CNWL has one of the largest peer and lived experience workforces in the NHS, with one of the most developed career infrastructures. With over 150 peer and lived experience roles, staff use their lived experience to support and educate people using services, other staff members, and address organisational cultures. Roles include Peer Support Workers, Carer Peer Support Workers, Peer Trainers, Peer Employment Specialists, Advanced Lived Experience Practitioners and Peer Educators.
The workforce spans across a broad range of services such as addictions, community health, eating disorders, mental health (including inpatient), blood bourne virus teams, forensic, employment services, the Recovery & Wellbeing College and more. We currently have staff in lived experience roles in Brent, Harrow, Hillingdon, Kensington and Chelsea, Milton Keynes, Surrey, Camden, Hounslow and Westminster.
- Mutuality – this is a shared relationship and we are in it together
- Reciprocity – in helping you, I help myself
- Non-directive – you set the pace and the areas we will focus on
- Belief in the possibility of a life with hope, control and purpose.
- Emotional and/or practical support
- Building and sharing recovery tools (whatever recovery means to you).
- Help me to feel less alone and more understood
- Listen to me empathetically when I need to talk
- Help me to set goals and plan for my future
- Support me to learn about my health condition
- Advocate for me to other staff members
- Support me to complete a health and wellbeing plan
- Explain how to navigate health services
- Attend important meetings and/or appointments with me
- Help me to find activities that improve my wellbeing
- Refer me to peer groups in the community
- Assist me with accessing the Recovery and Wellbeing College (an NHS college course provider covering courses on a variety of health and wellbeing subjects)
- Signpost me to other types of support services (e.g. benefits, employment, physical health).
Peer workers are not able to prescribe or advise on medication or facilitate personal care.
As peer workers we hold an unshakeable belief that recovery is unique to the individual and defined by them, including the right not to describe it in those terms.
We walk a path alongside the individuals we work with; we cannot determine what their journey looks like or how long it will take, it is theirs.
- Recovery is specific to the individual and can mean different things to different people
- It is about building a meaningful and satisfying life, as defined by the person themselves, whether or not there are ongoing or recurring symptoms
- It is deeply personal and involves the development of new meaning and purpose in one’s life as we grow beyond the sometimes catastrophic effects of our experiences
- People do not recover in isolation. Recovery is closely associated with social inclusion and developing a sense of belonging by developing meaningful and satisfying social roles within communities.
What is Peer Working?
A Peer Worker is someone who draws on and shares their own experiences in order to inspire, model, and inform others in similar situations. It is holding a shared knowledge of worlds we have visited and inhabited, and in some cases, survived or escaped.
There are different types of peer worker roles, but they all aim to:
- Bring together people with shared experiences to support each other
- Provide a space where you feel accepted and understood
- Treat everyone's experiences as being equally important
- Share their own experiences (good and bad) to promote the belief in recovery.
Where we are
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Brent
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Camden
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Harrow
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Hillingdon
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Hounslow
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Kensington and Chelsea
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Milton Keynes
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Surrey
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Westminster
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Adult Acute Mental Health Inpatient
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Adult Autism Diagnostic Service
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Bloodborne Viruses
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Community Mental Health Teams
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Complex Care
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Complex Emotional Needs
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Dual Diagnosis
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Early Intervention in Psychosis
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Eating Disorders
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Employment Services
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Health & Justice
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Older Adult Services
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Peer-Supported Open Dialogue
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Perinatal Mental Health
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Recovery and Wellbeing College
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Reducing Restrictive Practices
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Rehab
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Single Point of Access and Urgent Care
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Young Adult Pathway
Peer and Lived Experience Roles
At CNWL, we have a range of peer and lived experience roles, from entry level to leadership positions. Peer Workers and Senior Peer Workers engage directly with service users and hold case loads whereas those in more senior positions have strategic input and work to lead services using their lived experience as a frame of reference to support decision making and influence.
Peer Support Workers possess lived experience relevant to the specific setting or service in which they are placed. For example, a peer support worker in an inpatient unit will have first-hand experience of a significant admission(s) as an inpatient on a psychiatric ward. If they are working in a specialist service, their lived experience will align with the area of that service.
They will have already worked in a health or social care setting (paid or voluntary) and once in role will undertake training delivered by CNWL in our Level 4 accredited module ‘Developing Expertise in Peer Working'. They work alongside people using our services with principles of mutuality and reciprocity to support individuals to move towards recovery as defined by them.
Senior Peer Support Workers are experienced peer workers who have completed either the Level 4 accredited module developing expertise in peer working or an equivalent peer worker training course.
They contribute to positive change in services, giving feedback from a lived experience perspective and undertaking projects to improve the service.
CNWL has Senior Peer Support Workers across the trust in community, specialist and inpatient services. They work 1:1 with people, create and facilitate recovery groups and are part of service user involvement.
They supervise Peer Support Workers within their services, co-facilitate supervision groups for peer workers and feed into the central lived experience team. They are actively involved in the recruitment and induction of peer workers and can take a key worker role within transformed community hubs.