
  So, for example, the example that I absolutely love to quote, and you'll see why.
• 46:51
  And in terms of perhaps silencing the naysayers in Liverpool.
• 46:56
  A new neonatal surgical unit is being built at the moment as a direct result of WHO shoes co-production conversations.
• 47:05
  So it doesn't, it doesn't get any bigger than that.
• 47:07
  It can't do, and what happened there, Ruth, you'll love this, because that outcome was never on the radar at the beginning.
• 47:15
  Not at all.
• 47:16
  Not and, but the conversations, we, I think we had four different workshops.
• 47:21
  And there was a mum called Helen Calvert, who's babied her, had heart surgery.
• 47:26
  She made it happen.
• 47:27
  So in terms of co-production, Helen Calver, absolutely amazing, insisted that whose shoes came to order? Hay Children's Hospital, Joanne Milford, brilliant pediatrician there.
• 47:39
  Um.
• 47:40
  Transformation lead got hold of it.
• 47:43
  I mean, we literally went, Helen and I went to meet Joe at Alder Hay Hospital.
• 47:48
  This is years ago.
• 47:49
  Joe ran around the hospital with a copy of her shoes board game under our arm, getting out on the table with whoever happened to be around.
• 47:57
  Look at this, look at this.
• 47:58
  So we got buy in from the hospital to have the workshops.
• 48:02
  The Chief Chief executive, Louise Shepherd was very supportive.
• 48:05
  That makes a difference.
• 48:07
  Um, and they had a series, I think it was about four different workshops.
• 48:12
  And what happened was that throughout the workshops people kept saying, oh, well obviously we can't do anything about that.
• 48:19
  Obviously we can't do anything about that.
• 48:21
  And what the thing was that they couldn't do anything about, which is true, is that Liverpool Women's Hospital and Alder Hay Children's Hospital are four miles apart.
• 48:31
  And, but vulnerable babies were being transported.
• 48:37
  Between the two hospitals and families were finding like a new dad.
• 48:41
  Well, do I be with the mom at Liverpool Women's Hospital? Do I be at the baby with the baby at order hay? What do I do? So perhaps we can do something about that.
• 48:53
  Perhaps if there's a new neonatal unit at order hay, they would need to go backwards and forwards between the the two.
• 49:00
  So that's what I mean by like true co-production.
• 49:04
  So then people got excited and Joanne and her team put in a business case and obviously a new unit like that cost millions and they were successful.
• 49:16
  So it's being built at the moment.
• 49:18
  I think opening quite soon and I'm hoping to go up, you know, and see it.
• 49:22
  Wow.
• 49:23
  Yeah.
• 49:24
  And, and we had the, we have the graphic artists.
• 49:26
  So in, again, in terms of visualizing what we do, a big part of it is how do you capture what people are saying? So you have the conversations on the table.
• 49:37
  And what can be frustrating sometimes is people are so deep in these incredible conversations that they're forgetting to write anything down.
• 49:45
  And it would, it would get lost.
• 49:48
  So we have.
• 49:49
  Post-it notes and instead of having a table facilitator who records everything, we have post-it notes everywhere so that if you have a quick thought or you've said something, you can take control and you can write your own post-it note.
• 50:02
  And then we have a visual artist who records all the conversations and then that can become an action plan or used in a business case or whatever it might be.
• 50:12
  Very, very powerful.
• 50:14
  And of course the visual art, you know, that happens like that.
• 50:16
  Anybody who's seen, it just, just looks incredible, doesn't it? So that in itself is inspiring.
• 50:22
  And you actually answered my next question, so I'm pleased I went back to that bit because my next question was, can you tell me about an incredible outcome that's come out of your shoes? And I don't think you can probably go from any more incredible than playing a game where you've got some nice little crocs going round on a board with some footsteps and some colorful cards that to go in with lots of people, passion and a new hospital.
• 50:45
  I mean, that's a massive impact, isn't it? And the impact of that hospital.
• 50:51
  Just from what you've said already, you know, dad's not having to think, whereabouts am I where, where I need to be, this hospital or that hospital and babies not having to be transferred when they're vulnerable and I'm sure so much more as well about that hospital that's probably come out.
• 51:06
  I dunno if you, if there's anything else you want to share.
• 51:08
  Beck Jill.
• 51:09
  I had a goosebumps moment for a minute there and I mean, as you can probably tell, I'm not a big fan of counting and league tables and KPIs and so on, so I take it all with a pinch of salt.
• 51:21
  I understand that.
• 51:22
  Yeah.
• 51:22
  But coincidentally, I think der Hay have come out at the top of one of these recent.
• 51:28
  League tables and Midlands Partnership Foundation Trust have come out as at the top of their league table or number one or number two kind of thing.
• 51:37
  And you know, perhaps it's, it's something to do with, because I mean, whose shoes and the ability to open the doors and having an unknown kind of thing, you know, like whose shoes that's going to genuinely find out what people will think rather than try and over manage that.
• 51:55
  Perhaps that's, you know, perhaps that's part of a mentality in a trust like that whereby they're open to learning.
• 52:03
  And what I've found with the whole whose shoes journey and certainly in the early days, it was very, very telling that possibly the, whether it was local authorities or whatever it was, who desperately in my view needed whose shoes in terms of perhaps thinking a bit more creative, thinking a bit more creatively, and you know, just opening the doors to conversation.
• 52:27
  They weren't the ones going for whose shoes, it was the ones who were already pretty excellent and who just want to make sure we're doing the right thing, find out what we can do to improve and that applied whether it was care homes or whether it was, you know, uh, all, all sorts of of different teams that we've worked with, housing associations.
• 52:49
  You know, I'm going back to the earlier sort of community-based sort of social care aspects that people perhaps don't know so much about.
• 52:56
  Yeah.
• 52:57
  And so much, and what you, what you've really said there as well that I really liked is that open to learning.
• 53:02
  And I think that we, so often when we talk about learning, develop, and improving, people think it's a course, it's a module, it's a program, it's an online delivery.
• 53:12
  But actually learning is just constantly learning with and from people.
• 53:17
  Those networks for learning together, as I've, I've called them since my dsy work.
• 53:21
  It was one of the things that came out my work was that you need networks for learning together.
• 53:25
  And people, they sort of get that bit and think, oh, so what do I need to go and learn? No, you just need to learn with people, with and from people all the time.
• 53:33
  Listen, be curious and um, yeah.
• 53:38
  To me, that's what that's about.
• 53:40
  You know? So, and I think that's what you are doing.
• 53:42
  To be fair, Jill, you are creating, if you said to people, I'm creating a learning environment, they might think, well, what's that? But actually that's what you're doing.
• 53:49
  You're creating an environment where people learn and question and do all the things they need to learn.
• 53:54
  So we're coming towards the end of our time, Jill, now, and I'm really conscious so I could talk to you, you know, and just carry on listening because it's been fascinating.
• 54:02
  And as I said, I was quite excited to, to have you on when I met you up at the Dsy event.
• 54:07
  I was like, oh, Richard, I'm gonna have to ask you.
• 54:08
  That's really nice podcast.
• 54:10
  Even a fellow podcaster, but also just because of everything that, that you do.
• 54:15
  So what, what, what's, what's your final, um, key message? You said earlier on, you said, we might come onto that, but I'm gonna ask it a few.
• 54:23
  Well, what can I do to make a difference? So, whichever way you want to do it, but it's one of those questions you said that came out about what can you do to make a difference? I'm asking you, but you might do it for, you know, the people listening, whether that be, you know.
• 54:36
  Just people in our community are public, or would that be a, you know, somebody on the front, front line, or whoever that might be.
• 54:42
  What can people do to make a difference? Okay.
• 54:45
  Well, I can answer that really well I think in that.
• 54:49
  That links with our pledge.
• 54:51
  Okay? So what we do in a Who She Workshop is we don't just throw it at people at the end that we are asking them to make a pledge.
• 54:59
  We kind of sow a seed right the way through everything that individual people can make a difference.
• 55:05
  There's always something they can do.
• 55:07
  So we invite them to think about what they're going to do to make a difference.
• 55:12
  And again, it's a bit kind of reverse psychology sometimes in that if you can't think of anything, then please don't make a pledge.
• 55:20
  You might think of something later, but don't write something down just for the sake of it all, because you see the person sitting next to you writing something.
• 55:27
  It's not that.
• 55:28
  It's something from the heart that you really want to do.
• 55:32
  And honestly.
• 55:33
  Ruth, it can be the tiniest thing.
• 55:37
  It can be, I'm going to speak to so and so about such and such that that's fine.
• 55:42
  And small things add up, or it can be a big thing.
• 55:47
  And when I can think of, quite recently, I'm going to set up a community bus and take it all around the community and we're going to offer these different services and we're gonna see what other services are needed.
• 55:59
  That could be on the bus, I mean whether it's taking blood pressure or what, whatever it is.
• 56:04
  And then when it's live in the room, I kind of invite people.
• 56:09
  Okay.
• 56:10
  So do you need any help to do that? Probably setting up a community bus you do you know, is there anybody else in the room that can help you? So we get an energy going and obviously with my kinda social media connections, I can normally link them to somebody who's already doing something similar.
• 56:27
  So I think.
• 56:28
  Coming directly back to your question, you know, what can someone do? I think find what you're passionate about.
• 56:34
  You know, what is it that, and, and rather than saying they should do so and so, you know, this needs to change.
• 56:41
  Think about what small action you can do to make a difference and then do it.
• 56:48
  And it really is, and that can like simplifies it.
• 56:51
  And then, okay, you might well do another action, another one.
• 56:54
  And, you know, I, I think the other message would be it's lonely to do it on your own.
• 56:59
  So linking with other people, find people with that shared passion and do it together or learn from them.
• 57:06
  So for example, during the pandemic, we did some virtual whose shoes workshops.
• 57:13
  And I think it was really difficult and really demanding because we were trying to bring a creative approach online and.
• 57:22
  We were working with some very, um, challenging kind of topics to try and keep things going for them during the pandemic.
• 57:30
  So we did a whole day workshop with Robury and Telford maternity team, and then separately we did an equivalent workshop on the, I think it was that way around.
• 57:42
  It doesn't really matter with East Kent who were both in a similar position under the media spotlight.
• 57:48
  Really good people trying to do their best.
• 57:51
  But if you said, do two organizations work together, I.
• 57:57
  What does that mean? You know, does it mean the Chief execs work together and know each other? Go for a drink together, whatever.
• 58:03
  Does it mean that perhaps the bereavement midwife in one trust has got a mate in another trust, in a similar position, really difficult job.
• 58:13
  They know each other, they talk to each other, they learn from each other.
• 58:17
  So the kind of community of practice idea, which I think you've mentioned really strongly, I think is a really key message.
• 58:24
  Thank you, Jill.
• 58:25
  It's been absolutely fascinating.
• 58:27
  Um, I think those key messages, you've said them really well, so I don't need to repeat them.
• 58:32
  Thank you.
• 58:33
  Um, I'll certainly be thinking about planting my seeds and.
• 58:38
  Following my passion and thinking about those actions, I can take those small actions, um, and link in who can I link in with to take those actions.
• 58:45
  Brilliant.
• 58:46
  So thank you so much for joining me today.
• 58:47
  I really appreciate it.
• 58:49
  It's been absolute pleasure.
• 58:50
  Thank you, Ruth.
• 58:51
  I've loved it.
• 58:52
  Thank you.
• 58:53
  I hope you found this episode interesting and inspiring.
• 58:57
  If today's conversation has stirred something within you, please share it together.
• 59:02
  Let's build the ripple that we need to create change.
• 59:06
  And if you haven't yet, please follow the show and leave a rating.
• 59:09
  You can also find on my link tree a link to my feedback form where you can share your questions, ideas, and reflections, and talk about what you'd like to hear on this podcast in the future and what matters to you.
• 59:23
  Together, let's shape a space into something reflective and purposeful.
• 59:28
  So for now, stay caring, stay connected, and stay curious.
• 59:35
  Hi, I hope you enjoyed that conversation as much as I did.
• 59:38
  Listening to Jo and how she uses her board game to provoke play and poetry and pledges, taking conversations, really listening to what matters, turning them into actions with people.
• 59:51
  I think this shows us that co-production isn't a tick box is about change, starting with listening.
• 59:58
  So my question is, what's your next step and who might you take it with for now, until next time.
• 1:00:06
  Goodbye.