Noor started as a consultant at EHdK last year; how did she like the first few months and what stood out to her? She tells you all about it in this blog.

This is how it can be done

There are countless articles, podcasts and documentaries online about the Dutch healthcare landscape. We help you by choosing the most interesting and inspiring pieces that we think you should have seen, heard or read. They will make you think, and hopefully afterwards you will feel especially motivated to do something about it. Change in healthcare is needed. With these articles, we especially want to show you that things can indeed be different, as long as you believe in them.

Coming together to make a difference – Nadine.

With more than 20 years of experience in youth care, Nadine has seen a lot in the field of care for vulnerable youth. Together with Brian Esselaar, she founded EHdK with the goal of improving youth care, among other things. In this interview, she shares her insights on the changes in youth care since 2007. She also tells how the Youth and Safety Eastern Netherlands program puts us with the first leg into the future.

The program, launched in the Eastern Netherlands, aims to prevent juvenile crime by connecting municipalities and juvenile justice partners. Nadine shows why programs like this one are so important and the impact it makes for youth, municipalities and professionals.

Working visits are important when working as a consultant. As a ‘newbie’, I experienced the impact of such a visit in various projects, such as, for example, the cooperation around the complex VG target group in the Northern Netherlands. A working visit to one of the clients in this project made an immediate impression on me. Being in contact with the people you do it for gives your work extra charge.

It is now two years since I started as a consultant at EHdK, and I am not so new anymore. I now have more than ten projects, one seminar, one major launch, twenty training days, two guest lectures, two strategic summits, two Christmas celebrations and, above all, many experiences behind me. The main thing I have learned in the past year is that you only understand what you are doing it for when you know who you are talking about. At EHdK, we are focused on understanding what we are talking about. That’s why I’m taking you through the value I see in looking along on the shop floor.

An integrated approach must match local realities

In the complex landscape of care for people with severe mental illness (EPA), one lesson has become clear over the years: a successful integrated approach must connect to local realities. Maarten and Pim, consultants at EHdK, emphasize this in their work and in their recent collaboration with the ‘t Gooi region, where together they helped develop a “Gooi EPA approach.”

“You don’t have to know everything right away: as long as you learn to listen carefully” – Teun

Making impact: what does it really mean? – Jos

When we talk to colleagues about what drives you in consulting work, within minutes it’s about making impact. When do you make impact? For some, this means making an immediate impact on the care clients receive. For another, it means helping a client make an important decision. For a third, it means, for example, contributing nationally to a system change in care. When do you make enough impact? In the following paragraphs, I explain how we at EHdK do our best every day to keep making care better.

“In one evening, all the reasons to work at EHdK came out” – Siebeline

As a new consultant at EHdK, you get to sit down with the directors right away. That is quite impressive when you are just starting out. A very good example is that I was allowed to join an informal introductory dinner for directors of the Frisian youth care and the new aldermen. In one evening the main reasons why I started working at EHdK became clear: namely creating social impact, and the fact that as the youngest employee you are not at the bottom of the ladder, but count and contribute.

By taking a critical look at ourselves, we hope to increase our outward impact – Mees

The diverse work as a consultant at EHdK can still be quite impressive as a new employee fresh out of college. Switching quickly between different assignments and traveling from place to place can be quite a challenge. Fortunately it also gives an enormous amount of energy to master various issues in a short period of time and to deal with people from a large number of organizations. The switching between these different issues and organizations is a fun challenge that allows you to quickly learn about the social problems you normally read a lot about.