5 tips for involving clients

CrossCurrents

 

By soliciting input and participation from clients, you send a message of partnership and recovery. Tom Regehr, founder of CAST Canada, an Ontario-based consumer-survivor education forum, offers ways to include clients at all levels of system, service and evaluation efforts:

1. Make a commitment to hiring former clients and creating visible peer support. Regehr suggests involving former clients in welcoming new clients. “First contact can be staggeringly important,” he says. “Sitting in a waiting room alone can be awful.”

2. Encourage clients to run a support group that provides a safe, productive place with a progressive involvement model, and that isn’t facilitated by a professional.

3. Use clients in awareness raising events, such as planning public educational events and designing posters and web sites.

4. Recognize clients’ changing needs. As they heal, what they need and want may change. “Allow for graceful exits,” says Regehr. At CAST, panel members only ever commit to one event at a time.

5. Include clients on advisory boards and committees.

 

 

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