Strengths-based social care: Children, young people and families

All practitioners and organisations involved in providing interventions to children and young people and their families need to possess a shared set of values that underpin SBAs. This includes:

• recognising and building upon people’s strengths, capabilities and connections
• recognising people’s rights and enabling them to take and share responsibility and accountability
• sharing power, resources and knowledge to effectively co-produce with individuals and families
• the need for humility, personal and organisational self-reflection
• embracing a learning culture
• commitment to building longer-lasting and more personal relationships with children and young people and their families
• a renewed focus on inequality and tackling institutionalised discrimination against minority groups
• courage and perseverance, and a willingness to embed these values in everyday practice.

Implications for practice

• All language included in guidance and tools must be reviewed to reflect strengths-based values, e.g. emphasising ‘time with family’ rather than ‘family contact’.
• Human resources should be guided by values-based recruitment to ensure that organisations are able to build a sustainable SBA. Attitudes, and behaviours such as compassion and humility should be assessed as well, and recruitment should be user-led. For example, in Islington, people who use services are on every panel and use motivational interviewing.
• It is not just the council that is responsible for the outcomes of children and young people and their families: every agency has a part to play. A commitment to the above values should therefore pervade through all agencies and partners if they are to work effectively towards the goals

SBAs are grounded in all the practitioners and organisations involved sharing the same vision. This includes being clear about why an SBA is being adopted and what its aims and objectives are. This creates not only a shared ethos, both within and between agencies and workers, but also makes innovation more likely.

Additionally, SBAs are often underpinned by a particular evidence-based theory, a set of good practice principles, often as part of a model or framework. It is such models and frameworks that shape the way social workers operate, in their work and in their critical thinking and decision-making.

Furthermore, adhering to a theory or framework results in a shared understanding of the aims and outcomes of interventions and what good practice looks like. It also places clear expectations on all the people involved, including practitioners, managers and other agencies or organisations. This ensures that families get a more consistent experience and that social workers and other practitioners are working in a similar way. Finally, this shared understanding provides a common language for discussing practice, issues and solutions.

In order to embed SBAs in the fabric of organisations, leadership should aim to be clear, visible and strong, and model strengths-based behaviours and organisational change. This means working alongside frontline staff to ensure learning through practice. Given that SBAs reflect very different ways to working than those organisations are typically used to, leadership should also be courageous. What this means is that organisations need leaders who aren’t afraid to push boundaries and make room for innovation, who change the conversation, who re-imagine safeguarding, risk and liability, who recognise that investment in new approaches takes money and time, and who appreciate but are also not tethered by national targets.

Additionally, leadership needs to exist at every level and across all agencies and partners – system leadership and engagement of senior management is critical. For example, the evaluation of the first wave of the Children’s Social Care Innovation programme reported that projects that indicated good progress usually benefited from strong, consistent leadership and this was thought to have been crucial to bringing about improvements in care.

New ways of working require a commitment to building the confidence and skills that practitioners need to work effectively with children and young people and their families.

This includes:

• a stronger focus on listening, hearing, reflection and empathy
• facilitation and mediation in group settings
• co-productive practices with organisations, children and young people and their families
• story-telling in order to create a clear vision of people’s lives, including their strengths, experiences, needs and concerns
• the application and understanding of social pedagogy which is underpinned by the idea that each person has inherent potential, is valuable, resourceful and can make a meaningful contribution to their wider community
• community building and development, and encouraging and implementing peer support.

In fact, many of the projects employing SBAs in the Children’s Social Care Innovation programme specifically aimed to develop the skills of practitioners. Several evaluations found that these projects were successful in increasing professional confidence and skills. For example, social workers in the 10 SoS pilots reported that training gave them confidence in using SoS and its tools, and developed their skills in identifying and managing risk and communicating better with children and young people. Additionally, skills development should be embedded as part of an overall strategy, including other factors such as organisational culture, a shared practice framework and management expectations.

It is crucial that relationships with children and young people and their families are at the centre of support, with a focus on the needs of families and not on the limitations of services. Providing more intensive and consistent support to children and young people and their families not only improves outcomes but also improves their experience of the process, in which they work with a single person and build strong relationships over time. Such an approach also tends to increase family engagement. This was a key common feature of successful projects using SBAs in the Children’s Social Care Innovation programme in that it provided increased time for direct contact with children and young people and their families. A number of projects noted improved relationships between families and social workers.

Similarly, practitioners should possess an immersive and in-depth knowledge of their communities. This means having greater knowledge of community resources, social capital and networks, as well as prevailing issues and concerns. Cultural competence is also important – practitioners who are well aware of and attuned to a family’s culture are better able to build trusting relationships and have nuanced conversations about sensitive issues.

Practitioners who are delivering SBAs should be well supported by managers and colleagues. Effective management and supervision is also important and can be approached in many ways, as demonstrated by numerous projects employing SBAs in the Children’s Social Care Innovation programme. For example, specific training and development of supervisory managers and the employment of consultant social workers or clinicians to provide high-quality support for practitioners.

Team cultures should also create a supportive environment where practitioners feel safe to take risks and work innovatively. For example, they should seek to provide a combination of support, compassion and challenge within the team culture and also within its practice. More specifically, constructive challenge should aim to create change, identify potentially missed opportunities and build confidence, and not undermine staff or create an oppressive environment:

“We need to be happy to be challenged in our jobs. We all like challenge in other aspects of our life, and should look forward to challenge when we are practising.”

SCIE seminar participant

Collecting, sharing and having access to data is key to ensuring that decision-making is appropriately informed and that outcomes of change are accurately measured. Similarly, using an evidence base to inform the development of interventions provides experience of what is needed to maintain fidelity within the model or framework that is being adopted. The evaluation of the Innovation programme reported that seven projects included a review of research at the outset due to a lack of evidence in specific key areas of children’s social care.

The Growing Futures programme in Doncaster was established in 2015 to improve outcomes for children and young people and their families, particularly those who had experienced domestic violence and abuse (DVA).

The design of the programme was very much in line with the key principles of SBAs.

• A multi-disciplinary team including 12 domestic abuse navigators (DANs) was employed to work with families, with each family working with one key DAN worker who provided intensive support and built trust and confidence.
• Opportunities for skills development were provided in the form of a leadership course for leaders, a masters course for practitioners and mentoring training for relevant professionals from other services.
• Management worked to embed a transformative whole-family approach towards tackling DVA.

Positive impact on families, social workers and multi-agency working

Families reported significant benefits, including feeling as if their wishes and concerns were listened to, that practical advice and support was provided and that they had a greater level of trust in their DAN, compared to previous experiences of social workers. As one family member commented:

“[She] has been more giving us, like, solutions to, you know, if you think there’s an incident about to happen, or you feel that you are getting frustrated, type thing. She’s shown us other different ways we can go about dealing with it.”

Social workers also reported multiple benefits of working with DANs in a whole-family model. These included more uniform and consistent completion of risk assessments for DVA and better engagement between families and services. As one social worker commented:

“I’ve got to say, I think what’s made my job easier is [the DAN] doing all that work with the DVA, because obviously I have experience in DVA but not to her level.”

Multi-agency working was given a specific boost by the development of a whole-family approach, which centred on services coordinating to provide support and therapeutic input to perpetrators, victims and children.

In Shared Lives, a young person or adult who needs support or a place to live moves in with or regularly visits an approved Shared Lives carer. Together, they share family and community life. Shared Lives has always been a service available to adults, but in recent years this has extended to include people from the age of 16. Transition to adult social care can be challenging practically, mentally and emotionally. Transition is often referred to as ‘the cliff edge’, where many services end and young people are transferred to new social work teams, health care providers, support services, and third-sector organisations that play a role in helping to maintain a happy, healthy life.

The rationale behind accessing Shared Lives from 16 or 17 is to provide a baseline of stability, to develop a safe home environment and establish trusting relationships as a source of support and stability throughout these major transitions. The values and principles of how Shared Lives works are relevant for people of all ages, but seem especially relevant to young people in transition. The opportunity to be part of a family and social network in young adulthood sets a young person up for the road ahead.

Shared Lives carers use their family home as a resource, so young people access their support in a very normal home and family environment like their peers. This provides committed and consistent relationships and reduces the risk of young people feeling like a burden or a ‘job’. The relationship between the Shared Lives carer and the young person is one of mutual benefit. Shared Lives carers want to be present in a young person’s life; they want the young person to be present in theirs. It is a shared life.

Paul’s story

Paul is a young man who first accessed Shared Lives aged 17. Joe is his Shared Lives carer.

Paul has been living with Joe and his wife for the past eight years. He celebrated his 18th birthday with his Shared Lives family.

Joe says: “Paul was our second placement. At the time, our own children were 15 and 16 so it was really important that whoever moved in with us was compatible.”

Paul’s introduction to Joe was an initial day visit, where they went to a fair together.

Joe recalls: “Paul won one of the prizes at the raffle and ended up going on stage. Then we had a weekend together and the rest is history.”

When Paul moved in he needed a high level of practical support and personal care, including assistance washing, brushing his teeth and shaving, help to go to bed and to complete his night-time routine. Eight years on, Paul’s skills around independence and self-care have developed significantly.

“Paul now chooses his clothes, he’ll shave, shower, get dressed and come down by himself. None of that was possible when he came.”

Joe

Paul shared what it’s been like: “Now I’m more independent, I feel good. I do my shower, my dress, my own teeth, my own clothes, the whole thing is fine and I keep doing fine.”

The personal development of people in Shared Lives is not isolated to the person that comes to stay.

Joe explains: “My wife comes from a social work background whereas I do not, so initially, relating to Paul’s needs was difficult, hearing about his background was very different to being hands on and actually as the months went on, our roles reversed and I ended up being the main Shared Lives carer. We had a 60th birthday party for me four years ago. My children were asked to say something about me, nobody did and guess who did? Paul. He said what a wonderful chap I was in front of everyone. I was in tears. Although my children aren’t saying anything, this man did.”

Looking at this example of Shared Lives, you can see the spectrum of the ordinary and the extraordinary. From learning how to shave, to giving a speech on behalf of your Shared Lives family.

On how it’s been supporting someone at the age of transition, Joe says: “It’s been different seeing someone growing up to be an adult; it’s a totally different experience. You change your whole perspective on how you address the situation.”

On what the experience has been like from Paul’s perspective, he says: “I’ve been with my family for eight years and I’m happy. They’re my whole world, my whole life.”

The Leeds Family Valued project was an ambitious system change and expansion programme and included:

• awareness-raising and ‘deep dive’ training to embed restorative practice (RP) across the workforce for children, families and communities
• the expansion of family group conferences (FGCs) to more families including those affected by domestic violence.

The essence of restorative practices is that human beings are happier, more productive and more likely to make positive changes in their behaviour when those in positions of authority do things with them, rather than to them or for them.

Impact on the RP system

The training programme met its target number of participants. This included 5,913 awareness-raising attendees expected by end of 2016 and 1,392 ‘deep dive’ attendees. The training was generally very highly rated. As one participant commented:

‘It has helped me to ask questions in a more open way, or with a more friendly tone, instead of maybe an accusatory manner … it has been very successful … I’ve noticed that children have been a lot more open and honest with me.’

Participant

There was also a reduction in child in need (CiN) cases for the six clusters targeted of 6.5 per cent, which was statistically significant to a 1.2 per cent reduction across all clusters.

Impact of expansion of FGCs

There was a highly successful expansion of the FGC service with an overall 395 families progressing to an FGC in 2015–16. This represented an unprecedented scale of delivery. Additionally, outcomes indicated that social work involvement decreased for families who had an FGC.

There were also positive outcomes with families, with 99 per cent of 54 parents/carers reporting that they felt their FGC had helped to address their problems. Moreover, 100 per cent felt involved in the process and that their values had been respected. As one participant commented:

‘You get your views heard and everyone gets their chance to put their point across and everyone gets listened to. It was really, really, positive for us all.’

Mother in case study

Wigan Council is being supported by Innovation Unit to implement the ‘Deal for Children and Young People’, a new asset-based service for those in care or at the edge of care who need help and protection.

They have been inspired by their Innovation Programme projects Achieving Change Together (ACT) – which seeks to tackle child sexual exploitation – and the Specialist Health and Resilient Environment (SHARE) service, which provides extension of support and services for young people at risk. This approach has also been informed and inspired by North Yorkshire’s ‘No Wrong Door’ innovation which provides integrated care to young people in care or at the edge of care.

The service includes a ‘hub’ approach focused on early intervention and prevention, where the ‘hub’ is a multi agency team rather than a physical place. This multi-agency, co-located team sits under one management structure and provides support for the young people and practitioners who work with them – responding to both therapeutic and professional needs.

The design of the service embraces an asset-based approach by:

• starting with young people’s experiences in care by designing the service based on the experiences of a small group of eight young people in care
• co-designing at all levels, including: a weekly young people’s steering group; bi-weekly steering groups involving frontline staff, managers and senior leaders; large-scale events including partner agencies; a dedicated programme board; and engagement with foster carers.

The project is still in its developmental stage and shows much promise. To date the work has included: three new hub teams established; 30 innovation and co-design workshops; and 300 people engaged in the project including council staff members, partners, young people and carers.

Halton Borough Council was one of six local authority areas that took part in Phase 2 of the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) Named Social Worker (NSW) pilot between October 2017 and March 2018. The pilot aimed to build an understanding of how having an NSW can contribute to individuals with learning disabilities achieving better outcomes. Halton saw the NSW as an opportunity to explore and test new ways of working around transition and to reduce the number of young people reaching crisis point through an earlier intervention approach. The aims were to:

• help young people and families to understand what works already (and what doesn’t) in order to develop a new approach to working with young people who are often seen as the most challenging and who often end up in out-of-area residential placements
• work with young people and those who support them to develop plans that are true to the strengths and needs of individuals and that help them to thrive within their communities
• support social workers to reflect together on their practice and develop a better understanding of the skills and behaviours that enable relational working
• build on a strong foundation of integrated health and social care services in order to ensure that future planning is seamless.

The approach

The transition team NSWs took a proactive approach to working with young people, working alongside the children’s health nurses and schools to identify the young people who needed support the most and prioritising them for intense intervention. They also worked closely with a local advocacy agency, Bright Sparks, to understand what ‘good transition’ looked like from the young people’s perspective and to produce tools to help engage them.

The impact

• Young people and the people around them developed a positive relationship with their NSW outside a period of crisis. They learned about the transition process earlier than they would have in a ‘business as usual’ model. They had the opportunity and time to feed their own views into person-centred plans for the future. This reduced anxiety around transition and improved the quality of their care packages.
• NSWs reported an increase in confidence around the knowledge, skills and values required to do good social work with young people with learning disabilities. They were motivated by the opportunity to put these skills into action.
• Partners across the system, including children’s social services, advocacy agencies and health teams were engaged with and fed into the process, creating a place-based approach to transition in Halton. This has raised awareness of the need for a strengths-based and early-intervention approach to transitions.
• The new packages of care, based on the young people’s needs and preferences (particularly those who have seen reductions to respite packages and changes to residential settings) led to some significant financial savings (or costs avoided) for the local authority.

• Directors and assistant directors of services should demonstrate strong, visible leadership while modelling strengths-based behaviours and adopting strengths-based values to motivate staff.
• They should be willing to lead on culture change – push boundaries, re-imagine risk, safeguarding and liability, invest in new approaches that may take time to demonstrate outcomes and ensure that organisations have the systems and processes in place to facilitate culture change.
• Investment in and commitment to multi-agency working and negotiating data sharing across services and organisations is also imperative.

• Heads of services also play a key role in leading and modelling strengths-based behaviours and values. More specifically, they should provide practitioners with the support and supervision they need in order to effectively perform their duties.
• Similarly, they should provide practitioners with the skills and confidence they need to work in strengths-based ways. This can include training, coaching, co-working, performance management and permission to take risks and innovate.

• Frontline practitioners should embrace strengths-based values and learn new skills such as listening, empathy, story-telling, reflection, facilitation and collaboration in order to build knowledge of communities and trust within them.
• They should also be committed to co-production with children and young people and their families, appreciating that people are experts in their own lives and can take the lead in developing solutions. This includes a significant re-imagining of the practitioner’s role, where they are willing to share power, resources and knowledge.
• They should have in-depth and immersive knowledge of their communities as well as the cultural competence needed to build trusting relationships.

• Partner organisations such as voluntary and community sector providers and wider services such as the police, youth offending teams, and drug and alcohol teams should work together with social care practitioners to co-develop solutions and provide practitioners with the support and expertise they need.
• They should also be open to sharing data and evidence to ensure a holistic picture of issues and concerns.

1. Department for Education (2018) Seven features of practice and seven outcomes, London: DfE and Spring Consortium.
2. SCIE (2015) Care Act 2014, Strengths-based approaches
3. Munro, E. (2011) The Munro review of child protection: final report – a child-centred system, Cm 8062, London: DfE.
4. Department for Education (2014) Rethinking children’s social work – Department for Education Children’s Social Care Innovation programme, London: DfE.
5. Rees Centre (2017) Children’s social care innovation programme: final evaluation report, London: DfE.
6. Cormac, R. (2016) Nurture development: taking a strengths based approach to young people – moving from ‘at risk’ to ‘at promise’
7. Signs of Safety website

• Children’s Innovation Programme website
• Department of Health (2017) Strengths-based social work practice with adults: roundtable report, London: DfE.
• Department for Education (2018) Learning from the Department for Education’s Children’s Social Care Innovation programme. Learning summary 3: implementing systemic models of social work, London: DfE and Spring Consortium.
• FamilyCare (2013) ‘Working with children, young people and their family: a practice philosophy guide’, Australia: FamilyCare.
• Hammond, W. and Zimmerman, R. (2012) ‘A strengths based perspective’, Canada: Resiliency initiatives.
• A system wide approach to innovation: asset based children’s services with Wigan Council
• Leeds City Council (2018) ‘Findings from strength-to-strength seminar’, Leeds: Leeds City Council.
• Mason, P. et al. (2017) Leeds family valued: evaluation report. Children’s Social Care Innovation programme report 43, London: DfE.
• McCracken, K. et al. (2017) Evaluation of growing futures: research report. Children’s Social Care Innovation programme report 29, London: DfE.
• McNeish, D. et al. (2017) What have we learned about good social work systems and practice? Children’s Social Care Innovation programme: thematic report 1, Oxford: DfE.
• NSPCC (2014) Solution focused practice: a toolkit for working with children and young people, NSPCC.
• Queensland Government (2013) ‘Engaging with families: practice paper’, Australia: Queensland Government.
• Sebaa, J. et al. (2017a) ‘Informing better decisions through use of data in children’s social care. Children’s Social Care Innovation programme: thematic report 4’, Oxford: DfE.
• Sebaa, J. et al. (2017b) Systemic conditions for innovation in children’s social care. Children’s Social Care Innovation programme: thematic report 5, Oxford: DfE.
• Social Care Institute of Excellence (2015) Co-production in social care: what it is and how to do it, London: SCIE.
• Social Care Institute of Excellence (2015) Strengths-based approaches.
• Social Care Institute of Excellence (2017) Asset-based places: a model for development, London: SCIE.
• Social Care Institute of Excellence (2018) ‘Findings from seminar on delivering a strengths-based approach to children and families’ social work’, London: SCIE.

The Social Care Institute for Excellence improves the lives of people of all ages by co-producing, sharing, and supporting the use of the best available knowledge and evidence about what works.

We have a national reputation for supporting evidence-informed improvement to social care. We are currently helping to set up the What Works Centre for Children’s Social Care and are coaching Department for Education Innovation Programme projects. We have a nationally recognised and widely-used Learning Together model for safeguarding reviews and audits.

We understand the challenges facing children’s social care and use evidence, a systems approach and co-production with children, young people and families to help organisations find solutions.

Evidence-informed practice

We draw on evidence to help organisations design, commission and deliver better children’s social care. We conduct best practice scopes, research reviews and evaluations to produce learning to help organisations and systems improve.

Co-production

Co-production is a way of working that involves children, young people and families, and adults in equal partnership; and which engages them at the earliest stages of service design, development and evaluation. We can help develop and design national and local co-production arrangements with people from all backgrounds to support change.

Systems approach

We apply a rigorous systems approach to help organisations and their multi-agency partners review performance, practice systems and direct practice and identify ways forward.

Shared Lives Plus is the UK network for family-based and small-scale ways of supporting adults. Our members are Shared Lives carers and workers, and Homeshare programmes. Shared Lives used to be known as Adult Placement.

A compassionate, economically strong and successful city has children and young people at its heart. From the influential first years of life through a child’s education to the care and love they receive growing up – these are the things that shape us and our communities. Our ambition is for Leeds to be the best city for all our children and young people to grow up in. Child Friendly Leeds is the initiative for everyone who shares this ambition, from enthusiastic individuals to large organisations, every contribution counts and we can all play our part in making a difference.

Leeds City Council’s children’s social care services are rated good and they are part of the Partners in Practice Programme, which aims to bring together the best practitioners and leaders in children’s social care to improve the system.

Child Friendly Leeds

• Appreciative inquiry: a change management approach that focuses on identifying what is working well, analysing why it is working well and then doing more of it.
• Asset mapping: a process for gathering information about the strengths and resources of a community – can help uncover solutions.
• Co-production: people who use services and carers working with professionals in equal partnerships towards shared goals.
• Family group conferencing: a process in which families can meet to find solutions to problems that they and their children are facing, within a professionally supportive framework. It involves all family members, friends and other adults who the family feel can contribute to making plans for the children.
• Local area coordination: innovative approach to supporting people with disabilities, mental health needs and older people (and their families/carers) to achieve their vision for a good life, to support people to be part of and contribute to their communities and to strengthen the capacity of communities to welcome and include people.
• Restorative practice: a way of working with conflict that puts the focus on repairing the harm that has been done. It is an approach to conflict resolution that includes all of the parties involved.
• Signs of Safety: strengths-based, safety-organised approach to child protection casework. Starting in Australia, the model asks ‘what works well with difficult cases?’
• Social pedagogy: concerned with wellbeing, learning and growth. It is underpinned by the idea that each person has inherent potential, is valuable, resourceful and can make a meaningful contribution to their wider community if we find ways of including them.