A stance of respect for local practice and expertise is one of the Core Features of AMBIT, and there are Training Exercises for Respect local practice and expertise in this manual.



Consistent with a Mentalizing stance, AMBIT adopts an explicit sensitivity and respect towards the local service ecology; for instance, local Social Work departments, Youth Offending Services, Medical services, Education, Housing departments, etc.

The aim is to build on strengths and existing local expertise (Scaffolding existing relationships as it were) and this is reflected in the process of Manualization, too, which asserts the value which existing local expertise in a team will add value in terms of how to implement other evidence-based ways of working, or AMBIT-influenced practices here, in this specific locality, amongst these specific organisational constraints. Much of what a successful team is already deploying locally with success will be expertise that offers value for other teams working in similar settings, or with similar target groups. This explains to some extent the high value that AMBIT places on its Community of Practice. AMBIT's TiddlyManual format allows for a "co-construction" of evidence-based practice and practice-based evidence, and moves away from the monolithic 'one-size-fits-all' approach that has characterised many manualized approaches before.

What this means is that AMBIT workers deploy their mentalizing skills not only towards:

• Young people and families
• Their team colleagues (the Keyworker well-connected to wider team is another of the Core Features of AMBIT)

But also in relation to:

• The local service ecology (other agencies and professionals working with the same client group.)

This means making a positive and explicit efforts (adopting this as a deliberate staff culture) to avoid 'polemic positions' ("Social workers are ALWAYS doing this to my clients...!", or "Typical GP!"), instead Addressing Dis-integration, for instance by using the Dis-integration grid to clarify one's own ('mentalized') understandings of local practitioners' positions.

AMBIT is never a stick to beat other practices with...

A huge amount of investment goes into training and developing models of practice, and developing the outcomes evidence that supports these. For a new model or approach to arrive in a locality and unintentionally (or, worse, intentionally) undermine or damage an existing model of practice that is working well, would be a serious "side-effect" of the training intervention.
AMBIT is expressly designed to avoid such unintended consequences. Indeed, any active attempt to use AMBIT as a "stick" to beat other methods and practices in a kind of "treatment models turf war" would be an extremely non-mentalizing use of these materials and theories.

Training

The training of AMBIT increasingly tries to recruit LOCAL specialists to deliver training on specific interventions during team trainings, or to deliver AMBIT training (see . There are Training Exercises for Respect local practice and expertise in this manual which we encourage AMBIT Leads and others to practice.

Experts by Experience

Another area of Local Expertise, is of course that of the Service users - who are Experts By Experience. The constant harvesting, learning from, and adaptation of a service in relation to Service User Feedback is thus a key part of the practice that flows from this principled stance.