Reward Power - There is a bonus available to the young person who keeps their room the tidiest, this is available at the end of each month. There are problems with this however as the manager is the only person who has power over this decision. She only checks on the rooms at the end of each month and makes a decision from that one inspection. This ignores any effort made during the rest of the month and the mind set of the young person at the time. It also raises issues around the standard of tidiness. What is the standard? Should the young person not be allowed to set their own standard? Why does tidiness matter, shouldn’t cleanliness be more important? It would be a much fairer system if the team could monitor cleanliness/ tidiness over the whole month and the young person could set their own standards, within house boundaries and with guidance. It needs to be acknowledged that we are working with young people here, not small children.
Coercive Power - Adults at WH have the power to discipline the young people through withholding rewards and other sanctions. However, I am very much with the school of thought that allows some input from the young people into what sanctions suit which negative behaviours. Recently this was put to the test regarding ‘take-away night’. The young people decided that if they hadn’t behaved well on the day then they would miss the take-away - not one young person has missed it yet!
Legitimate Power - This kind power is used most within WH. It is widely acknowledged that young people need boundaries and the adults need to take on a role which supervises, organises and appraises at different times each day. However, the young people also need some flexibility here and the ability to take on that role for themselves. It is a fine balance that is required here.
Personal Power, expert power, information and connection power also come into play at regular points during life at WH.
It must also be acknowledged that “power has structural, cultural and personal components” (Seden, 2003, p. 125). I would like to discuss the structural impact on one’s environment a little further. It will be useful for you to refer to appendix one here. As you can see the upstairs of WH is primarily bedrooms and bathrooms, with the exception of the manager’s office. The upstairs area is rarely used through the day and incident’s rarely occur in this area, with the exception of bedtimes. It seems strange then, for the manager’s office to be located here - away from the general running of the unit including the ‘heart of the home’ (kitchen) and the team room. Adults always seem to be running
upstairs with the phone (which is cordless and needs to be carried at all times by the shift leader), they also have to go upstairs to use the photocopier or fax and to collect stationary and paperwork. However, you always seem to be ‘intruding’ when entering the room as the manager directly faces you across her desk and the admin assistant has her back to you - working at her desk.
In the course reader Whitaker, Archer and Hicks discuss staff views “Feeling supported by their line managers is important for reducing stress and a sense of isolation in staff groups” (Whitaker, Archer and Hicks, 2003, p. 45). How can our day to day line manager support us if she doesn’t know what’s happening even though she is in the building? And if the staff team feel that they are intruding then do the young people feel it too? This feeling would be very difficult to manage within your own ’home’. Often meetings take place here too - leaving the room ‘out of bounds’ but clearly audible through the wall which separates this room from a young persons bedroom. Confidentiality is clearly another major issue that needs to be considered when discussing care environments.
It would be much more preferable for the manager’s office to be in place of the ‘chill out room’ downstairs. From here she would be much more accessible, the staff team would find it easier to access things which are regularly needed and confidentiality would be much less of an issue as the rooms on either side are used much less frequently and by a range of different people than a young person’s bedroom. The current ‘chill-out space’ is also a much bigger space allowing for improved ergonomics. The ‘chill-out room’ could then be moved upstairs to a much lesser used environment - allowing a true ‘chill-out’ zone.
As WH is primarily a living environment for the young people it would also be prudent to discuss the environment from their point of view. Here we need to take a closer look at their intimate spaces (their bedrooms). As you can see all of the rooms vary in size and obviously position. It is possibly coincidental that the young person who appears to have most influence over the others has the largest room and the room next to the manager’s office. He didn’t move into this room originally but during his placement he has worked his way into it, mainly gaining this space due to his good behaviour and his love of various hobbies which all seem to need large pieces of equipment!. Again, this could be related to power. You can also see from the plan in appendix one that this young person has no other young person’s room next to it. It is often referred to as his ‘corner’ of the building. Perhaps this has been an example of territory building. “On the whole many organisational environments maintain levels of territorial separation between people of different status or with different functions” (Peace and Reynolds, 2003, p. 137).
When we refer to appendix one again we can see that although I have stated that WH is a visiting environment (as well as a living and working environment) it has no formal reception area. This is because the primary use of the building is as a living environment for the young people and we rarely have formal reception area’s in family homes do we? At WH formal visitors are welcomed into the team room to sign the visitor’s book and less formal visitors can either be lead into the lounge or other areas downstairs. The learning guide discusses “The physical shape of an organisation - it’s buildings and accessibility, it’s welcome or lack of welcome at reception make a difference to the people who use it” (K303 learning guide, 2003, p. 68). It is clear from the floor plan that there is no room for a formal reception area at WH but I feel that this can only be a good thing where the young people are concerned. How would they feel if their friends came for tea and a receptionist was waiting to great them and have them sign the visitors book and give them their visitors badge to wear? Having said that we are only focussing on a 6 bedded unit here - the argument for a more formal area would be much more convincing when taking into account a much larger unit or a more secure unit.
Conclusions
In conclusion we can see that the care environment has many different uses and all of the people using it have to be taken into account when spatial configuration and planning is discussed. However, the service user’s - those that spend the most time in the structure and often need to feel ‘at home’ - should be our primary concern. The young people are defiantly the primary concern within WH and the unit is very ‘homely’. However, there is room for improvement. For this to take place the manager needs to think about her own position within the unit and how ‘front-line’ she needs to be in order to support the workforce and the young people. The distribution of power that the environment promotes also requires further attention with regard to standards, territory and choice.
Having said that it is also clear that a poorly designed environment that has another use as a workplace can make it’s workforce very unhappy. Looking at balancing dependencies, adapting to conditions and re-negotiating the environment could have a terrific impact on the team at WH and the answer to the problem could so easily be found and negotiated.
All in all I have found that with so many aspects and issues to consider “There is no perfect organisational arrangement for delivering care” (K303 learning guide, 2003, p. 69). However, WH can try harder to reach near perfection!
Word count
1949
References
Henderson, J., Atkinson, D. (2003) Managing Care In Context, London, Routledge.
Peace, S. and Reynolds, J. , (2003) ‘Managing Environments‘ in Henderson, J., Atkinson, D. (2003) Managing Care In Context, London, Routledge.
Seden, J. (2003) ‘Managers and their organisations‘ in Henderson, J., Atkinson, D. (2003) Managing Care In Context, London, Routledge.
K303 Learning Guide, Unit 5, pages 68-69.
Whitaker ,D. Archer, L. and Hicks, L. (2003) ’Working with and being managed by the larger organisation’ in Reynolds, J., Henderson, J., Seden, J., Charlesworth, J., Bullman, A. (2003) The Managing Care Reader, London, Routledge.
Reynolds, J., Henderson, J., Seden, J., Charlesworth, J., Bullman, A. (2003) The Managing Care Reader, London, Routledge.
