Carers Trust Network Partner, Lanarkshire Carers, awarded the Excellence for Carers Award

Carers Trust is delighted to announce that its North Lanarkshire and South Lanarkshire network member, Lanarkshire Carers has successfully achieved the Carers Trust Excellence for Carers Award.

The award follows a rigorous assessment of Lanarkshire Carers services to unpaid carers across both local authority areas, as well as the quality of its leadership, staff, internal processes and engagement with key local partners and stakeholders.

Welcoming the award, the CEO of Lanarkshire Carers, Barbara McAuley, said:

“The team here work incredibly hard to ensure quality standards are embedded in all areas of our work and to make a positive difference to the lives of carers across Lanarkshire."

"As an organisation run by, with and for carers we are absolutely thrilled to receive this external verification of our positive approach and clarity of purpose. It was great to be able to share this news with our Full Members who attended our AGM, the theme of this event was Carers at the Centre.”

By achieving the Excellence for Carers Award by Carers Trust, Lanarkshire Carers has been able to demonstrate that:

• Clear and complete approach to involving carers in the work, activity, and life of the organisation at every level in meaningful ways value carers and makes a real difference to them.
• A positive approach to the use of technology and digital to support carers and ensure services to carers are inclusive, accessible, and seamless.
• Everyone at the organisation is focussed on making a difference for and with carers. They are clear about what their purpose is, and they take a solution focussed approach that helps carers articulate the challenges that they are facing and the outcomes they are seeking to achieve.
• The leadership of the organisation is an example of best practice, nurturing sustainability, lateral leadership, and succession planning, which allows for a clear focus on strategic development that has unpaid carers at its heart.
• There is an abundance of team passion, commitment, and enthusiasm, at all levels, to provide excellent services for carers.
• Good practice in identifying unpaid carers and supporting and being inclusive to carers from a range of backgrounds and identities, particularly carers from BAME and LGBTQ+ communities.
• Lanarkshire Carers approach to supporting staff wellbeing was impressive – its carers for carers and carers for its staff and volunteers.

In making the award, Carers Trust has stated in the report that:

“Lanarkshire Carers demonstrates excellence across all the Excellence for Carers standard areas. The service is well run, delivers a broad range of person-centred services for carers, and has built positive partnerships with external organisations for the benefit of carers in the local area."

"The team are focused on delivering excellent services but are clear on where their expertise is and recognises the value of partnership working with others to support carers in their communities."

"The organisation demonstrated a clarity of purpose and Carers Trust are impressed with the whole organisation- the Trustees on the Board of Directors, Management and Staff team should be immensely proud of the work that they do to make a difference to the lives of unpaid carers.”

It was also noted that Lanarkshire Carers have a strong commitment to carry on making developments and improvements:

“There was clear evidence of nurturing sustainability, lateral leadership and succession planning, which allows for a clear focus on strategic development, is embedded in their collective thinking and approach… a clear, cohesive and holistic narrative on their strategic focus on sustainability, outcomes and taking a carer-led approach to their delivery, culture and systems and processes… a genuine sense of inclusion with all staff, they are meaningfully involved in service development and there is a sense of shared ownership when it comes to the successes that they achieve."

As well as signalling the quality of its services for unpaid carers, the Carers Trust Excellence Carers Award for Lanarkshire Carers means its partners, stakeholders and commissioners/funders can be confident they are partnering with an organisation that has best practice and sustainability embedded into their culture and practice.

Helen Oliver, Quality and Improvement Manager at Carers Trust, continued:

“We are delighted to be able to present the Excellence for Carers Award to Lanarkshire Carers. The passion and commitment to delivering excellent services, that make a clear difference to the lives of unpaid carers, was evident across the whole organisation. We very much look forward to seeing their services continue to develop and thrive”.

About Excellence for Carers

Excellence for Carers is the Carers Trust organisational standard for best practice in delivering services, information, and advice to unpaid carers.

It is awarded to partner charities (Network Partners) within the Carers Trust Network able to demonstrate both an existing excellence of service to unpaid carers and a culture that fosters continuous improvement and striving for excellence.

Carers Trust developed the award so charities within its Network are continually evaluating and improving the quality of services, thereby improving the quality of life for unpaid carers across the UK.