Help!

I've got an interview on Thursday to be a support worker for 3 adults with special needs, I haven't done that kind f work for nearly 15 years, what type of questions do you think they'll ask?

ooooooooooh well done im just off to put elijahpoo to bed but will have a think and write some stuff later

Hmmm I think Mari gona do better answering this than me. I'l try my best to help.

I did a social work placement for 4 months supporting adults to live independently in the community. They lived in an ordinary house but would have had staff support. I didnt do an interview for the post but so not sure exactly on questions.

Ok... Promoting independence was a big thing. Support them to do what they can. EMPOWERMENT is a big social work word. ANTI-OPPRESSIVE practice & ANTI-DISCRIMINATORY practice is another thing. That means providing choice and opportunities for all (well actually you could write a book on what they mean - google it!)

Erm questions may be...

* Why do you want to work in social care? What experience do you have? What skills and qualities do you bring? -

SKILLS -Ability to communicate and engage with people. promote & enable. You are self aware. Good at handling feelings. Good self management skills eg assertive/can manage stress/time management. Good observation skills. Creative - think on feet/outside the box. Humility - recognise limitations and consult seniors when appropriate. Resilient. Can work in PARTNERSHIP with people - other carers & clients.

VALUES/QUALITIES - Acceptance - deal with clients as they are. Non Judgemental attitude. You believe in Client Self-determination - meaning you play an active part in helping clients help themselves by boosting confidence, helping them recognise choices available, removing barriers, providing information.
Confidentiality. Respect for clients - appreciate its their life/home/opinion etc. Empathy. Unconditional positive regard - work positively and constructively with all clients and not just those we approve of or feel comfortable with.

* Some of our clients display challenging behaviours, can you give us examples of what these may be? Hitting, biting, refusing to engage, verbal aggression, destroying possessions, running away, harming themselves

* How would you deal with a client who was becoming aggressive? Stay calm, consider other residents safety as well as your own, do you know what usually works to calm them down...

*Possibly something about recording information accurately? Or whisteleblowing/reporting concerns? Basically you would report according to agency policy.

*Confidentialty is another thing they may ask about... Data Protection Act, not discussing clients outside work, dont leave files about.


Im going to stop now as im rambling on & reading it back im not sure if iv gone to social wory as opposed to a support worker....

ooooooh snoops you can't say empowerment anymore because it implies you have the power to empower and thus disempower people whereas in fact they should be the only people able to do that!!!

haha umm im still thinking (read eating crisps/making a cup of tea/printing rotas out) but will do you a proper answer in the very near future

ok so.....my last interview was 1.5 hours long but im not sure if that is normal!

we went over things like awareness of;

medication, finances, confidentiality, time keeping, interests and experience.

the key things for most places at the moment is the idea of 'person centred support' and 'inclusion'. you can find loads online about it, but its worth checking the organisation's website about their particular view as well. it includes the ideas of humanist psychology (so seeing the person as an individual with individual needs - much overlooked in a lot of care situations!), and the 5 dimensions of inclusion ('making a contribution, belonging, sharing spaces, being somebody and making choices'). the idea really is that it isn't enough to make a choice about your life, but you need to be a real part of your community. maslow's hierarchy of need is also quite a nice thing to have a look at. this is a nice website, although the things with maps and paths you probably don't need to know just now http://www.edg-sco.org/index.html?pid=78

the main part of the interview was case studies though, so they gave me a situation and i needed to tell them what i would do. here is an example:

you are supporting someone to go to a nightclub, they have severe epilepsy and use a wheelchair (didn't tell me why), they take medication at specific times and are only allowed to have 1 alcoholic drink per outing. what would you need to do in advance of your night out? they want more than one drink whilst out what do you do?

so my answers weren't amazing, but now they would be: in advance you need to ensure you have the finance for the outing, make sure it is properly accounted for, contact/visit the nightclub to assess accessibility, figure out how you will get there/home, make sure you have any medication with you and ensure it is accounted for, consider whether the lighting in a nightclub is likely to aggravate the person's epilepsy. the bit about the extra drinks is difficult, you would assess the person's capacity (hopefully you would be able to gauge this long beforehand) to make the choice, explain the possibly outcome if any of drinking too much - you can either refuse to support the person or have an 'on-call' person who is aware of the situation, or you can let them drink depending on the situation.

basically a lot is common sense, if in doubt say you would phone an on-call or manager. all companies now have policies on literally everything you can think of, so if you aren't sure say you would try to consult the company's policy. i would imagine they would go for a similar style of interview though as it tells you a lot about people.

also, we now organise interviews which include the people we support (or the ones who want to do it at least haha) so it is possible that some of the people you meet/are interviewed by are relatives/supporters/the people you may be supporting.

make sure you have some questions to ask, maybe about training, opportunity to move up within the company, what kind of hours/shift patterns you might be working.

i don't know what else to say i think i've said enough! can you tell i'm really into person centered planning?

But I do have the power muhahahaha!

I actually LOL'd at that empowerment thing. 3 years of uni listening to the word over and bloody over again and now they've changed their minds! What is Neil Thompson going to do now as its in most of his books. I do think you are empowering people in social care but & it isnt disempowering to support/assist/show people who dont know how to do something.

I knew Mari would answer it better than me. Her examples are good as they prob will give a scenario type question or ask you to give an example.

Good luck!

thanks you've both been a big help x

I'm also laughing at the empowerment thing. 2 years in college an 2 in uni banging on and on and on about it and now you cant bloody use it! I only left uni in September, how annoying! LOL

Good luck with the interview pinky! x

It was all about empowerment for me as well so I'll leave that out , I still remember old Maslow from my uni days Mari, I don't want to stress myself out too much remembering everything so I'll just be myself and give them a winning smile!

nah, just use your common sense, throw in some person centred answers (errm more common sense/nice values innit) and smile (but not like this cos its creepy) good luck!

how did it go? how did it go?

it was weird Mari, i was all prepared and they didn't ask any questions at all

I sold myself the best I could but they did say at the end they thought I was over qualified and they thought it was strange that I wanted to meet the residents.

that's crackers, get looking for a better company how could they not have asked anything? surely thats more of a speech than an interview?!!!

just received a promising email asking me back on Tuesday to meet the residents and to take my documents for a CRB check, fingers crossed!

Well done!

You must be very good at not doing interviews

yaaaay that sounds great are they letting you meet the residents because you were such a weirdo for asking about it, or do they do that normally

I think its probably just because I asked,you would think that would be the first thing they would do!

you would imagine, but hopefully that will be you back in the land of the working - barely chance to enjoy your redundancy

me again! so i get an email today asking me to bring my cheque book on Tuesday to pay for the CRB check, so it look good on the job front. They said they pay it back after you've worked a month but ask to pay it upfront incase you dont turn up for the job and they're out of pocket, does this seem right?

Iv never had to pay for a police check. In saying that iv only done social work placements - were obviously uni or social care council have paid and then my current post is with SS. Im not sure whether smaller agencys are different but tbh I wouldnt be happy with paying for it myself. Id probably go along with it but I think its a bit weird & be anxious about getting it back. What if they dont pay it back? How much is it? Its a lot to ask someone to find money before they are even earning.

i've never had to pay for a check, but tbh i wouldn't be surprised if the charity i worked for ask people to do this now as we have loads of people getting checked, then payed full time for 2 weeks of training then buggering off. you can't use the check for anything else but hopefully paying in advance would stop them!!!

if you can afford it i wouldn't be too worried about it, i haven't experienced it before but its actually quite a good idea

yep I can afford it, to be fair its a small operation, there's the owner, manager and one other support worker. I really cant afford to turn it down because the hours are so great.

I can see how from an agency/charity point of view its a good idea Mari.

But the things that make me wary is that in my situation, coming off income support and then waiting 4/5 weeks for a paycheck things are pretty tight when starting a new job anyway. I imagine for some people this would be a huge barrier.

Secondly I did get a job as a support worker for elderly people years ago but nothing came of it. Was the weirdest thing ever. Got a phone call to say id passed interview and they would be in touch, then got a letter saying the same, weeks later rang them and they said they were doing police checks, they rang me a week or 2 later to double check my dob, rang them again and they said there was a delay to the scheme opening and would contact me in a week or 2 and never bothered. About 2 months after interview I gave up on them. A friend got a job there when they readvertised 6 months later and the same thing happened - they told her she had job and they faffed about for weeks/months and in the end she started somewhere else and never heard from them again. Id have been raging if id paid for a police check and got no work from it.

Hopefully your job isnt like that and if you can afford it then just go along with it I guess.