When employees feel a sense of belonging within their teams and have access to support, it lays a foundation of psychological security. This helps provide the tools and resources they need to effectively handle tough situations.
A team dynamic promoting trust, collaboration, and solidarity, helps bolster the resilience and emotional regulation of staff. These elements are the cornerstone of what is known as a Team as a Secure Base.
Secure base teams are created to help care for the caretakers, fostering supportive team environments in which staff can better engage in their work. This approach not only boosts performance outcomes but also significantly reduces burnout, ultimately enhancing the quality of care provided to vulnerable individuals and communities alike. A research team from the University of East Anglia is inviting social work teams in Children’s Services to take part in research on the key components needed to create a secure base team.
Developed by Dr Laura Biggart and a team of researchers, the Team as Secure Base research and intervention framework recognises the crucial role that strong team dynamics play in bolstering the emotional and psychological wellbeing of staff. The current phase of the project is exploring the core factors contributing to the formation and maintenance of supportive and resilient work teams. Specifically, this project phase seeks to identify and clarify the key components that reflect secure base team function, while clarifying the five established behavioural dimensions of secure base team support:
- Availability: Being consistently available, approachable, and providing support to team members, especially during times of need.
- Sensitivity: Showing empathy, active listening, and being attuned to team members' thoughts, feelings, and needs.
- Acceptance: Creating a safe and non-judgmental environment where team members feel accepted, valued, and able to learn from mistakes.
- Co-operation: Promoting a collaborative team culture, valuing diverse perspectives, and engaging in collective decision-making.
- Team membership: Fostering a sense of belonging and identity within the team through clear roles, team-building activities, and inclusive practices.
These factors serve as the core principles guiding our research through the development of two innovative questionnaires: one exploring secure base teams and the other exploring secure base team leadership. By using these assessment tools, we can evaluate team dynamics across various secure base dimensions, ultimately improving on the current range of evidence-based intervention models available to social work organisations. Our work aims to provide the tools to create further empirical support for the Team as Secure Base model, especially demonstrating its ability to predict and positively influence vital social work outcomes. This evidence-based approach could equip organisations with valuable insights needed to create more supportive and effective workplace settings.
For these reasons and benefits, our research team at the University of East Anglia are inviting Principal Social Workers and senior colleagues in Children’s Services to work with us to help develop the Team as a Secure Base framework. To achieve this, we are seeking participation from social work teams (as collective units) to take our brief online survey, which takes approximately 15 minutes to complete. These social work teams will play a pivotal role in validating the Team as a Secure Base framework while adding to our understanding of secure base team dynamics. Survey responses will help ensure that our assessment tools accurately capture the nuances and challenges faced by child and family social work teams, and contribute to the development of evidence-based individual and team interventions for social workers.
The survey study will be conducted until December 2024. We would love to speak with you about the best way to approach collecting team-level data from your local authorities. If you are interested in working with us and would like to collaborate on this project, or have any other questions, please contact Reuben Weinstangel before 31 August 2024.
By working together to foster secure bases, we can create empowering and sustainable conditions that support the vital work you do in supporting the vulnerable communities you serve.
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