We have just wrapped up our final Skills Session for the year, and it’s been a really excellent process for us internally at Iriss. The interest and feedback has been beyond what we expected, given that this is a new programme for Iriss. Having sold out every session has been amazing!
Our Skills Sessions were born out of a simple idea - people in social work and social care do not have lots of spare time, and we need to respect that. If they trust us enough to give us an hour of their time to attend a webinar, we really need to make that worthwhile - and in a way that can improve practice immediately. For every one of our webinars you attend we will make sure you take something away that can improve your work - the second the session ends.
At Iriss we are very lucky to have a range of experts on staff with a wide and varied world of experiences to share, and they have delivered some amazing sessions that have given the Iriss Skills Sessions an incredibly strong start.
Katie Feyerabend delivered our first session, ‘Introduction to data analysis for social work and social care’, an accessible primer for interacting with data, specifically tailored to people working in social work and social care. We heard from attendees how they found the subject ‘intimidating’, but Katie is an ideal guide for helping people explore data analysis.
Emily Whyte then delivered ‘Creative (re)presentation’ - An examination of co-creation in practice. This session explored how Emily used co-creation techniques to include the authentic voices of care experienced people in discussions of care, without exposing them to further harm and without diluting the value and weight of their contributions.
Stuart Muirhead delivered our final session of 2025 - ‘Analysis and language use in social work writing’ - which gave a concentrated exploration of written communication, unintended impacts and best practice. A packed session that really focused on practical improvements workers could apply in their written communication.
If you didn’t manage to make a session this year, we will be delivering the sessions again next year (and maybe some covering new topics as well!). The best way to make sure you don’t miss out next time is to sign up to our newsletter.
If you have any questions or suggestions for sessions you would like to see covered you can contact our Comms Officer Jon at jon.dimmick@iriss.org.uk.
