1.5 Explain how own and others’ values, beliefs and experiences can impact practices and behaviours relating to equality, diversity, inclusion and human rights

This guide will help you answer 1.5 Explain how own and others’ values, beliefs and experiences can impact practices and behaviours relating to equality, diversity, inclusion and human rights.

As a manager in adult care, your values, beliefs, and experiences—along with those of your team—can shape the culture and everyday practices of your service. How you and others view difference can either support or undermine equality, diversity, inclusion, and human rights. Understanding these influences helps you to promote fairness and challenge discrimination.

What are Values, Beliefs, and Experiences?

• Values are the deeply held principles that guide how someone sees right and wrong. These often come from family, culture, faith, or life experience.
• Beliefs are ideas people accept as true. This may include religious beliefs, attitudes about disability, or opinions about age.
• Experiences are the events or situations someone has lived through. These shape attitudes, fears, likes, and dislikes.

Everyone has different values, beliefs and experiences. These can affect behaviours in positive or negative ways.

Personal Values, Beliefs and Experiences

Your personal perspectives shape how you:

• Respond to individual differences
• Interpret policies and laws
• Support people’s choices
• React to situations or challenges

For example:

• If you value respect for all, you are likely to challenge discriminatory language or behaviour from staff or service users.
• If you have positive experience working with people from diverse backgrounds, you may be more open and confident in adapting support.
• If you have experienced discrimination yourself, you may be more sensitive to the impact on others.

On the other hand, personal values or beliefs may sometimes lead to unintended bias if left unchecked. For example, if your upbringing involved negative stereotypes about mental health, you may need to actively challenge those ideas in yourself to avoid acting unfairly towards service users with mental health needs.

The Impact of Staff Members’ Values and Beliefs

Staff come from diverse backgrounds, each with their own mix of values, beliefs, and experiences. These influences can lead to differences in practice:

Positive impacts:

• Staff who believe in fairness treat all service users with respect.
• Staff with experience of inclusion may encourage others to try inclusive activities or approaches.
• Values of empathy and tolerance promote listening, patience, and trust-building.

Negative impacts:

• Staff holding prejudiced beliefs may be less willing to treat everyone equally (for example, refusing to provide personal care to someone of a different religion).
• Stereotypes may cause staff to make unfair assumptions about what someone can or cannot do.
• Staff who have never worked outside their own cultural group might feel uncomfortable or lack the confidence to adapt care for difference.

Unexamined or unchallenged staff attitudes may lead to poor care, exclusion, or even unlawful discrimination.

The Role of Organisational Culture

Leaders set the tone, but every staff member brings their own influences. If your setting welcomes open discussion about values and differences, staff are more likely to reflect, ask questions, and learn from others.

Signs of a positive culture:

• Encouragement of open conversations about identity, faith, and background.
• Recognition and celebration of diversity within the team and service users.
• Training and supervision focus on equality, inclusion, and self-awareness.

Risks to look out for:

• Tolerance of negative jokes, stereotypes, or “othering.”
• Staff struggling to adapt communication or approaches because of personal discomfort.
• Resistance to change from long-held beliefs or past experiences.

Effects on Service Users

Differences in values and beliefs among staff can directly affect service users, such as:

• Positive: Service users feel safe, respected, and included. Care plans reflect their wishes, backgrounds, and beliefs.
• Negative: People may feel ignored or judged, especially if their identity, beliefs or needs are not understood. This can lead to withdrawal, distress, complaints, or risk of harm.

Service users’ own beliefs and values also shape their preferences. Staff need to recognise this, avoiding assumptions or imposing their own views.

Your Own Role and Responsibilities

As a leader, you need to:

• Reflect regularly on your own values, beliefs, and experiences—and how they influence your actions.
• Support staff to do the same, using supervision, training, and open dialogue.
• Model inclusive attitudes and challenge inappropriate behaviour or language.
• Encourage a working culture where staff feel safe to examine and change their beliefs.
• Provide education and resources which help staff better understand diversity.

You also need to:

• Celebrate diversity in your setting—for both staff and people using the service.
• Support service users’ choice and autonomy, even if their beliefs differ from your own.
• Address conflicts sensitively, making clear that respect and equality are core expectations.

Managing Conflicts of Values

Sometimes, personal beliefs conflict with practices that support equality or inclusion.

• For example, a staff member’s religious beliefs might conflict with supporting LGBTQ+ service users.
• Another might have strong opinions about gender roles that clash with modern equality standards.

When this happens, it’s your duty to explain that while individual beliefs are respected, public behaviour should always align with professional standards, the law, and organisational policy. Training, dialogue, and support help staff bridge these gaps.

Ongoing Self-Reflection

Being aware that everyone—including you—comes with their own influences ensures constant reflection and growth. You can ask yourself:

• Do my actions support everyone’s right to equal treatment and inclusion?
• Have I challenged my own assumptions about certain groups or individuals?
• How can I continue to learn about, and from, people who are different from me?

Supervision, peer support and continuous learning all support this self-awareness.

In Practice

Everyday examples may include:

• Adjusting activities, meals, or routines for individual preferences and beliefs.
• Adapting communication to suit cultural or linguistic needs.
• Addressing and challenging stereotypes or derogatory comments.
• Involving people in decisions about their care, respecting their lifestyle, identity, and background.

Final Thoughts

Your values, beliefs, and experiences—and those of others—shape how you see difference, make decisions, and act. These influences can help or hinder the aims of equality, diversity, inclusion, and human rights in adult care settings. By encouraging reflection, open discussion, and learning, you ensure that everyone’s dignity and rights are respected in practice, not just on paper. This is central to effective leadership and to delivering person-centred care.