Workforce development
Skilling up professionals across the drug and alcohol sector
The Adfam workforce development project is part of the Drug Sector Partnership’s work.
The Drug Sector Partnership consists of Adfam, Drugscope, The Alliance and eATA and is funded by the Department of Health. It exists to improve working on drugs and alcohol between government and the third sector.
The project aims to support the continued development of a competent and trained family support workforce, including volunteers, in the drug and alcohol sector. We want all the hard work being done by practitioners to be recognised and supported.
Project
1 - Developing a qualification
The first stage of the project consists of developing a qualification for practitioners supporting families affected by drug and alcohol use. Role profiles, qualifications and National Occupational Standards were mapped, an online survey was run for service-managers of family support organisations and consultations were held in the summer of 2010 in London and Leeds for practitioners and service-managers. The results of this were used to create a role profile for practitioners working with families affected by drugs and alcohol.
The role profile is being used as the basis for the development of a qualification in early 2012 between Adfam and FDAP.
These role profiles are now ready to be used by the sector. Role profiles are extremely useful in both recruitment and continued professional development and assessment. Using the competencies in the role profile is also an effective way for managers to identifying areas for improvement or training for staff. We encourage all interested organisations to download the role profile and briefing below.
Resources (pdfs)
- Role profiles for Family support worker and Drug and alcohol worker
- Role profiles briefing
- Summary literature review of relevant policy
- Summary of results from our online survey of family support providers
2 - Training directory
Adfam is developing a simple training directory for training around families, drugs and alcohol. It is open to all training in England relevant to practitioners who support families affected by substance use. We encourage any individuals or organisations which have developed this type of training to submit their training.
3 - Volunteering toolkit
Adfam has developed a toolkit 'Real voices in volunteering' for use by any volunteer, prospective volunteer, volunteer-manager or prospective volunteer-manager.
It represents an important new resource - this is the first time that both the generic volunteering material and the background information on drugs, alcohol and families has been brought together into one place, illustrated by the real life experiences of recovering substance users, family members and volunteer managers. Throughout the creation of the toolkit these groups were consulted and their knowledge and expertise used to help make something practical and resonant for the sector.
Adfam hope and believe that this toolkit will aid those already involved in volunteering, encourage those thinking about becoming a volunteer and reassure organisations which are worried about employing someone with a history of substance use. We hope that you will, as a contributor said to us, – ‘be brave – step out there!’.
The toolkit is available to download in its entirety and its appendices are also available to download seperately.
Resources (pdfs)
- Real voices in volunteering toolkit (complete)
- Real voices in volunteering Appendix A: Role profiles
- Real voices in volunteering Appendix B: Job descriptions
- Real voices in volunteering Appendix C: Appraisal form
- Real voices in volunteering Appendix D: Supervision form
If you would like to give feedback on any part ofthe project or have any other questions, please email Oliver Standing.
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