Meet the team… Sophie

Sophie manages one of the newest branches to join the Nobilis fold – Beaconsfield in Buckinghamshire. Overseeing an office team, plus more than 100 carers certainly keeps her busy. Here she tells us more about her past career, her day-to-day role with Nobilis now, and the book she has written.

I originally took a part-time job as a carer in 1995 while still at Reading University to earn a bit of money to help me get by and support the baby I had in the middle of my studies. What started as a brief, part time career working as hands-on carer, turned into a full-blown lifetime career. By 2004, I was registered to manage a 10-bed care home for adults with learning difficulties in Reading.

I obtained my NVQ4 and the Registered Manager’s award by 2006 and went on to manage services for a range of client groups including those with dementia; I commissioned new domiciliary care services, worked as freelance consultant for both health and social start-ups and more recently as a Quality & Compliance Manager.

Today, my day-to-day job involves managing activity on behalf of Nobilis, which includes staff performance monitoring, maintaining staff qualifications and CPD (Continuing Professional Development) as appropriate and in accordance with regulation requirements, writing tailored care plans for our clients and completing related Risk Assessments, all of which ensures that our care is bespoke and agreed client needs are fully met. We also work in collaboration with sister organisations, including Local Authority personnel, as well conducting internal quality assurance audits and much more!

It takes patience, kindness, gentleness, flexibility, and a caring attitude to be a good carer. Each day is different and of course, each person we work with is unique.  There’s never a dull day in the care industry.  I love a challenge.

When I’m not working, I write a bit of music and play the guitar. I love eating out, watching quizzes, tennis, rugby and travelling. Writing is one of my hobbies and I’m hoping it keeps me going when I retire.  I have self-published three children’s books, which are live on Amazon under my author name Sophie Scenic Daniel. Last year I was offered a publishing contract for my book – Life Without My Family, Lone Survivor of Eleven Children, based on my life story.  It is due out anytime now. It’s not a sad, hopeless tale, as the title might suggest. It is a very happy story of my refusal to give up and die just because I’m a lone survivor. I have gone on to have four grandchildren from two of my four children – the icing on the cake for me.