Debbie Smallbones - Video Profile
Transcript
West Sussex County Council have been excellent in supporting me in my career development and they allowed me to do an introductory certificate to social work to give me a taste of what it would be like and I also completed my NVQ 4 in Care. These were all funded by West Sussex County Council. I then embarked upon an application to apply for a position as a Social Work Student at the University of Chichester, which West Sussex County Council agreed to fund, and my career path now is wide open really. In the positions I've been in, all of my managers have been very supportive of my role and have been very supportive with training. My work colleagues, equally, are very supportive and some of them have actually gone through training themselves so we've been able to share the experiences. In addition, this prompts debate and discussion within the team and I think it keeps us all a little bit refreshed in our mind about what training does and the benefits it has. West Sussex County Council has undergone a lot of changes recently. I think there is benefits from the changes that are happening and equally there's benefits for the staff. To me, West Sussex is a very challenging environment to work in. People think that it's a soft option perhaps, that it's easy, but we have a lot of challenges presented with the rural areas. We have poverty and deprivation and we have areas which are a little bit more affluent and it's a test of your skills. West Sussex County Council offer flexible working, which is advantageous as the hours I work means that I can have long weekends every second week. Working within West Sussex is challenging, exciting, very proactive and there's a lot of people with different needs and backgrounds which makes for a very fulfilling and rewarding role.
