Social life

We are both members of the CSP’s Support Worker Reference Group, which was set up with the aim of highlighting and developing the associate/support worker role nationally. 

We strongly believe that networking is a huge area in which we should be encouraging other associates to engage, with one of the best ways being through social media. 

We feel it’s important to have CSP support for an official social media group for associates and support worker members, and we recently met with the CSP communications team and the professional adviser for support workers to discuss creating social media accounts

We decided on a Facebook group because a recent survey found that, of associate members who use social media, 32 per cent use Facebook compared to only 16 per cent using Twitter. 

After getting the go ahead, we had regular contact with each other – creating the group, determining rules, and deciding who would be admin and moderators – before the Facebook group went live in  November.

We’ve had a great response, attracting members and engaging on different topics. The whole of the Support Worker Reference Group is involved and we’re in regular contact with one another on how best to run the Facebook group, sharing news and CPD. 

Anybody can request to join the Facebook group – you’ll simply have to answer some questions before being accepted by a moderator. And any member can post, and we check posts before they’re live to ensure they’re relevant to the associate and support worker role. 

We’re aiming to share up-to-date news and CPD opportunities, and we hope the group will be a support for all members and help them develop within their own roles.

It’s been an absolute pleasure to work with the CSP on creating this group. If you would like to join please search on Facebook for CSP – Associates and Support Workers. 

• Steve Huckstep is a therapy assistant practitioner in major trauma at Birmingham Children’s Hospital
• Chris Richards is a physiotherapy technical instructor for Hywel Dda Health board in mid Wales