At Buckinghamshire Mind, a deep understanding of the needs and experiences of people with mental health problems drives everything that we do.
Influence and Participation with Buckinghamshire Mind
Our vision for involvement
It is our privilege to work to improve people’s mental health. Including the influence and participation of people with lived experience means that we will be more connected to the everyday issues of living with a mental health problem.
There are many benefits to a culture of working together. Meaningfully engaging people in our work will ensure it is informed by a broad range of experiences and will effectively meet diverse needs. Where we can, co-producing our information will mean it is more useful to the people who receive it and easier to understand.
Your experience, knowledge and skills are valuable to us and we see you as having expert knowledge.
You don’t need to have used our services to influence our work
We recognise that all lived experience provides valuable insight and, in order to hear from a diverse range of voices, our involvement will not be limited to people supported by Buckinghamshire Mind. If you have lived with a mental health challenge yourself, or cared for a friend or family member with this experience, we’d love to talk to you – whatever services you may or may not have used.
Equity, Diversity, Inclusion and Equality of Involvement
When reaching out to people with lived experience of mental health problems regarding involvement opportunities, we want you to know that you will be heard and acknowledged whatever your ethnicity, sexuality, gender, age, economic background, nationality, physical health, religion or beliefs.
We will always ensure that our opportunities are advertised fairly and in accessible ways, and that no one is excluded from applying.
Benefits of participation and involvement to you
If you chose to share your lived experience with us, we will make sure that you have the opportunity to explore and share your own reasons for wanting to be involved with Buckinghamshire Mind. You will set your own goals for what you want to achieve through your involvement. We will then work together to ensure that the opportunities we offer you will help to reach these goals. Examples of goals might include; enhancing CVs, building confidence, learning new skills, meeting an altruistic desire to improve experiences for future service users, or a combination.
To register your interest or find out more, please complete the form below or email [email protected]
What does involvement look like?
We are seeking participants for two Lived Experience opportunities:
- Experts by Experience to help inform our work in a variety of ways on projects across the organisation.
- Lived Experience Interviewers to represent the voice of Lived Experience when we are interviewing for new staff members by taking part in interview panels. This will be coming later in 2024.
We also have other ways to get involved:
- Champions who work specifically in reducing stigma through our Champion the Change programme.
- Volunteers in various areas of the organisation.
Find out more about all of these roles
Leaflet
Influence and Participation
Please use this form to register your interest in participating in Buckinghamshire Mind's work."*" indicates required fields
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