12 minutes
One connection that holds Plan one connection that does not depend on a paid worker, take the first step, and know when to step back.
What you’ll be able to do Plan one connection from the community map, take the first step with the person, and identify the point at which the worker steps back. Compare the responses to this question and explain your choice: What should change? Document a next step for One connection that holds: Take the first step on one connection this month and set a date to check whether the person is known there. The introduction, the problem, and the step back Building a connection that holds has three parts, and services are good at the first two and bad at the third. The introduction: going with the person the first time, making sure someone there knows who they are and why they have come. The practical problem: transport, timing, the first awkward conversation, whatever would otherwise stop the person going back. And the step back: leaving, so that the relationship forms between the person and the place rather than between the place and the worker.
The step back is the hard part because it feels like withdrawing support. It is the support. A worker who stays becomes the door, and the person never becomes a member. The test of whether the connection holds is whether the place contacts the person directly, and whether they would notice an absence.
The connection plan Choose one door from the map: a place where the person has an interest and where people gather around it.
Go with the person the first time. Make sure one person there knows their name and why they have come.
Solve the practical problem that would stop them going back: transport, timing, cost, a first conversation.
Step back. Set the date now. Drop off, do not sit in, do not report on the person to anyone there.
Check at the date: does anyone there know their name, do they have a role, would they be missed? If not yet, what practical problem remains?
Signs the worker has become the door Members greet the worker by name
And the person by nothing. The relationship has formed with the wrong party.
The place calls the worker
About the person, rather than calling the person. The person has become someone who is managed there.
The worker reports on how it is going
To the director, the coordinator, the family. The person's membership has become a service outcome, discussed by others.
The person only goes when the worker is on shift
The connection depends on a schedule. It will end when the schedule changes.
Set the step-back date before the first visit What you can change You control when the worker stops attending. Setting the date in advance prevents the drift in which staying feels safer every week.
What to watch for Do not let a worker's presence become permanent because it feels supportive. Permanent presence is the mechanism of displacement.
Your next step For one connection, write the step-back date into the plan before the first visit.
Carry this forward One connection pursued to the point where the person is known and has a role is worth more than a plan full of activities.
The worker's role is to make the introduction, solve the practical problems — transport, timing, a first conversation — and then step back before the relationship becomes one that runs through them.
The sign that it is holding is that the place or the people contact the person directly, and would notice if they stopped coming.
A list of the plan's steps, a flashcard set on stepping back, a scenario decision and a knowledge check.
Take the first step on one connection this month and set a date to check whether the person is known there.
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