Working with Other Charities

Working together to make Worcester ‘a city where homelessness is rare, brief and seldom re-occurring’

The unifying purpose of Worcester Cares is to make Worcester a safe and prosperous City for everyone where communities are resilient and people matter; Homelessness is rare, brief and non-recurring and where the vulnerable are protected.

Our Alliance

Worcester Cares is an ‘alliance of the willing.
Its role is to:

Enable people to fulfill their potential by resolving underlying issues and causes, the consequences of which can be homelessness, substance misuse, offending, mental health and risk of exploitation. These have a negative impact on their health and wellbeing and life expectancy.

Provide support to enable people to become inter-dependent not dependent citizens. Allowing them and step down from services, by providing the right support at the right time, reducing the pressures on crisis and emergency. We use the terms ‘building resilience, recovery and strengthening the community’.

Support people to achieve their goals (the things that matter most to the individual) through an honest relationship that changes over time as aspirations grow, develop and are achieved.

Support the City Council in its statutory responsibilities in relation to homelessness and Health and Well Being.

Our Principles

Working together

We are committed to working together using the Worcester Cares Principles which are:

Commit to unanimous, principled and value based decision making on all key issues.

Consult widely where changes to our own or others services or new services are considered necessary in order that services operate cooperatively as ‘a system’.

Adopt a culture of ‘no fault, no blame’ between partners and seek to avoid disputes.

Be abundantly generous in word and deed, always encourage, support and foster a culture of deep collaboration and mutual respect.

To make decisions on Best for Person basis not best for worker or best for organisation or service.

Use the appropriate language to describe the people we help.

Adopt the protocols on information sharing, confidentiality and safeguarding.

Be connected

Everything we do acknowledges that everyone is a citizen and we will work to enable them to make a positive contribution to their community. We focus on the needs of the person and we connect to meet those needs.

Asset and strength-based

We look for opportunities even in adversity and believe all people have the ability and competence to achieve great things. We focus on skills and assets rather than deficits and barriers and we invest in the energy and enthusiasm of people.

Listening

The person using the system is in control. This is not just about choice but enabling them to understand they have agency to determine their own future. We always recognise people’s perspectives on the value held in their relationships and networks and we involve people with lived experience and people delivering the system in the on-going development of the system. We are intelligence-led, data driven and measure the difference we make and will intervene early where possible and recognise the safeguarding of the vulnerable is everyone’s business.

Find out more about Worcester Cares