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Learning and Development

We invest in training and development to help you to develop and so you can deliver excellent support.

Learning and Development

Training and Support

We help our staff to realise their ambitions in many ways: through a thorough induction, training courses, bespoke development plans, on-the-job learning, flexible e-learning courses and much more.

When you join Brandon

Everyone who joins Brandon has a full induction. This includes an introduction to all the functions and lots of useful information about who we are, what we do, and your employment with us. Your induction will then be tailored dependent on the role you’ll be doing, continuing with your team to ensure you’re up-to-date with all the essential skills that you need.

Ongoing Support

Our person-centred approach doesn’t just apply to the people we support, but also our staff, who we help to reach their full potential.

We encourage people to share what’s important to them, involve them in decision-making, and empower them to be creative in the way they work.

We organise one-to-one meetings at least every eight weeks which gives staff the opportunity to discuss training needs, review progress, and raise any issues they have. For support workers, at least one of these meetings will be an observation session.

Your Individual Learning Plan

We’ll work with you to identify learning needs and develop an Individual Learning Plan. Your plan could include completing relevant qualifications in Health and Social Care, or management, broadening your experience, developing certain areas of your skill set, or something completely different. It’s tailored to the individual and designed to help you reach your full potential.

Career Routes at Brandon

You may join us as a support worker and want to focus on that role during your career with us. Alternatively, you may want to develop into a new role; there are plenty of career pathways open to you at Brandon:

The Care Certificate

We know that starting a new job can be both exciting and daunting, even if you have experience of working in social care. That’s why when you join us as a Support Worker, you’ll have a comprehensive induction into Brandon, through which you’ll learn all the fundamental skills and knowledge you’ll need in your job. Your induction will include training and assessment for the nationally recognised Care Certificate.

What is The Care Certificate?

The Care Certificate has been developed by Skills for Care and Health (the workforce development body in England). It's an identified set of standards that social care workers adhere to in their daily working life, and is required by all Support Workers across the sector. It’s an important element of the training and education that will make you ready to practice.

All the work that goes into your Care Certificate can be transferred to a Health and Social Care qualification, so it’s that first step on your career ladder in the sector and we aim to fully support all our staff to gain the qualifications required for their role.

How does it work?

Typically you can achieve the Care Certificate within your first few weeks and you’ll 'earn as you learn'. There are 15 topics; you’ll complete a range of training modules delivered in flexible ways, including e-learning, classroom-based and 'on the job'. After you’ve completed the training modules you’ll need to demonstrate you've understood the learning and can put it into practice.

Coaching

Our in-house coaching programme helps people to tackle work-based challenges and confidently find solutions to problems they face. Coaching involves a structured conversation which enables the person being coached to look at different ways to resolve the challenge or problem that they’re facing.

Our coaches are trained to follow a model which helps the person being coached to fully understand the nature of their challenge, explore options, and commit to an action plan to resolve the issue.

Once trained, coaches provide coaching to individuals and also support Brandon’s leadership development programme to train managers in coaching skills for their teams.

Mediation First

We understand that occasionally conflict can arise in any work setting and should this occur here, we want to ensure that people feel supported in resolving them. This is why we have the 'Mediation First' service available to all employees, should they ever feel they need it.

Mediation gives the individuals involved the opportunity to explore the underlying causes of the conflict and encourages the parties to identify a resolution for themselves. Our mediators are employees who have expressed an interest in mediation and we have number of qualified mediators from a variety of roles across the organisation, all trained to a national standard by our partner organisation, The TCM Group.

Mediation First is based on problem solving, empathy, and building relationships. It’s not about point-scoring, it’s all about coming to an outcome on which both parties agree and move forwards.

Find out more about our roles