Supporting Dorset Council’s children’s services to strengthen their use of the conversational model in their front door
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Transforming the front door to children's social care
We help improve outcomes for children and families by transforming how Local Authorities work with their partners from the very first point of contact.
Local authorities and their safeguarding partners face real challenges to deliver children's services centred around the needs of children and families.
The Families First Partnership (FFP) programme aims to create an opportunity to refocus local safeguarding ecosystems towards more effective early intervention. A key element of that will be ensuring that meaningful conversations to take place at the front door to children's services, centred around the needs of children and their families.
We have supported UK Local Authorities to transform their front door, helping them adapt how they work with their partners at the first point of contact. We've helped them adopt a conversational approach that enables teams to focus on helping the right children at the right time.
Overview of the programme
An effective front door is fundamental to good social work practice and achieving good outcomes for children and families.
Combining user research, service design and social work practice, we help social care and safeguarding teams redesign how they work with partners and how referrals flow through the system. The model improves social work decision-making at the front door, so families get the right support they need at the right time.
Our approach is shaped by the work and research of Professor David Thorpe, who has implemented the Transforming the Front Door model within social work teams in the UK and Australia, including teams in Bradford, Darlington, Kirklees, Leeds, London Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham, Manchester, Norfolk, and Oldham.
This research has been formalised into a 12-month programme of discovery, service design, training and data analysis.
It introduces and embeds a conversational approach at the front door, transforms how teams work as collaborative partners with other agencies, and controls how referrals come into social services.
We have expanded David Thorpe's model to support multidisciplinary front door teams, adapted to suit the local authority's context and needs. This includes working with family workers, family support advisors, and family advice line workers.
An evidence-based approach
The Transforming the Front Door approach involves:
- Reviewing how the front door currently works through ethnographic user research with social workers.
- Redesigning referral pathways and processes to simplify the front door and ensure the right help is provided at the right time.
- Training and coaching front door teams in conversational techniques and high quality partnership working.
- Data analysis, monitoring and evaluation to track the impact and ensure it the approach is being delivered consistently and sustainably.
Professor Thorpe's model is backed by two decades of published research evidence. It has reduced social work referrals on an average of 30%, reduced social work caseloads, staff turnover, and statutory interventions including the number of children in care.
The approach has been reviewed and validated in multiple Ofsted inspections and its impact in Darlington was cited in the 2022 MacAlister Review.
Impact
- Quality of referrals
It improves the quality of referrals into social work, enabling all partners to better respond to children and families’ needs.
- Stronger partnerships
It embeds true, proactive and collaborative partnership working to achieve the best outcomes for children and families.
- Reduced caseloads
It reduces social worker caseloads by up to 30%, allowing them to focus on proactive work with children and families who need their support.
- Reduced interventions
It has been proven to reduce the number of Looked After children and Child Protection Plan, by giving the right support at the right time and preventing children drifting into care.
Meet the team
MacAlister Independent Review of Children’s Social Care, May 2022
"Having direct conversations with social workers at the front door helps partners become more effective and confident in their decision making about how best to help families.
Children and families are now more likely to receive the most appropriate intervention at first contact, meaning they are better supported."
