We learned this week that, apparently, if you look at Companies House data for keywords and analyse some of the policies and behaviours, then, broadly speaking, the care home sector comes out in second place, pipped by the creative industries sector by one per cent.
To be honest, I’m always a bit cynical of this kind of ‘research’, given it is top-level analysis of the sort of information companies choose to write down and put in the public domain. Which ultimately means that those with clever communications teams (hello advertising agencies) will appear higher up the list than those who may be much more ‘mission-led’ or values-driven, but don’t put their resources into talking about it.
That said, I think this is an interesting indicator of the kind of sector care homes operate in. I don’t just mean it shows it’s a compassionate area driven largely by people who want to improve the lives of others, because that’s obvious and inherent. I think it highlights an interesting aspect of how it talks about itself, and therein lies a potential clue to how it is too easily sidelined.
The language of ‘mission’ (a problematic word for other reasons, but let’s park that one for now) is aligned with charity, which is associated with doing good stuff voluntarily, based on the kindness and whim of donors and those who largely give up their time to do positive things for the people or issues they care about.
I bring this up now because this is a particularly pertinent time to be thinking about how the sector is perceived – both from those within and on the outside – as Baroness Casey prepares to launch her national conversation about how we fund adult social care as part of her work developing a set of recommendations that will potentially lead to the creation of a National Care Service.
As we see time and again with political campaigns – particularly those that have happened in the last ten years - language really matters.
The need to reframe the narrative in adult social care is something that was highlighted by the King’s Fund earlier this year, and built upon by Care England in their May report, which sought to shift the “national conversation too often focused on pressure, crisis and cost”.
To paraphrase co-author, PMLR’s Nathan Hollow, the sector “has a powerful story to tell about its value to society, its economic contribution, and the opportunity it presents to transform the nation”.
As policy makers set about the seismic work of pushing forward with that conversation on a national level, perhaps it’s time for the sector to think more deeply about the way it talks about itself. I don’t mean ditch the caring essence of what it does – I mean having a think about the semantics that link it with charity. Because ultimately the public as a whole doesn’t believe it’s their job to support charity – they see it as a choice, and that, as all in the sector know and want, has to change.
What’s your view? I love to hear from people working at all levels in the sector – let’s talk: Email me here or find me on LinkedIn here.
