Think Family – Section 2: Practitioner and Organisational Checklists

What should practitioners do?

The following checklist should be used to support practitioners in ensuring they are taking a ‘Think Family’ approach.

Ask yourself…

1  Reflecting on what parents told us in Section 1  – is this your practice?

2  Have I asked who is part of the family and do I understand family members’ roles and relationships to each other, including important people who are not a relative?

3  Do I know who else lives in the household, or has regular contact?

4  Have I considered the strengths of the family and what is working well?

5  Have I taken time to understand all the demands on the family and how they will be able to manage with the demands they face?

6  Have I considered if other family members are in need of support?

7  Have I considered if other family members are at risk?

8  Have I explored caring responsibilities, for both adults in the home and young people?

9  Have I considered domestic abuse, including patterns of coercive and controlling behaviour, and how that may play out in the dynamics of the family? Could this be affecting how the family members are presenting to professionals?

10 Do I know if other practitioners/organisations are working with the family?

11 How can I help to ensure that organisations are working together in a coordinated way, and that all professionals’ expertise is considered?

12 Have I listened to what support the family want? How has this shaped the plan?

13 Have I explored what their solutions may be?

14 Have I been open and honest about my concerns?

15 Has the family been able to engage throughout the assessment/support process, and been kept openly informed? If the family have not participated in meetings/discussions, was this justified, and/or are there barriers to the family participating that need to be explored?

16 Have I taken my concerns to supervision?

What should organisations and leaders do?

Think Family requires organisations to embed this approach into practice. To support this embedding, consider the following questions:

1  Are the ‘Think Family’ principles embedded within your organisation’s policies, practice standards, tools and training?

2  How do practitioners in your organisations know about ‘Think Family’ and use it in the services they provide?

3  Are managers knowledgeable and skilled to reflect on ‘Think Family’ approaches in their supervision with practitioners?

4  Are you listening to families and practitioners, seeking their regular feedback in order to improve practice?

5  Does your organisation’s processes and templates (for e.g. risk assessments, support plans) enable practitioners to work flexibly to apply a ‘Think Family’ approach? Do you have procedures that help to minimise the effects of staff turn-over?

Go back to the previous section Think Family – Section 1: What is ‘Think Family’