Category: News

Triangle to launch new editions of the Family Star Plus and Family Star, April 2023

Posted on by Donna

We are delighted to announce we have now finalised the new editions of the Family Star Plus and Family Star.

In April 2023, these new editions will be replacing the current editions on the Star Online.

What has changed?

The new editions have the same outcome areas and Journey of Change. The changes are to the language and resources to:

For example:

  • The top of the Journey of Change is now ‘managing well’
  • 8 is more clearly the end point for families with extra needs
  • The Star areas names are more client-centred e.g. How I feel, My children’s learning and Our family routine
  • Wording changes avoid any suggestion of blame or triggers for people, while keeping the essential clarity needed between stages

What people say about the new edition?

“We all feel that it is a significant improvement”.

“More family-focused and trauma-informed”.

“The language is more client-focused and strengths-based”.

“The wording is more friendly and positive”.

“This version will get better buy-in with the families we work with”.

“The visual scaling for parents uses appropriate language, and is concise and easy to understand”.

What next?

  • You will notice some changes to the wording when completing stars on Star Online or using the PDF documents 
  • If you use the Family Stars in your own software, we will provide what you need to update to the new edition
  • Update any internal documents with the new names of the outcome areas and Journey of change stages
  • The data is comparable with the current editions – we will advise on small differences – so there will be no interruption in your reporting
  • There is no need for additional training, though do consider a refreshing, to make sure you get the most from the Star.

Fit with the Supporting Families Outcomes Framework 2022-25

Since the start of the Supporting Families Programme, many local authorities have been using the Family Star Plus to evidence their outcomes. This new edition coincided with the publication of the  and we took this new framework into account when creating this new edition.

We are finalising a mapping document to show how the Family Star Plus (2nd Edition) is uniquely placed to evidence many of the family needs identified in the programme guidance. This will be published in Feb 2023.

Why did we do this review?

As a social enterprise, Triangle commits to investing part of the Star licence in keeping the suite of Stars under review and up to date. We keep abreast of changes in sectors and keep learning alongside our collaborators. We have a rolling program of reviews and new editions and are prioritising earlier, widely used versions, such as the Family Stars.

Join our webinar for more information  

Sara, Star Development Director, will be hosting a webinar on Zoom on Tuesday 25 April at 10am (UK time.)  Register HERE – register even if you can’t attend and we will send you the recording.

Stay updated 

You can subscribe to our newsletter to receive updates directly to your inbox, so there is no need to keep checking for new blogs.

*****

Related items

Psychometric factsheets and reports | Triangle (outcomesstar.org.uk)

New GIRFEC mapping guidance for Scottish organisations and practitioners using My Star (Scotland)

Posted on by Donna

My Star aligns with Scottish Government’s ‘Getting it right for every child’ approach

In November 2022, Triangle published new GIRFEC mapping guidance for licensed Outcomes Star users of My Star (Scotland).

The My Star (Scotland) guidance for workers covers how to use Star data to report against the eight indicators of well-being (often referred to as SHANARRI). It can be found within the Star Online system via the following link to the resources section: Resources – Triangle (staronline.org.uk) and clicking into the ‘Additional Star Resources – Scotland’. There you will find the following documents:

  • My Star Guidance for Workers (Scotland)
  • My Star Chart (Scotland)
  • My Star Flashcards (Scotland)

Within this section, similar guidance is also available for the Family Star (Scotland) and the Family Star (Early Years) (Scotland).

History

Wellbeing sits at the heart of the Scottish GIRFEC approach to provide tailored support and help for children, young people and their parents.

To help ensure everyone (children, young people, parents, and the services that support them) has a common understanding of what wellbeing and the GIRFEC principles mean, practitioners and organisations are asked to consider each of the eight SHANARRI well-being wheel indicators when working together to address individual issues.

The approach considers children’s well-being to be rights-based, strengths-based, holistic and adaptable enough to take into account the stage of development and the complexity of each child or young person’s individual life circumstances. It provides a consistent framework and shared language for promoting, supporting and safeguarding the well-being of children and young people.

SHANARRI Indicators

  • Safe
  • Healthy
  • Achieving
  • Nurtured
  • Active
  • Respected
  • Responsible
  • Included

My Star (Scotland) was developed in 2015.  At that time the GIRFEC framework and the associated SHANARRI indicators were in their infancy. Consequently, although many of the outcome areas of My Star directly related to the eight SHANARRI well-being indicators, these were not automatically included or referred to within the My Star (Scotland) resources. 

In 2022, during Outcomes Star training sessions facilitated by Licensed Trainers with North Lanarkshire Council, involving staff from education, children & family services, feedback suggested benefit in creating bespoke guidance which, whilst not changing the content or data obtained from using My Star, directly linked the outcome areas of My Star with the eight SHANARRI well-being indicators.

Staff from these services aim to support children and their families to thrive within their families, school and the local community. It was felt there would be distinct benefits for staff having clear correlation guidance between the child or young person’s circumstances, the interventions supporting them and how this meets the GIRFEC framework.

The development of the mapping guidance was a collaborative process involving managers and staff from North Lanarkshire Council and Triangle.

After several months of work, My Star/ SHANARRI mapping guidance was agreed, and the supporting materials were produced.  These resources were then circulated to all organisations in Scotland using the My Star for further feedback and comment.

Following a subsequent feedback review, the resources were finalised and published in November 2022. 

If you are a Star Online user, these documents can be associated with your service by your Account Lead, who will give you access to the materials required. Alternatively, if you are not a Star Online user, your Account Lead will have individual access to the system and can save these documents to your own internal systems for distribution and use.

It is hoped that the guidance and associated materials will be of benefit to all organisations in Scotland using My Star and will assist both at an operational level in providing support to the child, young person and their families, but also at a service level, whereby services are easily able to link their delivery of services to the well-being indicators outlined by the Scottish Government.

Background information

My Star for children was originally developed in 2013 in collaboration with Family Action, Action for Children, Westminster Council and Coram.  In 2015, Triangle developed My Star (Scotland) in collaboration with Fife Council and input from Dumfries and Galloway Council.

Further information

If you would like further information about My Star or the Outcomes Star, please email us at info@triangleconsulting.co.uk

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Scottish Association for the Study of Offending (SASO) Annual Conference 2022

Posted on by Donna
Jim Boreland

I’m Jim Borland, the Implementation Lead for Triangle in Scotland. My role is to support a range of different organisations across the country to use the Outcomes Star in a way that best helps them to support their various clients.

I am also an ex-Police Officer, and following my retirement from the force, I worked for several years in a national charity. Much of the work there was focused on rehabilitating offenders and supporting people within or on the cusp of the Criminal Justice system. As such, I have a genuine interest in things relating to the Criminal Justice system and was keen to attend the Scottish Association for the Study of Offending (SASO) conference on November 11th 2022, which focussed on access to j, in particular, the obstacles to obtaining justice from both sides of the Criminal Justice system in Scotland, for victim and perpetrator alike.  

I looked forward to hearing about the current challenges and learning more about the range of successful recent initiatives and plans to support everyone within society to get access to justice when they need it.

As a result of the recent pandemic, this was the first face-to-face conference in recent years, bringing together a variety of interested individuals and front-line organisations working in the justice arena. The keynote speakers were all high-ranking professionals within their disciplines discussing their personal experiences of the justice system in Scotland. The conference also allowed them to propose some ‘blue sky’ ideas to help ensure access to justice will be available to everyone who needs it in the coming years.

The conference highlighted and celebrated the invaluable work undertaken by front-line services and staff. It was also an excellent opportunity for delegates to connect, network, learn from each other, and share experiences.

Whilst some initial design work had already commenced, Sheriff Principal Aisha Anwar spoke about the various technological advancements developed due to the pandemic, including the use of ‘virtual’ courtrooms and evidence provided remotely via digital platforms. She also highlighted several new procedural improvements, including ‘electronic’ warrants and fast-tracking domestic abuse cases, designed to streamline the sometimes lengthy legal processes. These developments are intended to ensure that the justice system is demonstrably ‘fair’ to all and provide appropriate and timely access to justice for both an accused person and the victims of crime.

The next speaker was Andrea Coomer, the Chief Executive of the Howard League for Penal Reform. Throughout a very passionate presentation, she highlighted the apparent lack of diversity in the Judiciary system, particularly in England and Wales, and consequently, the noticeable lack of trust by a majority of the general public, particularly with young people and people from ethnic minorities. She provided several examples of young people being unable to access justice. She posed questions about the suitability of court proceedings when the reality was that the person might be suffering from mental health issues, be a victim of abuse themselves or be disadvantaged in accessing legal representation due to their personal circumstances. Her plea was that ‘legacy’ legal systems need to change as we move towards the future.

The next speaker was Andrea Coomer, the Chief Executive of the Howard League for Penal Reform. Throughout a very passionate presentation, she highlighted the apparent lack of diversity in the Judiciary system, particularly in England and Wales, and consequently, the noticeable lack of trust by a majority of the general public, particularly with young people and people from ethnic minorities. She provided several examples of young people being unable to access justice. She posed questions about the suitability of court proceedings when the reality was that the person might be suffering from mental health issues, be a victim of abuse themselves or be disadvantaged in accessing legal representation due to their personal circumstances. Her plea was that ‘legacy’ legal systems need to change as we move towards the future.

The last keynote speaker, Ronaldo Renucci KC, the Vice Dean of the Faculty of Advocates in Scotland, spoke at length about the practical issues faced by defence solicitors, including a declining number of solicitors, a lack of new defence solicitors coming into the field, the capping of legal aid, the increasing amount of work for existing defence solicitors, the rising number of new clients and increased case preparation requirements. These issues are even more significant for cases involving sex crimes, which are very distressing for all persons involved (prosecution and defence alike). He emphasised the right for everyone to have the ability to access justice, and that included obtaining appropriate legal representation. However, this is becoming difficult due to the limiting factors raised, and he put forward several ideas about improving the current situation.

The afternoon session was an interactive session where groups of delegates reviewed scenario’s where access to justice was complicated due to a vast range of legal and organisational processes. Throughout these scenario discussions, it was highlighted that there was still much work to be done to ensure access to justice reaches everyone who needs it – accused persons, victims, and the public in general.

Whilst the use of the Outcomes Star might not at first glance appear to directly link to getting ‘access to justice’, it is relevant when organisations support individuals throughout their journey within the Criminal Justice system.

Clearly, everyone has different support needs from the system, and using the Justice Star could assist with that.

The Justice Star recognises that each person requires an individually tailored plan to support them throughout their journey towards and through the Criminal Justice system. This could include after being charged, post-conviction, in prison and re-entering the community upon leaving prison. These tailored plans would involve having effective supportive networks, supportive relationships and a sense of community which is vital for well-being but also for diverting the individual away from previous criminal activity and out of the Justice system itself.

In addition to the Justice Star, The Empowerment Star assists survivors of domestic abuse in getting their life back on track and dealing with the trauma of what’s happened to them.

The person-centred approach used by the Outcomes Star was very much at the heart of the Panel discussions, where representatives from the Scottish Human Rights Commission, Victim Support Scotland, Scottish Prison Service and Local Authority Social Work, highlighted the need for better action planning and more creative solutions, to achieve more sustainable results irrespective of the person being the offender or victim.

At Triangle, we often discuss the importance of enabling and empowering people by being person-centred, strengths-based and using trauma-informed language. However, as highlighted by most of the speakers, several external factors linked to the Criminal Justice system will directly impact what is achievable by a person or supporting organisation. The most obvious was available finance. It was commented upon frequently that a lack of funding directly affected the quality of service and support that could be provided, significantly impacting the levels of access to justice a person could achieve. In some cases, it was more of a ‘post-code lottery’ as to whether necessary support to access and achieve justice was available.

It was evident, however, that additional money alone won’t fix the problems. The culture of the current Criminal Justice system, being based on traditional processes, procedures and even standards of dress, doesn’t make it user-friendly or even recognisable to people accessing it. It’s like a strange new world they don’t recognise or understand. Therefore, whilst there is a degree of familiarity with using traditional ways, there is also a need to move forward with the times, and several presentations indeed demonstrated a move in that direction.

The conference provided several examples of innovative service delivery developed to meet the demands of a changing society, mainly due to the recent pandemic. These new ways of working will continue to put the individual at the centre of any new processes. As the Outcomes Star has been demonstrated to be an effective tool in determining needs, highlighting gaps in service provision, and providing data analysis to support change, I hope Triangle may be involved in future discussions around this change process.

Overall, plenty for me to ponder relative to the Criminal Justice system in Scotland. I look forward to continuing some of these discussions with existing or new Scottish clients in the future.

Further information

If you would like further information about the Justice Star or the Empowerment Star, please email us at info@triangleconsulting.co.uk

Stay updated

You can subscribe to our newsletter to receive updates directly to your inbox, so there is no need to keep checking for new blogs.

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Related items:

More about our Stars for the Criminal Justice Sector

Outcomes Star ‘virtual training’ package developed as a result of Covid-19

Posted on by Donna

Delivering increased flexibility and choice for UK and international clients

When the Covid-19 virus shut down the world in March 2020, many organisations had to quickly revise their face-to-face training to deliver online learning. Our training team did a fantastic job of rising to the challenge, and within weeks we had a virtual training offer, we adopted new digital learning strategies to produce an online version of the Core Star training course by May 2020.

Now the Outcomes Star virtual training delivery has been implemented for a while. It’s time to evaluate the engagement and benefits and explore the importance of high-quality Outcomes Star training in a classroom or a virtual learning setting.

Why is engagement so crucial to learning, especially online?

If you’ve ever taught a course, you’ll have seen how easy it is for learners to refrain from paying attention, participating or putting forth effort. The level of engagement and understanding directly impacts an individual’s ability to apply Star information and skills we teach in practice.

A key challenge for us was how to emulate our in-person Outcomes Star learning experience in a live synchronous virtual environment. We were determined to create the same high level of engagement, enjoyment, and interactivity learners experienced face-to-face and virtually to ensure the Outcome Stars are understood and used well.

Key members of our training team upskilled and undertook industry leading LPI online training course designer and facilitation qualifications to meet the challenge.

We also explored technology options and now mainly deliver training using Zoom, Microsoft Teams, and other platforms upon request.

Creating virtual training was an exciting evolution for us. We learned how to use embedded tools such as polls, chat, whiteboards, and breakout rooms to bring people together for valuable discussion, practice, and collaboration. We discovered we could use these tools to stimulate thoughtful and fruitful interactions to enable peer learning virtually. We now use a range of interactive activities that support and reinforce content to help virtual learners connect with the content.

We have been delighted with the engagement and participation levels. Feedback has been overwhelmingly positive and reassuring. We know virtual learners feel confident in their understanding of the Star and have a positive outlook on their learning experience.

“Thank you, … that was genuinely some of the best training I have had virtually. You were very engaging and understanding”
Outcomes Star client
"The trainer was excellent at executing the delivery, and I will be adopting some of her techniques within remote delivery"
Outcomes Star client
“The ability of the facilitator to adapt to the experiences of the participants showed their in-depth knowledge of the Outcomes Star and how it can be used to benefit our clients”
Outcomes Star client
“The training was excellent. The way it was delivered and explained really helped me understand the Star”
Outcomes Star client.
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We found organisations welcomed the flexibility, saving time and money.

Traditionally face-to-face learning is a one-day event. If you can’t get everyone on your team there, they miss the training, which is now a thing of the past with remote training. Our remote Star training option is also available in ½ day modules, suiting clients not wishing to close a department for a whole day, reducing travel costs and time, and supporting geographically dispersed teams with networking opportunities. Training remotely means we can also match your service with trainers knowledgeable about your sector, wherever you are.

Virtual Core Star training advantages

  • ½ day modules
  • Reduced travel costs
  • Less time away from the job
  • Convenience of not needing to travel physically
  • Opportunities for isolated or dispersed teams to interact and network

Whilst many organisations opt for the ease and convenience of virtual training.  There are many situations when training your staff face-to-face is the right, if not better, option. There are several advantages to conducting face-to-face training as opposed to doing it virtually to consider.

Face-to-face Core Star training advantages

  • Being part of group learning ‘live’ is a powerful learning method
  • Fosters connection and collaborative social interaction
  • Strengthens workplace relationships
  • Trainers adapting to body language leads to better learning results
  • No option to multi-task

Why is Outcomes Star training so important?

When the Outcomes Stars are used well, they have the capacity to transform lives and improve services in a wide range of social provision sectors. 

We learned early on that although the Star looks like a simple and intuitive tool, training to understand its values and how to use it properly is vital. Without training, the Journey of Change, the User Guides, and the detailed descriptions of the scales (the numbers on the Star) can too often be put to one side by practitioners. Unfortunately, using the Star in this way undermines the meaningfulness of the data and the benefits for the practitioner’s keywork and the person receiving support.

The Outcomes Star is a trauma-informed relational tool that supports change in keywork relationships. It helps practitioners and the people they support to have better conversations.

It does this by helping create a better quality of listening to develop a shared understanding of a person’s life, priorities, and needs from their perspective, using an evidence-based conversational framework to guide the conversation.

As well as the tools themselves, training and guidance around the Outcomes Star emphasises flexibility in responding to a client’s window of tolerance and preferences – for example, about when and how to introduce and discuss the different outcome areas.

There is also guidance about identifying appropriate action plans in a trauma-informed way that is sensitive to the client’s capacity to drive things forward themselves.

It’s important to understand the Star’s focus on engagement, choices, and actions is more valuable than a tool that measures the severity of problems because the Journey of Change breaks down complex, personal change into small steps.  

It helps spotlight the positive shifts and incremental progress that can be overlooked. Identifying and celebrating the small steps that make a difference in people’s complex lives is a key benefit of the Star– helping to counter-act any reliance on unrealistic expectations, which can have a detrimental, demotivating effect.

The Outcomes Star tools have many features that directly support trauma-informed working that we explore in detail in training, including:

  • Relationship-based
  • Empowerment
  • Focuses on the present, not someone’s history
  • Strengths-based not deficit-based
  • Holistic
Triangle’s values

Outcomes Star training equips practitioners and licensed trainers with a deeper understanding of the theory and values behind the Star so that they can build this into their practice, training, and induction processes.

Whichever training delivery option you choose, our flexible hybrid offer will meet your practitioner and manager’s need to understand and use the Outcome Star well in your service.

  • Understand how to co-create sustainable outcomes for people receiving support
  • Measure outcomes for adults and children
  • Analysis your data and innovate service delivery

Making an impact

As part of our strategic review in 2019, we surveyed our clients to find out what difference the Star makes. We expected broadly positive findings, but the appreciation and impact delighted us.

Here are a few highlights:

  • 87% of Star users report that their keywork is more effective as a result of using the Star
  • 81% said that Star data reports enabled them to monitor and report on their outcomes more effectively
  • 95% say that the Star supports good conversations and collaboration between staff and service users
  • 92% say that it helps service users to get an overview of their situation
  • 93% say that the Star supports person-centred, strengths-based working
  • 92% say that the Star motivates staff and service users because it makes change visible.

Licensed Trainers and the CPD Community

Licensed Trainers (LTs) are individuals who have received training and achieved the LT qualification to deliver training and support effectively within their organisations. Licensed Trainers become part of a community of Outcomes Star trainers.

The ‘train the trainer’ route can be cost-effective for large organisations.

At the end of 2021, we launched our of CPD sessions for Licensed Trainers to educate, inform, and inspire for free. Our CPD program has increased workplace engagement, improved communication, and generated significantly more opportunities to share top training tips and good practices via professional peer-to-peer learning.

In 2022, we delivered a wide range of informative and interactive sessions focussed on supporting our community of licensed trainers (LTs) globally. We aim to provide key ‘takeaways’ in every session for licensed trainers to use in their own training rooms immediately. The intensive development and delivery process results have been very positive, and over 66% of our Licensed Trainers globally have already attended sessions.

These sessions cover a range of subjects and draw on specialist knowledge and information across Triangle and beyond.

Please view our 2023 CPD calendar to book.

Please don’t hesitate to contact us for more information on becoming a Licensed Trainer.

New resources for Licensed Trainers coming soon

New dual face-to-face and virtual training slide deck and training manual will be available for Licensed Trainers from March 2023. Read more. 

We look forward to training you soon, face-to-face or remotely, to demonstrate how well the Stars measure service user progression and distance travelled, how they can highlight areas for service delivery improvements, and illustrate your social impact to funders. #Enablinghelp

The cover of the Outcomes Star core course training presentation & training manual 2023

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The Outcomes Star is available under licence with training in the UK and internationally. 

We usually need around 4-6 weeks’ notice to organise a trainer and materials, so please speak to us about your timescales.

Training prices start from £240 per person.

If you have any questions about remote training or new Stars, or want any information on the new Star Online or anything else, don’t hesitate to contact us at info@triangleconsulting.co.uk

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#SheMatters Conference Oct 2022

Posted on by Donna

I am Marie Buss, I support Triangles clients who are typically Local Authorities, NHS organisations, and charities, to use the Outcomes Stars well within their services across the South East of England.

I am also an ex-Probation Officer, so I was delighted to recently attend the #SheMatters conference on Oct 21st, 2022 as I wanted to hear about the current challenges the sector faces today and learn about the range of successful initiatives supporting women in Prison and the community.

The #SheMatters conference, organised by Imago Dei Prison Ministry, brought together a variety of front-line organisations working with women in prisons across the Southeast to talk about their work, and hear from many women who spoke about their ‘lived experiences’ of the UK’s criminal justice system. The conference celebrated the valuable work of front-line services and was an excellent opportunity for delegates to connect, network, learn from each other, and share experiences.

Here at Triangle, many of our service provider clients deliver support services to women and men in the criminal justice sector using a range of Outcomes Stars. Unsurprisingly, several speakers’ views chimed with our mission and values. They spoke with a real passion for women to receive trauma-informed care, about the importance of collaboration and transparency, and highlighted the importance of enabling help by giving women a voice and some control over how their sentences are delivered.

Abi Gardner, the Deputy Governor for HMP Send, spoke about the women’s journey in the criminal justice system much like we talk about the Journey of Change. Abi’s commitment to offering a range of interventions within the prison system and the recognition that every woman is an individual requiring a tailored sentence plan was inspiring. Abi spoke about the importance of delivering support to women at their own pace, based on their unique priorities and needs. She highlighted the need for women in Prison to feel connected, gain peer support and receive support from different agencies, and feel a sense of community and togetherness to create change. Abi also highlighted how critical physical activity is to human well-being. Particularly women (and men) in confinement.

When we develop Outcomes Stars with collaborators and the people on the receiving end of the support, having supportive networks, supportive relationships, a sense of community, and exercise is always vital for well-being. All these areas are conversation topics between the person receiving the support the support worker when using the Outcomes Star. 

When I completed Outcomes Stars with people on probation some years ago, I found that the Star enables better conversations about a person’s life and creates a shared viewpoint of where they were at, which led to better action planning, and ultimately more sustainable results. Abi echoed this approach as being the prison’s aspiration, Send Prison try to meet the women ‘where they are at’, while also mentioning the difficulty of developing creative solutions due to the restrictions within the CJS. Even so, I was grateful to hear Send Prison is taking steps to develop innovative solutions for women.

At Triangle, we often talk about the importance of enabling and empowering people by being person-centered, strengths-based, and using trauma-informed language. However, in the CJS field, several dependencies impact what prisons can achieve. The regular changes in Government strategy, change in Criminal Justice Ministers, priorities and funding streams changing so frequently often means plans aren’t seen through, meaning less focussed attention on what matters. As if to highlight this point, just twenty-four hours before Abi spoke at the conference, we saw the resignation of yet another UK Prime Minister. 

What does matter? Funding, staff recruitment, attainment of staff, and better sentencing solutions than we currently have.

Speakers from Kent probation spoke about how the sentencing delivered to women often sets them up to fail. In response, they have developed an innovative women’s project.

As an alternative to women attending a meeting in a Probation office which can often be triggering. Women were instead invited to a safe space, with their children, to meet other women, whilst getting support from the third sector, engaging in a range of holistic activities, and receiving relevant advice on a weekly basis. This project is achieving better results for women and their children experiencing the UK’s CJS.

I found this project an excellent example of innovative service delivery, developed after reflecting on the support they offered and identifying what does and doesn’t work. Triangle actively encourages and supports clients to use their Star data to highlight gaps or needs in service provision and provide Star data analysis support upon request.

My day at the conference ended with an unexpected encounter with a client, Advance Minerva, who use the Justice Star. They are funded to deliver the Commissioned Rehabilitation Service Provision (CRS) for women in Kent. They discussed how men built the (CJS) system for men and that female specialist services are sorely needed. We conversed about the need for gender-specific services and tools, which left me with plenty of thoughts to take back to our development team.

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More about our Stars for the Criminal Justice Sector

The Justice Star is designed for use with people serving a sentence, approaching release from  prison or in the community. Preview the Justice Star

For people with long custodial sentences, we recommend the Recovery Star Secure

Explore all the Stars available for the criminal justice sector

Welcome back to conference season! Autumn 2022

Posted on by Donna

Events & Exhibitions

Autumn has arrived! After a notable absence in these past few years due to the pandemic, we are delighted the industry conferences are awakening again. We are exhibiting at three key exhibitions in the latter part of 2022 and attending several more.  Scroll to the bottom to learn more. 

At the time of writing, our first significant exhibition is with the Carers Trust Partners Network Conference: Reconnecting – Nationally and Locally taking place on the 21-22nd Sept in Nottingham. It’s the first big event in the carers calendar since 2019. We are looking forward to meeting old and new faces, promoting the Stars, the Star Online and the Star materials, as well as hearing about the radical changes in the unpaid carers landscape from the experts. We’ve also worked alongside Carers Trust to explore what could be learnt from Star data across several Carers Trust network partners and created a new Exploring Carers Star Data case study to inspire services supporting carers. Also available on the Carers Star webpage.

The next major event in our calendar is billed as the leading health & social care conference in Northern Ireland, taking place in Belfast on 19-20th October. The Northern Ireland Annual Conference & Exhibition 2022 (NICON22). This is Ireland’s first large conference for the Health & Social care sector since 2019. It will also be our first big exhibition for our new(ish) Scottish and Irish Outcomes Star teams to showcase our growing suite of almost 50 Stars. We’ll be promoting the value of the Outcomes Stars and highlighting the essential insight your service can gain from Star data, to support the people you serve, your workers and your service. We also will be exhibiting and networking with our colleagues across the private, voluntary and community sectors, and looking forward to hearing from the vast array of speakers. Read more about the team attending: Patrick Toland (Ireland), Jim Borland (Scotland) and Eileen Cassidy (Scotland & Ireland). Visit us at booth 8. 

The last major exhibition we will be exhibiting at in 2022 will be The National Children’s and Adults Services Conference in Manchester from 2-4th November. The event is aimed at all those working with children, young people, their families and vulnerable adults, including in health, social care and education. We are attending this event to promote the updated Family Star Plus, launching in Spring 2023 following the end of a significant 18-month review process. We will be providing information about the changes to the Family Star Plus, and we are keen to record reactions to the new Star to help us spread the word. For more information, don’t hesitate to get in touch with info@triangleconsulting.co.uk

Lastly, we are also attending the following events. 

  • 8-9th Sept: Go-Lab: Social Outcomes Conference 2022, Oxford – see blog
  • 22nd Sept: CAMHS National Summit 2022: Transforming Mental Health Services for Children & Young Adults, online
  • 3rd Oct: Learning from our practice 2018–2022 with Lloyds Foundation, London
  • 11-12th Oct: COMMUNITY CARE LIVE 2022
  • 21st Oct: #SheMatters Criminal Justice Conference, Kent
  • 11th Nov: Access to Justice, Edinburgh
  • 29th Nov: National Homelessness Event, online
  • 1-2nd Dec: National Commissioning Conference, Derbyshire

Come and talk to our teams who are ready to answer all your questions. Of course, you can always follow us on Twitter or LinkedIn and talk to us there. We are also always on the lookout for the next big success story of Star use and to support connecting services together.  For more information about marketing or your experiences using the Outcomes Stars you can directly contact Jen@Triangleconsulting.co.uk

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Going for collaboration at the GoLab Conference

Posted on by Donna
SOC22_Day_I_Slides_O2GfTGo-1 copy

Triangle co-founder and Outcomes Star co-author Joy MacKeith reflects on the theme of collaboration at this year’s Social Outcomes Conference and points to Human Learning Systems as an effective way to make this the norm in service delivery.

Hear Joy describe what Triangle has learnt about what works in service delivery in this podcast

Watch her conversation with HLS proponent Toby Lowe

In early September, I had a fascinating two days at the Government Outcomes Lab (GoLab) Social Outcomes Conference.

I learnt about Social Impact Bonds (SIBs) and other outcomes-based funding initiatives around the world, from France to Australia and Paraguay to Japan, but for me, the most interesting session was on the UK’s Life Chances Fund.

We heard from many of the initiatives receiving this funding, all of them doing incredible work in a range of sectors including vulnerable mothers, employment and mental health.

The strongest common theme was how this additional funding and its link to long-term outcomes drove meaningful collaboration between providers and commissioners. In these initiatives, all parties are working together to identify blocks and create an ecosystem of services that has the needs of the person being helped at the core. It was inspiring to hear about their work.

Interestingly there wasn’t very much talk about the payment mechanisms and the extent to which linking funding to the achievement of particular targets was a valuable part of the process. From behind-the-scenes conversations I have had at this conference in previous years, I know that this can be a sensitive subject. Projects can be reticent to raise this issue when funders are in the room.

There were, however, some interesting discussions about the sustainability of these programmes. Although they can demonstrate cost savings, these are not always savings to the organisation providing the funding. For example, the local authority provides the funding, but the health service makes the saving. And they are not always ‘cashable’. For example, re-offending rates are reduced, but that does not make it possible to close down a wing of that prison and thereby reduce costs, at least in the short term. This fact can threaten the sustainability of SIBs as the rationale depends on the logic of these cashable savings. Perhaps we need to look for other mechanisms to support collaboration.

I have attended this conference for the last four years. This year I sensed a growing recognition of the importance of a person-centred approach to service delivery and the need to create a collaborative service system to achieve this. And more and more people now have experience of seeing how this can deliver improvements in practice. What we need now is a way of making this way of working part of typical day-to-day practice – in commissioning and service management, rather than something that happens when there is an additional pot of money to incentivise and support it.

Here I think Human Learning Systems (HLS) has some of the answers. It is an approach with problem-solving and ‘doing what it takes’ rather than ‘doing by the book’ at its core. This was a point made at the event by Lee Whitehead of Manchester Metropole University. He studied many SIBs and found that those that followed the HLS principles were more likely to succeed.  Gary Wallace of Plymouth also talked about how they are taking the kind of relational approach that both HLS and Triangle recommend outside of the context of a SIB.

I’ve been exploring HLS and the overlaps with Triangle’s Enabling Help principles with Toby Lowe, one of its leading proponents.  You can watch our conversation here.

And for a fuller description of what Triangle has learnt from twenty years of creating and supporting the Outcomes Stars in practice, listen to this episode of Next Stage Radicals where I describe the main messages of our Enabling Help report.

Also, look out for October’s edition where Mark Smith of Gateshead Council will be talking about how they are transforming their service delivery – informed by HLS and working with the Outcomes StarTM.

I will certainly be back at GoLab in 2023. I hope there will be even more space next year to hear from people like Mark who are finding ways to implement the person-centred and collaborative approaches, that are so important to Triangle and the people who use our Outcomes Stars– with or without a SIB.

Further reading: Dr Anna Good shares her thoughts on #SOC22

Musings on the importance of trusting relationships, professionals’ emotional labour, and the desire to improve delivery through data. 

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GoLab – Social Outcomes Conference 2022

Posted on by Donna

Dr Anna Good shares her thoughts on #SOC22

Last week, Triangle directors- Graham Randles, Joy MacKeith and I attended the Government Outcomes Lab annual conference #SOC22

One presentation that particularly resonated with me was from Reji Ikeda at the Ministry of Justice in Japan. Talking about ‘value measurement for offender rehabilitation’, he emphasised the importance of the quality of the relationship and the ‘emotional labour of professionals and volunteers’ on rehabilitation outcomes. He also spoke about how poor occupational well-being can negatively impact these relationships. I couldn’t resist mentioning the Justice Star as an excellent tool for developing trusting relationships and boosting staff morale in this context.

Joy’s recent report Enabling help puts human relationships at the heart of effective service delivery, so this is at the forefront of my mind when thinking about the Star. The Enabling help report highlights the problems with borrowing from approaches such as the scientific and economic paradigms in social provision. Although not focused on the Star, the innovative suite of Stars offers a better, more enabling approach. I thought of this when the keynote presenter, Julie Battliana, stated that ‘agitation is alone is not enough to make change happen, innovation is required’.

 Another theme that I noticed running throughout the conference was the desire to use data to improve service delivery. I felt this was encouraging in a conference often focused on meeting targets and payment by results. Miika Vuorinen, a Chief of Evaluation from Finland, commented that one way to know if social outcome frameworks are working is to see if they are being integrated into the decision-making processes. Closer to home, Stan Gilmour from Thames Valley Police gave a powerful presentation, emphasising ethical decisions based on using data to allocate resources and plan social impact.

It’s possible I was looking out for these positive signs, as I feel passionate about encouraging and supporting good use of Star data. By ‘good use’ of data, I mean those closest to the creation of Star data (practitioners and managers) interpreting the data and using the learning to encourage changes needed to maximise the outcomes for those being supported.

Further reading: Going for collaboration at the GoLab Conference

Triangle co-founder and Outcomes Star co-author Joy MacKeith reflects on the theme of collaboration at this year’s Social Outcomes Conference and points to Human Learning Systems as an effective way to make this the norm in service delivery.

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Guiding Stars: How the Outcomes Stars help build hope and self-esteem

Posted on by Outcomes Star

Having recently returned from a long holiday, I am re-engaging freshly with Triangle’s work, creating Stars, training and supporting people to use them well and sharing our wider vision of an enabling service delivery system.

Returning after a solo hiking along the beautiful Cleveland Way, I had the chance to see our work with fresh eyes, and ask myself the question, “After 20 years of working on the Outcomes Star, why does it still matter to me so much?”

The answer that came when I asked myself that question was this: Working with the Outcomes Star gives people access to a developmental framing of their situation. The Star presents their situation as a time of challenge, not a sign of failure. The fact that they need help is an opportunity for them to draw on their existing strengths and develop new ones rather than being a sign of weakness. For people who are so often seen as a set of problems, having access to this hopeful, growthful narrative really matters. It is a simple reframing but it can make all the difference.

The Star reflects the person’s life back to them; they see they are a traveller moving forwards on their journey in life, rather than someone who has come to a dead end. The endpoints or the tips on the Star point to the way things could be, and in some cases they show what is already working well, giving people something to celebrate as well as offering things to work towards.

Stars have always been a navigational guide and a symbol of hope. Outcomes Stars are aptly named because they do just that – offer hope and guide us in the right direction. They don’t tell us exactly how to get there or exactly what it will look like when we arrive. That is something only the person completing the Star can discover for themselves. But they do shine the light forwards and give us the self-belief and self-confidence to keep moving forwards toward a better life.

We all need to see ourselves as heroes in our own journey – facing challenges and setbacks, but achieving and finding a way through as well.

As I reflect on my 20 years helping guide Triangle through the many challenges and triumphs of our work, I feel proud to be able to play a part in helping others move forward on their life’s journey. Refreshed by my holiday I am as hopeful and excited as ever at the potential of the Outcomes Stars to support and embed an enabling approach to service delivery.

Joy MacKeith, Founding Director

To find out more about Triangle’s vision for service delivery read “Enabling Help: How the social provision can work better for the people it services”. You can download the report or watch this video of Joy speaking about the key ideas in the report.

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The Family Star Plus within the Supporting Families Programme (2022-25)

Posted on by Donna

All local authorities delivering Supporting Families must have an approved Outcome Plan setting out their indicators of eligibility with associated family level outcomes against headline objectives set out in the programme guidance.

Since the start of the supporting families programme (formerly called the ‘Troubled families programme’), many local authorities have been using the Family Star Plus as part of evidencing outcomes within their approved Outcomes Plans. This version of the Star was developed specifically to be aligned with the programme’s objectives.

We are currently putting together guidance to show how the Family Star Plus fits the increased list of headline outcomes in the ‘Supporting Families Outcomes Framework 2022-25’, which will be in effect from 3 October 2022:

The new framework identifies ‘practitioner assessments and contacts’ or ‘Practitioner and/or self-assessment’ as valid data sources as part of the evidence within all of the ten headline outcomes, and the Outcomes Star, while collaboratively completed, fits within this category. 

‘Validated outcome measures’ are also suggested as evidence for meeting some outcomes. The validation of the Family Star Plus as an outcomes measure, including evidence of ‘inter-rater reliability’ and ‘predictive validity’ is reported in a recent peer-reviewed journal article (Good & MacKeith, 2021). 

We will publish the 2nd Edition of the Family Star Plus shortly as well as guidance on how to use the Family Star Plus (2nd Ed.) within the new Supporting Families framework.

Please contact our Research Analyst, Dr Anna Good (anna@triangleconsulting.co.uk) if you would like to find out more.