What does a lived experience worker do? (with Prunella Howard-Jay)

[00:00:05] Bronwyn: Hey, mental workers. You are listening to the Mental App podcast, the podcast about working in mental health for early career mental health workers. As always, I'm your host, Bronwyn Milkins, and today we are talking about what lived experience workers actually do and how clinicians and peer workers can work together in ways that are collaborative, respectful, and grounded in lived practice.

If you've ever been confused about what a lived experience role actually involves or unsure how to work alongside peer workers without stepping or toes or making assumptions, this episode is for you. We're breaking down the unique contributions of lived experience workers, the power dynamics at play, and what meaningful collaboration between disciplines really looks like. Here to help us out with this topic is our guest, Prunella Howard-Jay. Hi, Pru.

[00:00:48] Pru: Hi Bron, How are you?

[00:00:50] Bronwyn: Well, thank you. How you going?

[00:00:52] Pru: I'm good. I'm good.

[00:00:54] Bronwyn: So nice to have you on the podcast. Could you please start us off by telling listeners who you are?

[00:00:58] Pru: Great. Hi everyone. My name's Pru, I work in public mental health as a consumer workforce manager, so I oversee a team of about 45 consumer peer workers. I also do a lot of supervision for peer workers in my free time, and I sit on a few boards from the lived experience perspective.

[00:01:20] Bronwyn: Wow. So you are well embedded in the lived experience space.

[00:01:23] Pru: I am well embedded in lived experience space. I live and breathe it.

[00:01:28] Bronwyn: How did you come to be interested in it?

[00:01:31] Pru: I fell into it by accident, Bron.

[00:01:33] Bronwyn: Oh, really?

[00:01:33] Pru: A lot of lived experience workers do. I, I was studying my psychology degree and I wanted to get some experience in the field. So I joined... I went to Headspace and I joined their youth advisory committee as a volunteer. And whilst I was volunteering there, they told me that they had a peer support volunteer program. And I was like, what in the world is peer support? And they, they told me what it was and it's for people that have a lived experience. I was like, oh my gosh, that is me. I have a lived experience.

Uh, so I signed up to that, and then they were crazy enough to hire me into a full-time paid role. And I continued studying my psych degree, and as time went on, I just fell in love with lived experience work, and although I finished both my psych degrees, I decided to stick with lived experience, and here I am.

[00:02:24] Bronwyn: That's so cool. So how long ago was that?

[00:02:26] Pru: That was about, 10 years ago now. I can't believe how fast it's gone.

[00:02:31] Bronwyn: And now you're supervising and working in the sector yourself. So for those who are not familiar, what is a lived experience worker, and I guess added to that, why are they really needed in mental health?

[00:02:42] Pru: Yeah, totally, Bron. A lived experience worker, uh, works within the mental health field. Well, they work in a few fields, but predominantly in the mental health field, and they bring their own lived experience of mental health challenges. So we have, "lived" what it's like to have, have been unwell. We also have family carer lived experience roles and their lived experience is having looked after someone or cared and loved for someone who has had mental health challenges. I come from the perspective that I've had my own mental health challenges.

These roles, we, we use that lived experience to be able to connect with consumers. So we, role model recovery, hope, where that sort of person that you talk to where we're like, yes, we've been there. It's possible, uh, we can support them in navigating the mental health system, 'cause we've navigated it ourselves.

We sit in part of a multidisciplinary team. So we sit with the psychologists, the social workers, uh, the OTs, the psychiatrists, we're an equal member of the team. And we, uh, sit in clinical reviews, handovers, and we bring that lived experience perspective around what it's like to be receiving care, and we advocate for the consumer voice in those meetings.

And it's, it's so important because, when you are unwell, you're seeing professionals nonstop. Uh, and it can be, it can be exhausting, and, and there's power dynamics in all those professionals. They're, they're there to treat you, they're to make decisions about your care, and it can be very medicalized and treatment focused. And to have the opportunity to chat to someone who's been there, who's experienced, it is just a sigh of relief sometimes to have someone that's that's not there to treat you, that's not there to try and decrease your symptoms or to tell you how to fix it, just someone that's like, yeah, I know it's really hard, to sit in that with you.

And it, it really helps consumers to feel seen. 'cause being mentally unwell is isolating, all right? And, and you don't always know somebody else who's experiencing it and you feel, is this just me? Why me? Is it gonna be like this forever? Um, will it never end? Is there something wrong with me? So being able to chat to somebody else, it's like, nah, I felt that too. And look, I'm here today talking to you. living, living a- a full quality life.

[00:05:03] Bronwyn: It sounds like the lived experience workforce was really born out of noticing the gap in, in this area, so it's like people were just seeing professional after professional and having their symptoms reduced and maybe not sure how to navigate... Could you just speak a little bit to that about why, why lived experience was brought into the mental health system in the first place?

[00:05:23] Pru: I can, uh, it goes all the way back, it goes back very far to the 1800's, but, uh, we, we came from the consumer movement, but as, although it goes as back as far as the 1800's, it really exploded around the 1960s when we were de-institutionalizeing uh, our mental health services. Uh, there was a big human rights movement also around disability rights, which we were very closely aligned with. And it was really the lived experience, catchphrase is nothing about us without us, so we we're really advocating for a larger say in our mental health care and the outcomes.

And that's where lived experience really started. Uh, and, and over time, through that advocacy and through that movement, uh, we advocated for, for roles that could be embedded within the mental health system, to be able to advocate for that perspective and to provide support to people.

[00:06:18] Bronwyn: So there was a real retaliation against like institutionalization, restraints, like medical restraints, um, not having choice and control over, over your own wellbeing in, in a system, I guess.

[00:06:31] Pru: A hundred percent. And so you'll find if you're working with peer workers now, they, they still bring a lot of that. We sometimes call ourselves, uh, innovative disruptors. So we're, yeah, so we're not there to work against the, the clinical system. A lot of us have had some, some beautiful experiences within the mental health system that's supported our own recovery, but we have also had experiences that have harmed us or that have caused us trauma, or they've felt very uncomfortable. So we will still push against some of those systems and processes that sometimes don't feel that great.

[00:07:04] Bronwyn: I really love that about lived experience workers having worked alongside them, um, only recently actually, and I really enjoyed that human rights perspective that they brought, because sometimes as clinicians we're actually a bit more constrained in what we can and can't say about systems. Whereas I feel like I really loved having the lived experience workers there almost to be like, yes, yay. Please say something.

[00:07:27] Pru: Yeah, exactly. We we're, we're not as bound by, um, some policies and, and legislations as some clinicians are. So we can really come in and, and be that advocacy voice, uh, and, and champion those human rights and, and system change and reform.

[00:07:43] Bronwyn: What are some of the common reactions just in general that you've noticed to lived experience workers from consumers themselves?

[00:07:50] Pru: Uh, consumers love lived experience. Workers, uh, you get a lot of feedback that they finally feel seen or heard or understood, or that they, they didn't know other people went through these experiences, uh, they didn't know that other people could recover from, from, from mental health challenges. Or, you know, we have a lot of people that wouldn't identify as fully recovered, but are living really meaningful lives and consumers are like, oh wow, I never thought that I could have this challenge, but still have a meaningful and fulfilling life. A lot of the time they ask to see more of us that the demand is, is much higher than, than the resource in the system has given lived experience.

[00:08:32] Bronwyn: Yeah, it sounds like they're so valued by consumers themselves. Now, one thing that I did in preparation for this episode is that I had a little look through your LinkedIn posts just so I could see what the vibe of lived experience is, and in one of your posts, which I really enjoyed, it said that peer work is not just a vibe, it's a discipline, and I was wondering if you could unpack what you mean by that?

[00:08:55] Pru: I think a lot of people come into peer work and lived experience work because we've been told we have a meaningful story, all right, and that your story's great. And we def- it is definitely why we come into the, into the work, but you need more than a story, there's a whole skillset. Involved in, in being a peer worker, uh, you, you need to be able to build re- rapport with consumers and rapport with your clinical team. You need to be able to hold space, hold distress, hold boundaries. We don't just go in and blurt our stories to consumers. We need to know how to share our stories in meaningful ways that the consumer finds meaning in and doesn't feel like we're making the whole conversation about ourselves, you know, and we have to learn to hold their stories.

Um, and, and then we also have to learn to sit within a mental health system as a worker and navigate that when we were once on the other side, and that can be quite confronting, learning how some of our systems and processes work, uh, when you were once, once a consumer receiving treatment... uh, so it's, it's, it takes a skillset for sure.

[00:10:02] Bronwyn: Thank you for emphasizing that because I think a common misconception of lived experience workers is, is just that, that they just come in with a story and they've made that into a, a discipline, but it's very skillful, there's a lot of work involved in being a lived experience worker. Um, so I think that's really important so that we don't devalue lived experience work.

[00:10:21] Pru: Yeah, most definitely, and it takes, you know, all disciplines need ongoing, you know, professional development and supervision and training and peer work is no different if anything, we might need more of it. 'cause we haven't started with a three year degree. You know, we're, we're jumping in and we're, we're depending on the leaders that have done peer work before us to, to really make sure we're over what we're doing and we understand our scope of practice and how to fit into the team.

[00:10:47] Bronwyn: Another thing I wanted to ask was around the boundaries of lived experience workers. I think this is something where early career clinicians get confused. Could you just tell us what you see the role and I guess the boundary of lived experience work being?

[00:11:01] Pru: Our scope of practice can be very, very confusing, um, not just to clinical workers, but to ourselves when we first jump in the role... you know, it's, it's, it's definitely been something that has been coming together the last few years, but peer workers are a nonclinical role, we do not have clinical training. Uh, so we, we cannot make assessments, we cannot make formulations, uh, and we, we cannot diagnose and we cannot give advice, right? We, we can sit with someone and hold our story with theirs... So if they asked us about something that worked for us when we were unwell, we can share that, but we can't say for certain that will work for them.

We are really storytellers and story holders. Um, you know, when we write, you know, we do write case notes, but we, we keep them very factual. For example, we can't say that we think that they're appearing in a certain way that means a certain symptom or a certain diagnosis, we, we can't make those judgements. Uh, we are just there to, to hold what's in front of us and to hold hope. Uh, and we're not there to fix or to guide, um, or to work towards goals, we are literally just there to, to walk alongside consumers in their journey.

[00:12:21] Bronwyn: Do you think that bringing light to some of the approaches that clinicians have towards participants or clients is within the scope, like I'm thinking about, let's say that you're working in a drug and alcohol service and as a peer worker, you've observed that some of the language that the clinicians use around the clients is maybe not compassionate or not as kind or nonjudgmental as it could be. Is that within the role of a lived experience worker to raise that?

[00:12:51] Pru: Yes, most definitely, we, we do raise that. It's a tricky one though because we are sitting within a team of power dynamics, and peer workers don't always feel comfortable or safe to raise that or to know the most appropriate way to raise it without causing offense.

You know, we're aware that all of us come into mental health, because we want to make a change... no clinicians, you know, spent years studying and dedicated their life to mental health because they, they wanna be disrespectful or cause harm. Uh, so, it's us learning how we can have those conversations around language and practices and system reform in a way that keeps us safe, but also doesn't offend the other person. And, and that's a skillset within itself.

[00:13:36] Bronwyn: -was gonna say, can I just say how challenging that sounds like? Most of us, we like to avoid disagreements and we certainly like to avoid conflict, I imagine that, yeah, it could be a whole course in itself... how to disagree with clinicians.

[00:13:49] Pru: It, it most definitely is. Uh, and it's, it's probably one of the most common things that will come up in a peer worker supervision. They don't talk so much about working with consumers as much as they talk about working within multidisciplinary teams, and how we can respectfully challenge them. And, and sometimes the things we hear in teams, uh, trigger our own experiences, so, so our emotional reaction can feel even stronger. So, you know, we've really gotta stop and ask, are we emotionally reacting because of our own lived experience? Or are we emotionally reacting for that person? How do we calm down? How do we communicate this in a constructive waythat keeps us safe. 'cause sometimes sharing can feel very vulnerable, um, but also creates change for the service. Um, and, and doesn't, you know, if you pull people up too often you just become that annoying lived experience worker in the room and, and people just tiptoe around you. So you've really gotta think about how you do it in a way that you're not the person that's correcting the clinician next to you every 10 minutes.

[00:14:55] Bronwyn: Mm. What are some of the other challenges that lived experience workers might have in working within a multidisciplinary team?

[00:15:03] Pru: Scope of practice is a challenge. You know, a lot of peer workers when they first come into the role, they're learning what the role is, they haven't had training before they've got there... uh, so they're not a hundred percent sure of their scope of practice and the clinical team around them is not a hundred percent sure of their scope of practice. So you're working out what you can and can't do. People are asking you to do things outta scope. You're not sure if it's out of scope. Uh, so that's a challenge.

Then there's a challenge of, you know, when you enter that team, you're literally walking in with a big sign on your head that says, I've been mentally unwell, and that can be very vulnerable. I'm sure there's other people in the multidisciplinary team that have experienced mental health challenges, but they don't have it stamped on their head or in their email signature.

[00:15:49] Bronwyn: Mm.

[00:15:49] Pru: So you, you've disclosed before you've ev- ever even opened your mouth and that can feel, uh, very exposing.

[00:15:58] Bronwyn: Is stigma still an issue? Because as mental health workers, I think we like to think that we don't stigmatize, but there's lots of research, to my knowledge, which says that actually stigma can still persist amongst mental health clinicians. Like, I'm thinking of studies in particular towards people who might have a diagnosis of borderline personality disorder, say. Um, so there can still be stigmatizing things, I'm curious whether that's an issue for peer support workers.

[00:16:23] Pru: Stigma does definitely still exist, but in, in different ways. There's, there's the way that you would expect where, where you feel like you're looked down upon for having had an experience.

But we also experience paternalistic stigma. You, clinicians will, will wanna look after us and take care of us and nurture us, uh, which almost infantizes us, you know? Yeah, um, we're, we're adults, we're, we're an equal colleague. We're just as capable as everyone else, but sometimes the stigma comes in... oh, oh, they seemed a little bit off today, I wonder if their mental health is playing up. Do they need extra support? And although asking for support is great, sometimes it turns into baby in us a little bit.

[00:17:11] Bronwyn: I see that's really interesting. Gosh, it's so hard. There's so much to consider, isn't there?

[00:17:16] Pru: Yeah.

[00:17:16] Bronwyn: Um, I'm wondering what does it look like when organizations get and work really well with lived, experienced workers, and what does it look like when they don't get it right?

[00:17:26] Pru: When it works really well, you will see clinicians and lived experience workers working collaboratively, hand in hand, having good relationships, sharing the care over their consumers, having great communication between them.

When it's not going well, you'll start to see lived experience workers become unwell, right? They'll start taking leave, they'll start showing signs of distress, they may start avoiding meetings, you may hear that they're feeling unsafe. And unfortunately it then turns around sometimes and they say, see, lived experience workers just don't have the strength or resilience to be here. But what's really happening is the system that they're working in is causing them harm.

[00:18:08] Bronwyn: And how do we get organizations to do it well?

[00:18:13] Pru: That is a fantastic question, Bron. Uh, one of the best ways to get organizations to do it well is if they're starting it, is to hire a lived experience lead, um, who has experienced working in lived experience roles, and who can really guide someone, guide a service on how to do it properly.

[00:18:34] Bronwyn: That comes back to the, like, it's a discipline, not a vibe because if we get, say, I'm just thinking like myself.... actually I'm probably not a good example 'cause before I was a psych I actually did lived experience work.

[00:18:45] Pru: Oh, there you go!

[00:18:46] Bronwyn: 'cause I was thinking before how you said that lived experience work is a discipline, not a vibe, and I think your standard mental health clinician, like they might have a lived experience themselves, but they might not have knowledge of the discipline, of lived experience work. So if they're trying to say, bring a lived experience worker into their organization, look, they just might not be the most informed person. So it makes sense to me that you would hire somebody who does have experience in that area, a lead.

[00:19:12] Pru: So we say there's lived experience and there's lived expertise, and lived expertise is developing that expertise around our discipline. Um, 'cause yeah, you can definitely have lived experience and you could jump into a leadership role, but you don't understand how our discipline works. You, it's like I have two psych degrees, I've never worked as a psychologist, but you wouldn't go and hire me as a senior psychologist, and you shouldn't because I'm completely unqualified for the role, so, yeah.

[00:19:42] Bronwyn: And so it's just, yeah, having that humility to look at your skillset.

[00:19:45] Pru: Yeah, a hundred percent.

[00:19:46] Bronwyn: I do think that mental health clinicians may have this unfair assumption about lived experience workers, that they might not be recovered enough, quote unquote, to be able to do the lived experience work. Is that a concern that you might have amongst some lived experience workers, or is that, I guess, more, more of a negative view that's not grounded in reality?

[00:20:08] Pru: I think that's just another version of stigma. Who defines what recovered enough means. How, how do you even measure that? And recovery is not linear, there's a very good chance, and I can tell you it happens quite often, that we hire peer workers and when we hire them, they're in a great space in their recovery, they're smashing life, they're feeling great, and then something happens 12 months down the road and they have a little dip in their mental health, which is totally human and natural. What do we do then, turn around and fire them? You know, you, it's about how we support people in the ups and downs of life to get extra supervision or to perhaps take a break or to, to get flexible work arrangements. I don't think we can define whether somebody is recovered enough or not... They need to define that themselves.

[00:20:55] Bronwyn: Mm. I feel like that's a really nice way of putting it. Maybe we're holding lived experience workers to like a standard that is not nice or fair.

[00:21:04] Pru: Yeah, and I've had many peer workers that have had a dip in their mental health and they've gone and taken a break and they've come back and they've made the joke to me that they've, they've requalified, they went and did some training and now they're, they're back ready to connect with consumers.

[00:21:19] Bronwyn: Mm, totally. So I guess turning to how we can build good relationships with lived experience workers. So how can earlier career clinicians in particular build a good relationship with a lived experience worker? Especially if they've never worked alongside one before?

[00:21:35] Pru: Yeah, amazing question. So in my current role, I do a lot of training and early grad programs on how to work with lived experience. Uh, so being able to jump in and learn what it is early, I think is probably the best thing. If you're service doesn't have training on that, you know, you can jump online, there's heaps of YouTube videos on how to work with lived experience.

But talk to your peer worker, they're, they're an equal, they're a discipline. Just like if you've never worked with a psychiatrist before, you'd go and chat to your psychiatrist and you would learn how they lack to be worked with you. Just sit down, have a chat, ask what their scope of practice is, work out a way to build rapport, have open communication... We're all just humans.

[00:22:20] Bronwyn: I love that as well, because in mental health, um, so for example, I've worked in hospital settings, it's generally the psychiatrist that is the leader, so there is hierarchy embedded in our mental health system, even amongst clinicians, and what I'm hearing from you is that like, look, don't have the hierarchy with lived experience workers. We are equal, um, have a chat with us.

[00:22:41] Pru: Yeah, a hundred percent. And I think lived experience workers feel that hierarchy as, as all disciplines do. There definitely is a hierarchy in mental health, and I think peer workers feel like they're at the bottom of the hierarchy, yeah. Uh, but we argue that we should just break down power dynamics and all workers are mutual team.

[00:22:58] Bronwyn: Sounds good to me, yeah.

[00:22:59] Pru: Right!

[00:23:00] Bronwyn: Yeah, yeah. Um, so you've led like peer workforces and you've, I guess you've shaped supervision and governance practices as well. What do you see lived experience workers like actually need from organizations and their colleagues? What do we, what do they need to help them thrive in their role?

[00:23:20] Pru: Uh, lived experience workers to thrive in their role definitely need training. Lived, experience focused training, not clinical training. We tend to throw them into a lot of clinical training, which is not relevant to their role, they need training on their own discipline. Uh, they need an organization that supports training clinical staff on how to work with lived experience and peer workers. They need a lived experience lead that has experience working as a lived experience worker. They need access to discipline specific supervision. They need clear processes on how to access flexible work arrangements, and they need to feel safe and supported by their leadership.

[00:24:00] Bronwyn: Mm, sounds simple.

[00:24:03] Pru: It is, but it's not.

[00:24:06] Bronwyn: No, but it's worth it. And it, and it really aligns with where mental health is heading and this human rights based movement.

[00:24:15] Pru: Peer work has so much to offer to the mental health system and the multidisciplinary teams. We've got a whole different perspective that is not taught in the classroom, and the disciplines working together when we all come together as one is really powerful. We've all got the same goal at the end. We want these consumers to have a fantastic, meaningful life.

[00:24:36] Bronwyn: Mm.

[00:24:36] Pru: And when we, when we come together to do it, the outcomes for the consumers are just amazing.

[00:24:42] Bronwyn: So I've got a few questions that listeners actually asked about this topic area. One of them was, how do I know if I'm unintentionally overstepping into peer work territory and what can I do to avoid that?

[00:24:54] Pru: As in they're doing the peer work role?

[00:24:57] Bronwyn: Yeah, I think this one, I'm just trying to put myself in their shoes. I reckon this would've been, like, like psychs can use self-disclosure and they're like, well what if I'm unintentionally overstepping into like what they do? Um, I guess it's a boundary question.

[00:25:12] Pru: Yeah, it's a great question. Um, because I remember psychs never used to do self-disclosure and, and now they do. Um, and look, I can't speak on behalf of all peer workers and what their thoughts on s psychs doing self-disclosure is, but I think it's great if it builds rapport, self disclose.

The difference between psychs doing self-disclosure or any clinical role and peer workers

is it... Clinicians get to choose when and how they self-disclose. They don't have to self-disclose if they don't want to. Peer workers have self-disclosed before they've walked in the room just by the fact they have the title peer work, and we self-disclose as our intervention. We don't have CBT, you know, we're not doing ACT, our intervention is self-disclosure.

So as a clinician, if you're self disclosing, you won't be stepping on our toes. You know, go ahead, build that rapport if it helps your consumer, that's amazing. It's just remembering that peer work is doing it in a more intentional way.

[00:26:14] Bronwyn: No, that makes a lot of sense to me. Um, yeah, and it's got specific goals. So like, when I think of self-disclosure for me in my psych role, it, you're right, it's for building rapport. It's always in the service of the client, there's a, there is a reason. The reasons why you guys are doing it is to build hope, to encourage them to feel seen, heard, understood, to challenge power dynamics, that kind of stuff.

[00:26:37] Pru: A hundred percent. Yes.

[00:26:39] Bronwyn: Yeah. No, that makes perfect sense. Okay, and the other question I had from a listener was, what should I do if I see lived experience workers being tokenized or sidelined in my workplace? Um, but this person said they don't have much power to change things.

[00:26:52] Pru: Fantastic question, although feeling for them, if they don't have much power to change things. Check in on your lived experience workers and let them know that you're an ally. Ask them if they need support. Uh, in clinical review meetings, you can help amplify their voice, you know, back them when they speak. Uh, you'd have more power than you think just on the ground.

[00:27:16] Bronwyn: No, that's really powerful. Okay, and I'm wondering, where do you see peer work going in the future? Like let's say next five years?

[00:27:24] Pru: That's a great question. Uh, I think peer work is growing. I think it's moving more towards becoming a discipline. Uh, it's, it's, it's a very new discipline and it has lacked, uh, discipline supports and training and professional development. And I think we are getting much, much closer to having scope of practice, frameworks, training... uh, I would love for us one day to, to have a body that we can report to that that supports us. I think we might eventually get there, um, but I think you'll see more and more peer work embedded in teams than becoming quite the norm.

[00:28:02] Bronwyn: Yeah, like are you seeing a growing want from organizations and government even for lived experience workers?

[00:28:09] Pru: Yes. So in the organization that I work in, I started three years ago, and I had 10 peer workers and now I have 40 and I'm begging them to stop hiring more 'cause I need a second to catch up. But constantly you have teams going, but we need more peer work. We need more peer work.

[00:28:26] Bronwyn: Wow. That's, it's awesome. Um, but I'm sorry for your caseload as well.

[00:28:30] Pru: Yeah. It, it, it, you know, with... you can grow too fast at times. Um, but it, it's definitely growing. The, the demand is there.

[00:28:40] Bronwyn: Awesome. Um, is there anything else I haven't asked you that you reckon it would be helpful for early career clinicians to know about?

[00:28:47] Pru: I think I'd like early career clinicians to know not to be scared of working with lived experience. I think sometimes there's some hesitation. They don't wanna offend us, they don't wanna step on toes, they're not sure if they're gonna say the wrong or right thing. Please don't be scared, we're pretty friendly. We're happy to talk about our discipline. We're happy to talk about our role. If you are unsure, just ask and, and we'll happily talk your ears off about it. You know, we, we love a conversation and we're happy for people to ask, you know, there's questions that they don't know about our workforce.

[00:29:18] Bronwyn: Mm. Do you reckon some lived experience workers are afraid of clinicians as well? They're- they're more afraid of you than you are them?

[00:29:26] Pru: Yeah, peer workers come in and they a hundred percent feel a power dynamic with clinicians when they come in. They're coming into a workforce that used to treat them, that saw them as mentally unwell, and now suddenly they're like, how did I get a desk in this room with them? Do I belong here? Am I worthy of being here? I don't have a degree, they do. There's definite power dynamics for especially early in career peer workers that they definitely have a fear of clinicians.

[00:29:54] Bronwyn: Okay. Sure. Yeah. Is there anything we can do to help them feel more comfortable?

[00:29:58] Pru: Just welcome them into your team. Make space for them to speak. Go out, have a coffee with them. Build that normal human to human rapport.

[00:30:08] Bronwyn: Beautiful. Pru, this has been such a great conversation. I've really learned a lot about lived experience workers and the workforce in general. What do you hope that listeners will take away from our conversation today?

[00:30:20] Pru: I hope that they take away that lived experience is a workforce that's definitely needed within mental health and that it's one to collaborate with, not to work in silos.

[00:30:32] Bronwyn: Yeah. Beautiful. Pru, if listeners wanna learn more about you or get in touch, where can they find you?

[00:30:38] Pru: Uh, they can find me on LinkedIn under Prunella Howard-Jay.

[00:30:43] Bronwyn: I'll make sure that I have the link to your LinkedIn profile in the show notes, and I recommend giving Pru a follow. I enjoy your posts and I think they're really good about lived experience workforce.

[00:30:52] Pru: Great, thanks.

[00:30:54] Bronwyn: Listeners, if you found this episode helpful, please follow Mental Work wherever you get your podcasts from, and make sure you put the episode in somebody else's ears, it's the best way to get the podcast out there. That's a wrap, thanks for listening to Mental Work. I'm Bronwyn Milkins. Have a good one, and catch you next time. Bye.