This webinar is online on Zoom
Book your place
To book a place please email events@imroc.org with “Demystifying Research 2” in the subject line.
This webinar is part of our Demystifying Research series and builds on our earlier exploration of the question: Does peer support work? This session will be based on this latest paper, written by Simon Bradstreet, our webinar host, who will be in conversation with Emma Watson.
In this session, we shift the focus from whether peer support works to how, where, and why it works in real-world settings. Designed to be light-hearted but informative, in this session we’ll introduce key approaches such as evaluation and implementation studies, highlighting how they are used to explore the conditions that enable peer support to be effective and sustainable. Drawing on evidence from across the field, the webinar highlights what helps peer workers and programmes to thrive.
While there is growing confidence about what good peer support looks like, this session focuses on what it takes to make it happen consistently in practice. It offers a valuable opportunity to deepen understanding, connect research to practice, and reflect on how to strengthen peer support within your own context.
Date and Time
Wednesday 3rd June at 1-2.30pm (UK time)
What to Expect:
We’ll cover:
Why it is important to look beyond the results of Randomised Controlled Trials to understand the context in which peer support is happening.
A jargon free introduction to research methods related to evaluation and implementation.
A summary of what we know about the conditions for successful peer working.
Key takeaways and benefits of attending:
Build knowledge around research methods used to understand context and real world service delivery.
Increased understanding of the conditions for successful peer working and what to encourage and avoid at all stages of role development.
Extended opportunity for facilitated discussion and reflection with other members of our community.
Speakers
Simon Bradstreet
Simon Bradstreet works as a consultant with Imroc and brings over 20 years of experience mental health research, policy and improvement. His background includes roles in evaluation consultancy, academic research and teaching. As founding Director of the Scottish Recovery Network he helped introduce formalised peer working in the UK and developed a number of innovative programmes founded on valuing and building from lived experiences of recovery. Simon’s PhD focused on how stigma becomes internalised and has contributed to over 30 peer reviewed publications. Through Simon Bradstreet Consulting, he currently provides research and consultancy services to a number of clients, including the Mental Elf, Matter of Focus and Habitus Collective UK, and is a qualified Gestalt Coach, supporting peer leaders and others in helping roles.
Simon has a passion for communicating and demystifying research. His mission is to enable positive change and improvement in all aspects of health and social care through evidence-based and participatory methods.
Emma Watson
Emma Watson is the programme lead at Imroc for Research, Evaluation, Publications and Development, and, until recently, was the Peer Support Lead at Nottinghamshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust. As Peer Support Lead, she has led the strategic introduction of peer support workers into a range of clinical services, establishing training and supervision processes to support this development. Prior to this, Emma worked in a number of peer roles, including peer support worker, peer supervisor, peer trainer and peer researcher. Emma was among the first peer workers to be employed in Nottingham NHS Trust in 2010; an experience which transformed her own recovery, as well as her understanding of the power of lived experience.
As a programme lead at Imroc, Emma aspires to centre lived experience perspectives in research and publications, and offer accessible, creative ways for knowledge to be developed and shared. She is leading on the development of an MSc in Lived Experience Leadership as well as overseeing Imroc’s research and evaluation projects. Emma's commitment to advancing peer support is further demonstrated through her extensive research publications. She has authored numerous articles, as well as co-authoring the book "Peer Support in Mental Health," which provides an in-depth exploration of peer support concepts and practices. Her PhD explored peer support in the context of an NHS service, especially how this context changes or constrains peer support, and how individual peer workers resist this process.