‘And I Say, “Yes” Because I Want to Help’—Social Workers’ Reflections on Practice in Ireland During COVID-19

This chapter presents the findings of empirical research that gathered the practice insights of social workers, such as Ava quoted above, who were working in statutory child protection services in Ireland during the COVID-19 global pandemic. We designed the study as a practice research project. We gathered data on the experiences of ten frontline social workers in child protection and welfare services in different regions in Ireland via qualitative interviews and reflective diaries. We used a constructivist grounded theory approach to collate and analyse the data to develop a new conceptualisation of social work practice in Ireland during the pandemic, grounded in the experiences and perspectives of the research participants. We identify and discuss a core concept of ‘connection’ and its disparate variations, namely disconnection and reconnection. The findings of this study demonstrate the practice of person-centredness in social work. We also found that all participants seemed to value connection with their team, particularly during the pandemic, whether through realising its absence or through its provision of resilience.