03 QUALITY INDICATORS, KEY FACTORS, ILLUSTRATIONS & POSSIBLE EVIDENCE
AREA FOR EVALUATION 1 - WHAT KEY OUTCOMES HAVE WE ACHIEVED?
Role in the PIM
Here, you gather evidence about the real difference and benefits that social work services have made to the lives of individuals, families, and communities.
Measuring outcomes accurately remains a significant challenge for all social work services. The questions, prompts and sources of evidence in this section suggest some pointers that may help you to form a view, but to answer these effectively you will need to have defined the outcomes you want each service to achieve, and to have the relevant performance management and quality assurance systems in place to evidence how well you are doing.
PERFORMANCE IMPROVEMENT MODEL ( PIM)
AREA FOR EVALUATION 1 - KEY OUTCOMES FOR PEOPLE WHO USE SERVICES AND THEIR CARERS
Quality Indicator 1.1: Outcomes for adults, carers, children and families who use services
Key Factors | Key Questions to Ask | Possible Evidence |
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- The local authority enables adults and children to achieve the best possible social outcomes in terms of independence, overcoming barriers to inclusion, living law-abiding lives, and developing their abilities.
- There are effective outcomes for people who use the local authority's services and their carers, as evidenced by other inspection bodies such as the Care Commission, HMIe, and NHSQIS.
- The service has defined key outcomes for all its services, including those delivered in partnerships, and has systems in place to measure these.
| To what extent can we show that: - we are clear about what outcomes we want our services to deliver?
- we do outcome-led assessments and interventions rather than service-led ones?
- we can tell if people are getting the benefits from our services that we want them to?
Other questions: - What targets in relation to outcomes for people who use services have we achieved or not achieved?
- How do we compare with other similar local authorities?
| - strategies and policies that set out the outcomes that the service intends to deliver;
- completed questionnaires, surveys of people who use services and carers where these contain evidence of outcomes;
- focus groups of people who use services and carers where these contain evidence of outcomes;
- audit of files to identify evidence about outcomes achieved;
- peer reviews;
- benchmarking;
- examples of services which have improved in relation to promoting personal choice or control, independence and social inclusion;
- measurement of positive change in social circumstances;
- measurement of positive change in attitudes, reducing anti-social behaviours.
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Quality Indicator 1.2: Performance against national and local targets
Key Factors | Key Questions to Ask | Possible Evidence |
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- Performance against national standards and targets, e.g. National Standards for Foster Care or National Standards for Criminal Justice Social Work.
- Performance against local targets and objectives (these may show the local authority and its partners working towards achieving national targets or having exceeded them).
| To what extent can we show that: - we place good outcomes at the centre of what we do?
- we compare our performance with other similar local authorities?
- we have set targets for outcomes and we have met these?
Other questions: - What measures do we use for outcomes for people who use services?
- How well do we perform in relation to SWIA's core data set of outcome performance indicators?
- What trends do the measures show?
| - evidence from performance management systems;
- evidence from external scrutiny;
- evidence from national statistics;
- audit of files to identify evidence about outcomes achieved;
- peer reviews;
- benchmarking;
- current use of, and trends in, self directed support, including direct payments;
- data about reconviction rates.
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