The History of the London Support Group
This charts the history of the LSG up to the present time. A talk on the first 18 months of the group was given by Jo Anne Brown at the DAWN conference on Setting up a Workplace Bullying Support Group in October 2003. A transcript of the talk is available for members of the Network to learn some of the pitfalls of support groups before they get to them!
May
2002
A few people were attending the Dignity at Work Bill meeting at the House of
Lords and decided to meet up. Some even gave speeches! Some of the speeches
made at that meeting can be found here.
The group had a great time meeting others face to face, usually it was in cyberspace!
It was suggested that the group should meet regularly and be a support group
- the London Support Group was born!
June
2002 – May 2003 – The First Year
The group met irregularly. Jo Anne Brown organised the meetings and when she
wasn't well enough to, well, nothing much happened. In early 2003 she considered
giving it up organising meetings due to a lack of interest. She knew that a
support group was needed in London and the South East but wondered why there
was this lack of interest. The original six people had only increased to ten
in a year. She decided to arrange a regular meeting once a month and hoped
that some regularity would help some to get there - it worked. There were some
excellent nights, some even legendary! Just don't ask about the pub that was
designed by someone with PTSD...well, that's Angela's theory anyway!
June
- October 2003
With the attendance of the regular meetings being more stable and worthwhile
organising, Jo decided that it was time to get some new members - otherwise
we would stagnate and just grow old together! A message on a bullying newsletter
was successful and our membership started climbing rapidly - within 2 months
we had 24 members, more than double what we had for the first year!
It became clear that there was now a different mix of members. Some didn't get anything from our 'beer and an ear' attitude to meetings. The first year had seen people recover together at similar rates. Some of the new members were on par with us but some were clearly at their worst times mentally. It was not suitable for us to be in a loud pub, laughing and having a pint when people came to us for support. Well, not what the type we were offering at that time - support when you fall over maybe!
Things were also starting to get too big for one person. The numbers of enquiries and emails/requests for advice (a side product of running a group) meant that Jo was feeling really pressured. People who run groups or volunteer are also recovering, so Jo needed the work to be shared out. What the group 'was' needed to change, so that it met the needs of everyone who was attending and not just the old boozers!
When asked for help, Keith from DAWN was very kind with his time and experience. He advised Jo on many different aspects of making changes. The first of the changes was to set up an internet forum - wow, it was popular! Attempts to make further changes to the group didn't go as well as the forum. Although the group voted to formalise the group in a poll, there was one member who was vehemently against it and did his best to wreck it. While banter is OK, insults and attacks are not.
It resulted in the only member ever to be banned from the LSG. An offer of reconciliation was ignored. This was sad because he was a founder member and close friend of many members until this time. 'I'm alright Jack' attitudes have no place in a support group. What happened split the group and the divisions were felt for some time. The implementation of the ‘new’ LSG was postponed to allow the group to re-adjust.
November
2003 - March 2004
Some informal changes to what we offered made a big difference to the group.
We started getting pro-active in offering real help such as attending meetings
with members, going to their tribunals, even occupational health meetings.
We 'bought in' to their case and they equally bought into the group. Members
of the group had some great successes - Employment Tribunals, Employment Appeal
Tribunals, hard to get ill health retirements and even harder to get Industrial
Injury awards. No longer were people struggling on their own. This WAS a support
group!
The numbers of members were still increasing rapidly - 49 at the end of March 2004 - but some were still not attending meetings or using the forum. The time felt ready to start again with changes to the group. Some hard decisions on meetings and memberships were needed. A special meeting was held with a 'focus' group to agree our terms of membership and aims. We are a face to face group and yet had many members who had never attended a meeting - why?
The decision was made by the members that those attending the face to face meetings should get priority and the terms set around their needs. This may 'appear' unfriendly but we are not! We protect the safety and security of our members. Those who seek to harm or just 'lurk' are not welcome - they have plenty of other groups for that! The changes to the group meant that some no doubt had to leave. The group now say that each member makes the positive choice to participate and belong to the group.
The jobs needed to run the support group were listed and split into volunteer vacancies. Jo could no longer run the group on her own, it was far too big and she had other things to do - like the launch of The jfo Project in April 2004! It started with four volunteers - memberships, meetings & events, website and buddy system. These roles were quickly taken by people who were keen to help out the group and build on what Jo had already done. The group was now organised by four people - Angela, Jo, Kris and Olly. They also decided that they would become known as LSGeers instead of the long-winded LSG Volunteers! Oh dear...
The group published their first newsletter - CHOICE. We plan to publish CHOICE every six months. The buddy system was new and it was good that we have Kris, who has so much experience in support to launch this. It had been trialled very successfully and a full implementation was now being considered.
