SMART Planning |Leeds Safeguarding Children Partnership

Child Safeguarding Practice Reviews have regularly raised concerns about planning issues e.g. lack of focus, plans not reflecting identified concerns, over optimism and disguised compliance. Case audits, feedback from frontline practitioners and the recent OFSTED inspections have focused on this and have identified similar issues and concerns.

SMART planning is a way of working to help families and practitioners address any needs they may have and help families and professionals develop plans that are clear and address any identified risks and needs.

Using SMART planning can help practitioners to avoid drift and lack of progress of the child or young person. It allows for plans to be reviewed regularly ensuring the best outcomes for the child or young person.

The development of the plan is everyone’s responsibility including the practitioners and the family. It should draw upon the resources available to both the family and the professionals including their skills, expertise and knowledge. It is particularly important to have the right practitioners contributing with a specific understanding of their own services. Practitioners should feel able, and committed, to challenging each other about aspects of plans that they feel are not SMART.

SMART planning does not replace any current policies or procedures and most of the work that we already do is SMART. It should not be a big change for most practitioners, but it may be necessary to review current plans to ensure that they are SMART.

What does SMART stand for?

SPECIFIC

All parts of the plan should be as exact and detailed as possible.

For example, the objectives of a particular drug service could include the number of sessions, what drug tests are required and what the goals of the intervention are. This enables families and professionals to clearly understand what the concerns are and what is expected of them. The plan should also be exact about who is responsible for what aspects of the plan (a named professional or family member), how often they should meet (frequency and date of next review) and date when they would be expected to have the work completed.

Who, What, Where, Why, Which?

MEASURABLE

All parts of the plan should be measurable.

This enables both families and professionals to be clear about progress made and quickly identify when a plan is not working. Some aspects of the plan will be more easily measured than others. For example, information about a child’s attendance at medical appointments will be numerically recorded and easily evidenced. Concerns about a child’s emotional well-being would need consideration about how best to establish if progress was being made. This may involve planned structured time spent with the child and/or observations of their interactions with peer group in order to evaluate and measure progress.

The views of the child and young person should also be obtained. However, self-reporting by parents or non-professionals as the only proof of progress is not a safe way of saying that an objective has been met and should be used with other information.

How much or many?
how will I know when it is accomplished?
is the data measureable?

AGREED

Plans should be signed by parents and children so that agreement by all is clearly recorded.

Plans are most likely to succeed when agreed by both family and professionals. Therefore, we should be aiming for plans that are signed by parents and children so that agreement is clearly recorded. We should take into account the child / young person’s wishes and feelings and try to ensure that they are included and agree throughout the planning process. This aspect of SMART planning particularly underpins the council’s commitment to Restorative Practice (working with not to or for others) and helps people to find creative solutions to issues that are affecting them that avoid blame, retribution and punishment.

Professional agreement, commitment and ownership to the plan are essential to achieving successful outcomes for children. Agreement should not, however, be seen as a passive process and it is important for all professionals to offer constructive challenge when planning for children. If any aspects of a plan are not agreed then this should also be recorded and the implications for this non-agreement would need to be considered in the overall assessment of risk and likelihood of achieving change.

Have all of the people involved in the plan had their say and signed it?

REALISTIC

Plans should be realistic and based upon what we know and understand of the family and the needs of the child or young person.

For example, it would not be realistic (or indeed safe) to expect a parent with long term alcohol misuse issues to suddenly stop drinking. This aspect of the plan would need to be carefully developed with the input of a specialist worker who could best inform the meeting of what would be realistic in a particular case. In this case it may be invited a specialist worker to help the parent understand that they have alcohol misuse issues and to create a personalised plan.

Is this achievable and possible for the people involved?

TIMELY

All aspects of plans should contain realistic timescales (with dates) with some being broken down into stages to make them more achievable.

All aspects of plans should contain realistic timescales with some being broken down into stages to make them more achievable. Each plan should reflect the specific risks identified and needs of each child. It is more likely that children and young people will disengage with services if they feel that planned work and commitments made by agencies are not kept or if plans do not relate to their specific needs wishes and feelings.

When should the item be completed? Is this appropriate and realistic for the people involved in the plan? Can you say who is doing each item with set deadlines?

How to create a SMART plan

The most common errors that are made in SMART plans are that the statements are;

Vague
Action not outcome based
Not evidence based and measureable
Unachievable.

Examples of common errors include:

"Complete healthy living chart" - This is an action not an outcome.

Correct statement should be - "The healthy living chart will be completed weekly with the child and their responses noted and measured in line with the accompanying Likert scale."

"Make sure the children achieve their potential" - How would you do this?

Corrected statement - This statement is very vague. By measuring each child’s achievement and comparing it with their Fischer Family Trust estimated grades it can be seen if they are meeting their potential.

"Bob and Sue want to feel safe" - This is very vague and in its current form, unachievable.

Correct statement - "Bob and Sue’s attendance to be monitored daily. Records are being kept as to how often their parents are attending rehabilitation clinics to help with their alcohol misuse."

"Charlotte’s emotions to be measured" - How would this be measured so that progress can be seen?

Correct statement - "Charlotte’s emotions to be measured weekly using the SEN Feeling Chart. Targets as to how to improve this will be discussed with Charlotte during the meeting. "

SMART plan template

Specific

Who?

What?

Where?

Why?

Which?

Measurable

How much or how many?

How will I know when it is accomplished?

Is the data measurable?

Agreed

Have all the people involved in the plan had their say and signed it?

Realistic

is this achievable and possible for the people involved?

Timely

When should the action be completed by?

Is this appropriate and realistic for the people involved in the plan?

State who is doing which action with set deadlines.

Example of a SMART plan

Safety Statement - What is to be achieved: All the children need to continue to access education regularly to reach their full potential

What needs to happen? - Ms Smith to ensure the children's attendance at School and punctuality improves from 63% to 85%

Who will be responsible? - Ms Smith

When does it need to be done? -23.7.21

Checklist

When creating a SMART plan, ask yourself the following questions:

Is my plan in as much detail as possible including details on who, why, where, which, what?
Is my plan clear in what I am trying to achieve?
Does my plan say how I will measure each part?
Does my plan clearly show who is responsible for each part?
Are the expectations in my plan appropriate and realistic in regards to the needs of the child or young person?
Are the expectations in my plan appropriate and realistic in regards to the needs of the family?
Does my plan take into consideration the specific risks identified and needs of the child, young person and family?
Does my plan clearly show when I expect each stage to be completed?
Have the parents and the child or young person had their say in regards to the plan?
Is my plan signed by myself, the parents and the child or young person involved?