Meet The Team: Harley Pollard, Team Manager

Meet the Blue Sky Team: Harley Pollard

Name: Harley Pollard

Age: 30

Role: Team Manager of the East Region

Favourite genre of music:
I’m a musical theatre fan. This year I already have tickets for Jesus Christ Super Star, Wicked, Hairspray… and more! I love musicals; Mrs Doubtfire was a recent favourite.

How long have you been working for Blue Sky?
I’ve been working for Blue Sky for 6 years, but before that, I joined as a social work student, so I first became involved with Blue Sky around 8 and a half years ago.

Tell me a little more about your role…
I manage the social work teams in our Sussex and Surrey office and our Kent office. I have had several roles at Blue Sky. My current role involves supervising staff, overseeing how the teams run, looking after all our carers and young people - and lots of other tasks that may sound too unglamorous for this interview!

What do you find one of the best aspects of working for Blue Sky?
One of the things that has always stuck with me is just how much we support and invest in our young people to help them reach their full potential. I think the part I enjoy the most about my current role is also the development of our Social Workers. We’ve had Social Workers who have joined as students or newly qualified, and seeing them also grow and reach their full potential has been exciting. Just seeing that across multiple levels is really fulfilling.

What do you find the most challenging?
There are times when we try to make a well-informed decision based on all the information we have at hand and sometimes we get this wrong. Occasionally fresh information can come out at a later date, which means we may have chosen differently. I find those situations disappointing. I have to remind myself that everyone is always trying to do their absolute best.

If you could change one thing about the fostering process nationally, what would it be?
Retention of foster carers so we could offer more stability for our young people. We’ve had Social Workers that have been here for 10 years, and it makes a difference. Even in my length of service, I’ve seen young people right from the day that they came into placement and now they are 20 years old! Maintaining that level of professional relationship with them is special because I know I’ve been a consistent person in their life.

What do you wish that everyone knew about fostering?
The recognition of just how rewarding it is, whether you look after a young person for a day or 10 years. We don’t measure success on the length of the placement, because you can offer so much even looking after a young person for a couple of hours while their main carer is attending training. We are not always going to see the seeds that we sow and how they blossom, but that’s ok. There is also a stigma that young people are really challenging but I’d like people to recognise that behaviour is just a form of communication and it’s about looking beyond that.

What might someone be surprised to know about you?
I have a brown belt in Karate!