Shaping Our Lives Company Profile

About us

Shaping Our Lives is a national, user-led non-profit, working to make sure those who face the biggest barriers can have their say to make services better and more inclusive.

We promote the voices of different equality groups who use health and social care services, and other services provided by the public and voluntary sectors.

With these people, we tackle the issues they face and needs they have. Most – but not all – of our work is with Disabled people because 70% of health spend and most of adult social care spend is on Disabled people. Our expertise, however, is of working with people with multiple identities and disadvantages.

Our Company's Commitment and Culture

Shaping Our Lives is a user-led organisation, with a small staff team and a National User Group. We also use a range of experts from diverse communities to support the delivery of projects, providing flexibility and efficiency.

As an organisation, we are working towards a society in which everyone has equal life chances and support for independent living; a society which prioritises inclusion.

Shaping Our Lives actively seeks to work with people with a wide range of professional, voluntary, and lived experiences. We encourage applications from individuals from a variety of backgrounds, including those who have experienced barriers to finding or staying in employment or non-traditional work histories.

We highly value lived, life, and voluntary experience. We do not expect candidates to have specific education or university degrees.

We actively welcome applications from Disabled candidates.

We ensure that the application stage is accessible and flexible by avoiding rigid expectations and formats. Candidates are encouraged to submit applications in the format that enables them to best showcase their skills and experience.

Check out our Recruitment Process page to find out more about the steps we are taking to make our recruitment process inclusive and accessible.

Accessibility Provisions

We are committed to supporting our employees with disabilities or long-term conditions, and take various steps to break down barriers that disabled employees may face at work. Some examples of the support we can offer incude:

Flexible working arrangements:

Flexibility in work location as an adjustment.
Flexibility in working hours as an adjustment.
Return-to-work support.

Recruitment and onboarding:

Alternative application formats accepted.
Interview questions available in advance
Documents available in accessible formats.

Culture and support:

Disability inclusion training for staff.
Disability inclusion training for line managers.
Casual dress at work.

Other

Shaping Our Lives is a small remote-first user-led organisation. On the rare occasions when we meet in person, we anticipate that everyone will have different access needs so we conduct meetings and events in a hybrid set-up.

As a default, we book venues that are wheelchair accessible, have good ventilation, have accessible toilets, hearing loops, flexible lighting, quiet rooms and accessible parking.