9.2 Supervision and Management of Staff

Chapter 3 of Working Together to Safeguard Children sets out the arrangements organisations should have to safeguard and promote the welfare of children. These include the requirement of employers to provide ‘appropriate supervision and support for staff to ensure that staff are:

• Competent to carry out their responsibilities for safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children
• Working in an environment where they feel able to raise concerns
• Feel supported in their safeguarding role
• Familiar with the processes and procedures to follow if they have concerns about a child’s safety or welfare; and
• Have opportunities for their practice to be regularly reviewed to ensure they improve over time.
• Critical reflection through supervision to strengthen analysis.

Effective supervision is important to promote good standards of practice.

Lead practitioners should have access to high quality supervision. Effective supervision can play a critical role in ensuring a clear focus on a child’s welfare and support practitioners to reflect critically on the impact of their decisions on the child and their family. All lead practitioners should also continue to receive appropriate supervision and support for continuing professional development and to maintain professional registration, where appropriate, within their existing line management arrangements.

Working to ensure children are protected from harm requires sound professional judgements to be made. It is demanding work that can be distressing and stressful. All of those involved should have access to advice and support from, for example, peers, managers, named and designated professionals.

Supervision can be delivered as regular one to one meetings, catch-ups/ad hoc, 1:1s, group supervision (single and multi-agency) and peer supervision.

Those providing supervision should be trained in supervision skills and have an up to date knowledge of the legislation, policy and research relevant to safeguarding and promoting children's welfare. Effective supervision will create a culture of safety, equality, and protection within their organisation/service.

The Equality Act 2010 puts a responsibility on public authorities to have due regard to the need to eliminate discrimination and promote equality of opportunity

See also Underlying Policy, Principles and Values.  

The arrangements for how supervision is organised and delivered will vary from agency to agency, but all agencies should ensure:

• They have in place easy to use standard templates
• There are clear recording mechanisms, including decisions made in supervision being recorded on case files immediately
• The use of a contract/agreement/policy on supervision
• An internal escalation process is in place where there are disagreements that cannot be resolved within supervision
• Evaluation and action; there will be a process for capturing feedback and responding; and
• The model of supervision used will fit the context and organisation

Supervision should:

• Help to ensure that safeguarding practice is competent, accountable and based on evidence, and consistent with local and pan Sussex Safeguarding Children Partnership and organisational policies and procedures
• Ensure that practitioners fully understand their roles, responsibilities and the scope of their professional discretion and authority
• Help identify the training and development needs of practitioners
• Provide a thinking space for practitioners where reflection, scrutiny and evaluation of safeguarding work can take place
• Asist in creating a culture of safety, equality, and protection within their organisation/service.

With respect to individual cases, safeguarding supervision helps practitioners to keep a focus on the child’s needs, the risks posed by adults (or other children), to avoid delay in action, to maintain objectivity and to address the emotional impact of the work.

Good quality supervision can help to:

• Avoid drift
• Keep a focus on the child
• Maintain a degree of objectivity and challenge fixed views
• Test and assess the evidence base for assessment and decisions
• Address the emotional impact of work.

The Safeguarding Children Partnership is responsible for ensuring the overall provision of a robust safeguarding supervision process across all partners and will monitor this through a variety of mechanisms, including:

• The Section 11 self-assessment audit
• Casefile audits
• Relevant actions arising from local child safeguarding practice reviews.