A Dichotomy

Lets start with a question:-

"Re SYCRC inspection report. It is confusing, commented here before, how leadership is rated outstanding and yet every aspect of case supervision is rated as inadequate or requiring improvement. Can someone explain why this keeps being the case in inspection reports? It does not seem to add up, what am I missing?"

From the inspection report:-

"The CRC has found it difficult to recruit and train qualified staff and has made the decision to deliver the Professional Qualification in Probation (PQiP) in-house, and now has 11 staff progressing through the programme."

"A minority of operational staff (16.7 full-time equivalent) are qualified probation officers. The majority of responsible officers are probation service officers, many are new to this role and some have progressed from support roles. The CRC has put in place extensive development programmes, with varying degrees of effectiveness. Emphasis has been put on performance management and quality assurance, with a dedicated team of operational assurance staff taking a leading role in supporting the quality of practice through a variety of assurance and development processes. Data from the cases examined suggests that these processes have not had the full impact intended, as the CRC has yet to audit cases against the HMI Probation standards for the quality of supervision."

"Dynamic senior leadership has driven forward change at a fast pace, supported by an effective performance management system. The organisation has made great progress in improving performance and is now meeting or exceeding all key contractual performance targets."

"Most operational staff are unqualified and require more extensive training in assessing and managing risk of harm to others." 

"Most staff have seen at least one change of manager in the past year, for a variety of reasons. Greater stability is required to make staff supervision and development more consistent and effective."

"There are too many instances where individuals under supervision experience frequent changes of supervisor, which adversely affects their engagement with services and the consistency of service delivery."

"The assessment of risk of harm to others is not good enough, and deficiencies in identifying relevant information on file, or which can be obtained from other statutory partners, result in inadequate planning and provision of interventions to keep others safe."

"Skills in analysing factors linked to offending and the effective management of risk of harm to others are not well enough understood by all practitioners."

Here's yesterday's press release:-

South Yorkshire CRC - Beginning to address problems arising from shortage of qualified probation officers

South Yorkshire Community Rehabilitation Company (CRC) was found by inspectors to have weak case supervision, with some inadequate aspects and a lack of qualified probation staff.

However, though the inspection in November and December rated the Sodexo-owned CRC as ‘Requires Improvement’ inspectors also found an outstanding leadership team which was driving improvements.

Dame Glenys Stacey, HM Chief Inspector of Probation, said: “The CRC is making significant changes to its operating model. Individuals will no longer be subject to telephone-only supervision, and leaders have taken swift action – following our findings in Sodexo’s Northumbria CRC – to improve the important work of assessing each individual subject to probation supervision.”

The rate and frequency of reoffending by people under supervision in the CRC area was found to be comparatively high. In response, Dame Glenys said, “senior leaders are working with partner agencies on a laudable initiative to prioritise resources to those who are most frequently arrested.”

The CRC, she added, “must be sure to take the right steps in these and other cases.” More accredited programmes were needed, along with interventions to improve individuals’ accommodation and employment prospects.

Inspectors identified inexperienced staff as a problem in case supervision work. The number of qualified probation officers had fallen considerably since Sodexo took ownership of the CRC in 2015.

Dame Glenys said: “Alarmingly, although individual workloads are not generally excessive, the large majority of probation staff here are not qualified, and many are not sufficiently experienced at managing risk of harm to others.

“The CRC is training staff to achieve the Professional Qualification in Probation (PQiP), and putting substantial effort into quality management but, at present, the skills gaps are reflected in the poor quality of assessment and planning work with individuals.”

The report noted that weak assessments, leading to poor planning, “often resulted in insufficient attention being given to the likelihood of individuals posing a risk of harm to others. This was made worse when information from domestic violence units or children’s social care services had not been obtained, or when contact levels had been too low to monitor individuals effectively.”

However, Dame Glenys added that more recent assessments had shown improvement. Inspectors found the CRC had recently introduced a more comprehensive assessment model.

Overall, Dame Glenys said:

“Unpaid work delivery in this CRC is good, but urgent improvements are needed to the rest of its work, and in probation supervision overall. There have been too many changes of practitioners for individuals under supervision, and those practitioners have also experienced changes in line managers. That needs to stop now, so far as possible, and leaders must concentrate on improving the skills base, and with it the quality of work delivered.”