Participation in multi-agency working

Parents, carers and families are important partners in the development and delivery of multi-agency services. Encouraging them to participate can help ensure that:

• A service is developed which reflects local needs and hopes

• People access the service - either for themselves or for their children

• You develop a partnership approach in which you will be able to draw more easily on the knowledge and support of parents when carrying out work with their children

There are opportunities to involve families and the local community in three key phases of planning and delivering a multi-agency service:

• In consultation and planning

• In service delivery

• As service users

Participation in consultation and planning

Parental involvement is one of the key principles of Sure Start programmes. Evaluationshows that they have used the following techniques to help this happen:

• Use the expertise of the voluntary sector in engaging with parents and carers.
• Talk to parents in daycare centres and outside schools to let them know about the service and to hand out short surveys seeking their input.
• Hold 'fun' events rather than business-oriented meetings, which tend to attract fewer people. The downside is that the informal structure of these events can make it difficult to discuss service details. However, they do provide the opportunity to make an important first contact.
• Avoid 'consultation fatigue' by trying to demonstrate at an early stage how their input is making a difference to the way that the service is being developed.

Consultation may reach many people, though sometimes not in any great depth. More information and input can be gained if community members are directly involved in service planning. This can take a number of forms:

Parent forums: Some services set up 'parent forums' to oversee and comment on different aspects of the development process. This helps provide a formal structure for the voice of parents and carers to be heard. It can also be less daunting for parents and carers if they are working in a group with others in a similar situation.

Parent representatives on working groups: Often, working groups are established to look at different aspects of service development. Parent representatives are key members, to ensure that services meet community needs. Remember to bear their needs in mind when setting up and holding meetings - for example:

• Hold the meeting at a time they are available.
• Do not use practitioner jargon.
• Make the group inclusive and ensure that all members feel that their views are important.

In some cases, parent representatives may find training helpful in giving them the techniques and confidence to understand and represent the views of others.

Participation in service delivery

There are two main ways for community members to get involved in service delivery:

Involvement in governance: Many programmes and projects involve parents, carers and other community representatives in their governance, usually as a member of the steering group. An evaluation in 2002 estimated that up to 10% of Sure Start local partnerships have a parent chair and up to 30% rotate the chair, so that parent representatives will at some point hold the chair. In many cases, parents are involved in interviewing and selecting the service manager and other key staff.

Working for the service: Parents and carers can be a valuable resource, bringing energy and commitment while at the same time developing valuable employment skills themselves. 

Other examples of involvement include:

• Volunteering to assist in some aspects of the programme, for example support with reading
• Drawing on particular skills and talents, for example poster design or fundraising
• Being recruited as an outreach worker or parent liaison worker, as a first step to developing a qualification within the children's workforce

Participation as service users

Parents and carers have a profound impact on children and young people's well-being, so ideally they will be key partners in any work to support children and young people with additional needs. Engaging with parents and carers is resource intensive - but not engaging them can be wasteful, because families are unlikely to take up any service provision that they feel has been imposed on them.

To get people engaged as service users, evaluations of  Sure Start, extended schools pathfinders and On Track suggest the following: 

• Make sure that parents and carers know about the service:
  - use the links that health visitors, midwives and teachers have with children, young people and their families
  - disseminate leaflets and membership forms around local amenities and services such as grocery stores, nurseries and GPs
  - host one-off community events, such as fun days (for example Easter egg hunts, 'balloon days', picnics, Christmas parties and summer 'beach' parties)
  - organise leisure trips for interested community members
  - organise a formal outreach programme to get your message to more vulnerable and marginalised families
  - organise 'door knocking campaigns' where you involve all staff in going from house to house to tell people about the service. This has been used effectively in some Sure Start programmes. 
• Ensure your site is open, warm and welcoming. In communities where a number of community languages are spoken, try to ensure that staff or linked practitioners can communicate in these languages.
• Get the right people in community link roles, in particular those who can show empathy with or have first-hand knowledge of the community.
• Ensure that services meet the individual needs of the children, young people and families you serve, including children and young people with disabilities. These needs will vary between families and over time. This means offering a variety of ways for parents and carers to be involved in the service and influence what is on offer. Outreach, home visiting and drop-ins can provide a non-threatening gateway to other more specialist services.
• Show evidence of the way in which parental involvement has influenced the development and delivery of the service.
• Link with other agencies and ask them to help promote the service. Ask local organisations if you can hand out leaflets on their premises or at their events. Or set up arrangements for them to refer their own users to your service.
• Consider strategic use of local media to promote awareness of the service.

Meeting the needs of a diverse community

The national evaluation of Sure Start highlights the considerable challenges facing multi-agency services seeking to overcome unequal access to services for minority ethnic groups. The evaluation highlighted the following effective practice:

• Managers in multi-agency services, mainstream agencies and other community initiatives need to share knowledge and experiences. This may help minimise the risk of inadvertently overlooking need or aggravating existing tensions between ethnic groups.
• The involvement of male workers can often pay dividends in terms of involving fathers from the community, as can demonstrating a serious commitment to the inclusion of fathers and male carers.
• To reach the most people possible, services should not only be delivered during office hours. More diverse delivery patterns will maximise the chances of involving working parents.

Involving children and young people is also an important feature of effective multi-agency service delivery. Click to read more about the participation of children and young people.