December 2012 - IAPT

Children and Young People’s ProjectUpdate from the South-WestCatherine Gallop and Ian Frampton from the South-West collaborative describe their experiences of biddingto join the CYP IAPT programme, and how all the stakeholders in the new collaborative have come togetheraround their shared values.Exeter UniversityDevon, Plymouth, Torbay CAMHS, Exeter Universityand Young Devon have joined to create a new South-West IAPT collaborative. We are a diverse groupof practitioners, managers, commissioners, trainingproviders and youth participation specialists who allhave a passion for working with young people andtheir communities. Providing a service across a largelyrural and coastal county, but with three major urbancentres, requires understanding of the service pressuresacross different geographic and demographicareas, which range from high deprivation to relativeaffluence.When shared passions come together there is potential for great creativity, butalso for conflict unless shared aspirations can be agreed. This was never moreevident than when considering our own values in the light of the values and visionof the CYP IAPT programme, and having to agree a common way forward.Our self-assessments gave us a good basis from which to put together our bid. Itwas important for each of us to appraise honestly our services and educationalprovision in the light of what CYP IAPT would be asking of us. In addition toour core values, we each needed to acknowledge our weaknesses and emphasisethe strengths each service would bring to the collaborative. And, althoughenormously diverse, the partners are complementary, and are learning how to collaborateacross organisational boundaries.At the heart of putting together a successful bid was high-level endorsement,not least the strong contribution from our children’s commissioner, as well astrusting, open and honest relationships across the leadership group. Althoughthe memory of the final presentations is a blur of huddles, late-night telephoneconversations, last-minute dashes across London, and fleeting encounters withother CAMHS teams in the foyer, one thing was clear and heartening: everyone inthis group went the extra mile to make the bid happen.Catherine Gallop,Programme LeadIan FramptonParenting LeadSo what would be our advice to others preparing to join CYP IAPT? Well, start with an honest self-appraisalof your own services, develop strong, open relationships with your partners, ensure you have endorsementat all levels from service users to commissioners, be prepared to go the extra mile, and don’t panic if yourPowerPoint lets you down on the day!For more information please see: http://www.iapt.nhs.uk/cyp-iapt5