June 15, 2022

PSS Shared Lives Carers Awards 2022

We’re super excited to announce our first PSS Shared Lives Carers Awards – a chance to say a big thank you to our brilliant Shared Lives carers.

Our carers are some of the most dedicated, professional and kind people you could meet – and we want them to know what a big difference they make. If you use Shared Lives or if a member of your family does, if you’re a Shared Lives carer or if you work alongside a carer at PSS, why not say a big well done to the PSS carers you know?

Nominations open on 20 June 2022.

What are the categories?

The Big-Hearted Award: for a carer who has shown kindness, who’s caring, who looks after other people and who also knows how important it is to look after themselves, so they can give their all.

The Determined Award: given to a passionate person who doesn’t let anything stop them from reaching their goal – or goes the extra mile to help others reach theirs – no-matter how tricky things seem.

The Open-Minded Award: this one’s for someone who’s not scared of new ideas or to question things, who’s brave enough to venture outside their comfort zone, who has taken change in their stride or who’s gone on a journey with someone, led by that person’s experiences.

The Genuine Award: for someone who’s trustworthy, who has loads of integrity and who’s a team player – that person who’s unapologetically themselves and always tries to do things in the right way.

The Professional Award: this one’s for the carer who always shows their own kind of professionalism – they do what they say they’re going to do, when they said they’d to it, they take their responsibilities seriously, they show respect to the people they work with and they’re willing to push the limits but respect the boundaries.

Shared Lives Brain Box Award: which carers you know have gone above and beyond to make sure they’re the most up-to-speed, brainy carers in the land? We’re looking for the carer who loves learning and has thrown themselves into training up as much as they can.

Shared Lives Together Award: does your carer made decisions with you? Do you work together on things? Do you enjoy deciding on what to do together? We’re going to say a big thank you to the carer that has been brilliant at co-production this year, so tell us what you and your carer have worked together on.

Shared Lives Carer of The Year: this one’s the biggie – it’s for a shiny PSS Shared Lives carer who lives all of our values and represents the best of all of our carers all rolled into one. It’s an extra-special award for someone you know who you think’s really brilliant at what they do and how they do it.

Who can nominate a carer for a PSS Shared Lives Carers Award?

Anyone can nominate a PSS Shared Lives carer for an award. You could be:

Someone who is supported by a Shared Lives carer
Someone whose family member is supported by Shared Lives
A fellow Shared Lives carer
A member of the PSS team
A commissioner of Shared Lives
One of our partners

Who decides the winners?

The winners will be decided by a panel of our experts by experience – volunteers who use our Shared Lives service. The people we support know what it takes to make a great carer – and there’s nobody better to make the decision.

When will the winners be announced?

Nominations close on 31 August and winners will be announced at a ceremony at the end of the year. Watch this space!

How to nominate a carer for a PSS Shared Lives Carers Award

Grab your phone or tablet and open up your camera
Turn your phone or tablet on its side so it’s long-ways (in landscape)
Film a short video (no more than three mins) telling us who you’re nominating, in which category and why. Give us some examples of times they’ve stood out Really sell it to the judges!
Send your video to us on WhatsApp: 07889 756 343 or send it in a private message on Facebook via our PSS UK Facebook page.
If you can’t film a video and want to write it out, send your nomination to sharedlivesawards@pss.org.uk. If your nomination is shortlisted, we’ll need you to film a video then so we can show your nomination at our ceremony. Don’t worry, we can help you with that.

The rules

You can nominate one person per video. You can nominate as many people in each category as you like, but please separate each person into their own nomination video – for example, please don’t say ‘I’m nominating Julie and Sarah from Making Days’ – please do two separate nominations, one for each person you want to nominate.
Please make sure your video is filmed with your phone on its side. Nominations filmed in portrait may need to be re-filmed if they’re shortlisted, so save yourself some time and do it landscape.
Nominations open on 20 June and close on 31 August.

Need help filming your nominations?

If you’re struggling to film your nominations on your phone, let your Shared Lives development worker or another member of the PSS team know and they’ll be really happy to help.

Good luck!