Henshaws First Steps Team: A Day in the Life

The Henshaws First Steps Team is at the heart of the Henshaws sight loss support team in Greater Manchester. The team ensures that everyone who wants or needs support can access the support that would benefit them, communicating with people via telephone and email.

The team also manages all other enquiries that come to the main info inbox, and Greater Manchester telephone line, ensuring that they get to the right people who can answer them.

What is a day like for the Henshaws First Steps Team? Find out, as we share the variety of enquiries that come in, and what else we do to make sure people with sight loss can access the support they need.

Early Morning Start

We like to get in early; most of us start the day with a hot drink.

Before phone lines open at 9:00am, we check the incoming emails, voicemails, and website enquiries.

Info email inbox

We check the info inbox. This email address is for general enquiries, so we receive a wide range of emails.

People make referrals, ask us questions, and try to sell us things. People also make enquiries for the whole of Henshaws (including our college, Arts and Crafts Centre and the fundraising team).

We filter the emails and enquiries, send college and Arts And Crafts Centre emails over to them for them to respond to, and get rid of the numerous emails trying to sell us something. This leaves us the ones we need to get back to.

Website enquiries

We check the online referrals that come through the website. People can submit their enquiries through our form and make a self-referral, or someone on their behalf can fill it in. We keep these safe ready to respond to, either via telephone or email.

Voicemails

We then check the various voicemails and again filter them. We keep the ones from people who need calling back ready for when we make outbound calls.

We’ve now sorted through everything! We can deal with some of these enquiries early, as they need an email reply, but we don’t start making any outbound calls until 9:30am. This gives people chance to start their day, and they could be getting someone to school etc.

9:00am: The phone lines open!

The phone lines go live at 9:00am. They have been on answer phone since 4:30pm the previous day, so from now we’re expecting calls. We send emails and respond to what we can from the previous night’s referrals and enquiries as we wait for the first call.

And yes, we spoke too soon: we get our first phone call!

We receive a call from a professional wanting to make a referral to our services for a person they’re working with:

Professional: The person would really benefit from a chat with you about all the support they need. I think they may need counselling too.

First Steps Advisor: Okay we will give the person with sight loss a call back.

We’ve not quite finished typing the details up on this one, but the phone is going again. We receive a call from a person who’s heard we offer digital enablement:

Person: I’m struggling to see to read, I’ve heard my phone can read things.

We make the referral so one of our knowledgeable Digital Enablement Officers can follow up and provide the support this person has requested.

We always keep a record of what we have said and done. It makes it easier to keep track of the support we offer and where that support is up to, so if you call in, we can look and see when your next appointment with the digital team is.

Time for outbound calls

We’ve now got a quiet minute, so we’re going to call some of those people who made enquiries via the inbox etc.

Person: I’ve been to the hospital and have been told that I have an eye condition. I was  offered a chat with the ECLO (eye clinic liaison officer) at the hospital but I was in a rush. Could you give me some information about the ECLO?

First Steps Advisor: I can actually get the ECLO to call you if you wish.

Person: That would be great.

First Steps Advisor: Whilst I’m talking to you, can I just tell you about Henshaws services?

We add the person to our system and refer them to our fantastic enablement team and ECLO for further support.

We’ll work our way through the others while we wait for a few more calls to come in.

We make lots of outbound calls. As well as responding to enquiries, if you have been issued a CVI (Certificate of Vision Impairment) at MREH (Manchester Royal Eye Hospital), Stepping Hill, or Optegra Manchester, we will contact you to make sure you are getting all the help you need.

We call you back 3, 6 and 12 months too from getting your CVI. We do this for new people joining Henshaws too.

We’ve made a few calls back to patients, had a good chat and have also made some referrals for people to our digital enablement team, the local authority sensory team and various other organisations in the local area that can help.

As the Henshaws First Steps team, we really take a proactive approach to make sure the people of Greater Manchester with sight loss get the support they want and need, including at the point of diagnosis.

Back to inbound enquiries

Phone’s ringing again:

We receive a call from a really concerned parent. They’ve been told their child has an eye condition and has lost some sight. The first thing to do is offer a listening ear and possibly some emotional support. Many calls need this kind of support.

We focus on ‘what’s bothering you the most,’ so we can try and sort out a solution for the immediate concerns. We can then think about getting the parent in touch with our specialist CYP (children, young people and families team).

Once we’ve finished talking to the parent, we make the relevant referrals. She’s feeling a little better and more confident that there is some help out there.

There is a new email in the info inbox:

“How can we give a donation? We are a local company wanting to do a sponsored event.”

This is one for our fundraising team, so we send it over to them so they can get in touch.

Other bits and pieces

We make our referrals, as we don’t want to leave them until tomorrow.

We also post out some IAG (information, advice and guidance) booklets; we issue these to all new people joining Henshaws, as the booklets give an overview of what support is out there, and we have booklets tailored to each local authority of Greater Manchester.

As we’ve been making calls, we check people’s details etc. It keeps our records up-to-date, as many people change their numbers and sometimes move house. We also check how you would like us to get in touch, as people like to be contacted in different ways. We also ask people if they want to be subscribed to our Sight Loss Support Team and Hints and Tips newsletters, which we send out via email.

Anyone can subscribe to our newsletters. You don’t have to be registered with Henshaws.

You have the option to subscribe via our website.

It’s now 4:30pm, so we’ll switch the phones to answerphone. We’ll head off home, until tomorrow when we’ll do it all again.

No two days working in the Henshaws First Steps team are the same, so we can’t predict what calls and enquiries we will receive from one day to the next. One thing’s for sure though: we love the variety. We love being there for people with sight loss in Greater Manchester, so they don’t have to navigate their journey alone.