There are many different approaches to engaging local area partners throughout a diagnostic, but the overall objective remains the same – you want to ensure that your implementation plans are informed by a wide range of stakeholders who have all had a chance to contribute and shape the outputs. In other words, you want to use the insight and expertise of these individuals to help make the right decisions. The framework below illustrates the approach taken by many local areas throughout the DBV programme:
Give as many people as possible a meaningful heads up that the diagnostic work is taking place during the initial set-up phase.
Example: where local area teams made people aware of the DBV work and sent diary invites well in advance, they were able to involve more system partners in diagnostic activities.
Give representative sub-groups of stakeholders an opportunity to meaningfully input into understanding the opportunities to improve.
Example: the views of parents, carers and education professionals through survey insights were valuable, but they can also provide a different perspective in case review workshops.
Give representative sub-groups a meaningful opportunity to understand the diagnostic outputs and contribute towards the development of the implementation plan.
Example: a workstream targeted at helping children and young people with SEMH achieve better outcomes through earlier intervention should involve partners from CAMHS and similar services in the design of it.
Context: This case study looks at the approach taken by a county council to engage parents and carers throughout the diagnostic journey. In this scenario, LA colleagues chose not to release a survey for parents and carers as part of the DBV programme, as they had already rolled out their own annual SEND survey only a few months prior. Therefore, they wanted to consider alternative approaches to ensure they could keep parents updated with the progress of the diagnostic, as well as build in their views and feedback to help shape their long-term implementation plans.
Their first contact with parents and carers was through the chair of the PCF, who they provided with a brief summary of the purpose of the diagnostic. This was distributed to all members of the PCF, alongside more information on how they could become involved in the diagnostic.
Insight from case reviews revealed that parental confidence in mainstream settings was a key barrier to achieving ideal outcomes for children and young people. To investigate this further, the local authority set up a listening forum for parents and carers with children who either had been, or still were in a mainstream setting. This gave parents the chance to share their views on the changes mainstream settings could make that would have the greatest impact on their confidence. Discussions centred around inclusivity and the time and resource required to best support their child.
To ensure that parents and carers were also part of shaping the output from the diagnostic, they were invited to participate in the LA’s implementation planning day. This was a multidisciplinary workshop focused on understanding what had changed in the last 5 years, what they can learn from it, and how they can design workstreams to address the authority’s greatest opportunities for improvement.
