70 Dare To Imagine 9. Ensuring facilitation of and time for building trusting and collaborative relationships between partners throughout the project is essential for the programme to have a meaningful impact on the care home. Facilitated through: • Introduction days for artists in care homes (including taster activity for staff, tour of home for artists, and opportunities for open discussions). • Time for artists to be present in the home for research and development sessions prior to the residency. • Identifying key points of contact in care homes (with handover plans in the event of staffing changes) to facilitate regular maintained communication. • Mediation (where required) from host organisation (or person allocated this role, see point 1) • Regular check-ins, debriefs, and other opportunities for feedback and sharing. • Host organisation (or person allocated leadership role) promoting a culture of valuing each others expertise and the value of mutual learning. • Communication strategy (see point 1). 10. Ensuring a legacy from artists’ residencies in care homes is facilitated through artists spending lots of time physically being present in the care home and creating and leaving something tangible behind. This promotes care staff learning and skill development, helps staff see the positive impact of the arts which provides impetus to enact new skills and learning, and helps embed creativity in the care home culture. 11. Both arts organisations and care homes need to be aware of and plan for the additional time and resource that is needed for building relationships as the foundation for a meaningful experience and also for ensuring legacy from the artists’ residencies. Both care homes and arts organisations need to be prepared to re-introduce the programme to new staff to support relationships and momentum through staff changes and turnover. 12. Funders and commissioners also need to recognise the time and resource that is needed to build relationships, maintain communication, and embed legacy within artists’ residencies, as well as the time for conducting the actual activities themselves, and allow for this in their allocation of funding. All of the above support the ethos of the ARCH programme in recognising that older people in care need opportunities for creativity and expression, and contribute to the ways in which creative practice can be embedded in the fabric of care homes. These findings highlight the time investment needed from artists, care home staff and management, and those with overall leadership and project management roles, in order for residencies to have meaningful impact in care homes.
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