The Latest Bulletin

A key text for challenging ageism and promoting dignified practice. Dr Sue Thompson presents invaluable guidance on how to take care of older people in positive empowering ways that avoid common ageist assumprions and practices. This is an essential guide to good practice in eldercare. Available from here or from Amazon.

This is one of those tips that sounds so obvious and straightforward and yet is one that is so badly needed, given how often people seem to manage to get themselves into difficulties by either not planning at all or not planning fully enough. In working with people there are so many unpredictable variables but there is also much that can be anticipated if we take the trouble to think ahead and draw on our professional knowledge in the process. There is a great irony that people often say they are too busy to plan, whereas in reality it is more likely to be the case that a lack of planning could well be part of the reason why they…

Publications and commentary about good practice on equality issues, including sexual harassment, managing older workers, dress codes and neurodiversity. Click here to read more  

Before the Budget we set out five tests to judge whether the measures announced would deliver for people living poverty. Our analysis shows that the choices made by the Chancellor on social security, housing, and the economy do not pass those tests and risk pulling people into poverty as a result. Click here to read more

National Autistic Society, Chief Executive, Caroline Stevens sets out how our charity is adapting to the heavy financial toll of coronavirus. We have had to take some difficult decisions about how and where to spend the funding available, including reshaping and scaling back some of our work. This has affected many parts of our charity over the past 12 months and meant losing dedicated and talented colleagues across some of our national programmes, such as in our fundraising and events teams. But by far our most difficult decision has been to close one of our helplines, our general Autism Helpline. This is a significant loss and we are deeply sorry we can’t continue it. But, as Caroline explains, this will…

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The ideal practice guide for every social worker and social work student. Based on Neil Thompson’s extensive experience of bringing theory to life in a practice context, this invaluable manual is an essential guide for all practitioners, from student on placement through newly qualified worker to old hand. Available from here or from Amazon.

Gathering appropriate information to get a helpful picture of the situation we are dealing with is a central part of the role of a wide range of professionals. If we do not have a reasonably clear picture of the circumstances we are engaging with we can miss significant issues, distort and oversimplify the situation and potentially make a bad situations worse. Not having enough information can therefore be problematic. However, what can also be problematic is if we have too much information. This is because: (i) we can waste a lot of time and effort in gathering more information than we need; (ii) we can confuse ourselves and others if we end up drowning in far more information than is…

As our lives have become busier, desire to do things quickly and efficiently has grown — something the rise of speed reading apps, lack of break-taking at work, and a general focus on “productivity” has shown. Good time management skills, therefore, are now highly prized both at work and at home. But do such techniques actually work? In a meta-analysis published in PLOS One, Brad Aeon from Concordia University and colleagues find that they do — but perhaps not for the reasons you’d expect. While time management skills have become more important in evaluations of job performance since the 1990s, their biggest impact lies elsewhere: in personal wellbeing. Click here to read more

Body image is how we think and feel about ourselves physically, and how we believe others see us. When we talk about body image, there are lots of ways we can think about our body and the way we look. In June 2020, the Women and Equalities Committee launched an inquiry to hear from young people and professionals about how body image can impact how people feel about themselves and how it can impact their mental health. Click here to read more