Find and Manage a Foster Placement
The report for Department for Education's Find and Manage a Foster Placement Alpha assessment on the 26th January 2021
Service Standard assessment report
Find and Manage a Foster Placement
| From: | Government Digital Service |
| Assessment date: | 26/01/2021 |
| Stage: | Alpha |
| Result: | Met |
| Service provider: | Department for Education |
Service description
A series of digital tools which will provide the right level of information in a structured format to professionals around the child when it is required. The tools provide information from foster families, social workers, local authorities and fostering agencies. We aim to assess the feasibility of both the tools by testing prototypes with users and capturing metrics on the quality, efficiency and granularity of the information it produces. The objective is to gather further evidence about the value of these tools and the impact their introduction would have on the whole sector and children that depend on our services.
Service users
- placement officers
- local authorities
- social workers
- foster parents
- fostering agencies
1. Understand users and their needs
Decision
The service met point 1 of the Standard.
What the team has done well
The panel was impressed that:
- the team were able to incorporate secondary research from OFSTED
- team have spoken/tested with a large number of users and have been able to prioritise the riskiest assumptions based on needs and in-depth insights
- needs and pain-points of user groups clearly evidenced by research (i.e. desk research, interviews and end to end usability testing of the service journey)
- good to see users with access needs have been included in the research
What the team needs to explore
Before their next assessment, the team needs to:
- ensure the assisted digital support model is tested with users to ensure it works
- to consider including children in future user research to get their feedback and looking at ways how this service can help to capture any of their identified needs
- continue to capture the needs of users on the lower end of the assisted digital spectrum and ensure plans are in place to support where needed
- continue to include non-expert and potential users of the service including more LAs that could potentially use this service
2. Solve a whole problem for users
Decision
The service met point 2 of the Standard.
What the team has done well
The panel was impressed that:
- the team has developed two key services in alpha to help solve the core problems identified during the discovery phase
- the team had also considered how to make the current process better for users by reducing the number of paper forms
- the amount of research carried out to understand how and where to minimise the amount of times users had to provide the same core information to foster services and OFSTED
What the team needs to explore
Before their next assessment, the team needs to:
- further, consider how the two services provided can provide an overall end-to-end solution for their core users
- explore how the service will address the core problem of a child not finding adequate placements
- during Beta the team should aim to work in the open more in partnership with LAs, foster centres, children and foster parents
3. Provide a joined-up experience across all channels
Decision
The service met point 3 of the standards
What the team has done well
The panel was impressed that:
- user research had taken place to improve the experience of a child social worker whose time is often taken up by the demands of paper form filling
- user research had taken place to understand the experience of a child in the care system
What the team needs to explore
Before their next assessment, the team needs to:
- continue to test working prototypes with foster parents and social workers
- continue with more user research to better understand how changes to the online part of the service will affect offline channels and vice versa
- explore ways of moving the diary service into live public beta quicker to reach a wider audience for feedback and iteration
4. Make the service simple to use
Decision
The service met point 4 of the Standard.
What the team has done well
The panel was impressed that:
- the service researched pain points to design new solutions to common problems which were reducing the ability for users to efficiently and accurately complete their tasks within the existing placement journey
- the team prioritised their riskiest journeys and iterations to the service were based on research to understand the mental models of users
- page styles and patterns within the service were adapted to better meet user expectations
- the service is hosted on GOV.UK and uses components from the GDS Design System
- there is a clear journey for how organisations and foster families will gain access to the service
What the team needs to explore
Before their next assessment, the team needs to:
- conduct an audit and more research into the language used within the service and ensure that users with a variety of experience with the foster care placement journey will be able to understand what they need to do
- do more research with users less experienced with the existing journey, for example, conduct research with new foster carers and foster family social workers to ensure that some of the unique patterns which match the mental model for the existing paper journey, make sense to everyone who needs to use the service
- consider splitting the two separate services which were demonstrated; find and match a foster placement and manage a foster placement. Each service has very different user groups and may benefit from being separate services.
- consider the feasibility of linking the manage a placement part of the journey to the find and match part if the aim is to better link data between different organisations involved in the foster care placement journey. Currently, the recording of a child’s time in foster care is done using paper documents and information is often lost; the team should consider how allowing the services to transfer data between each other may also help reduce gaps in data, reduce many of the challenges organisation users are facing and lead to better matches for the children in care.
- in beta, the team will look into more users who report to DfE to understand what they need and if their needs can be met from this service
- consider adding the social workers’ placement referral to the scope of this service, specifically integrating it into the ‘find and match’ part of the service, rather than keeping this as a word document that is emailed to placement workers
- get an accessibility audit by an official body such as DAC.
5. Make sure everyone can use the service
Decision
The service did met point 5 of the Standard.
What the team has done well
The panel was impressed that:
- the service has been tested with 83 users including 11 users with access needs from across a wide range of organisations who will use the service including independent fostering agencies, foster families and their social workers, child social workers and placement offices and 4 local authorities who have responded well to the service in testing
- the service has been iterated 4 times after conducting 22 user interviews with a variety of users across roles to understand the current foster care placement journey and its pain points
- there has been a lot of collaboration between DfE, local and central government and relevant organisations to understand how the service will work with their existing systems and there is a plan around involving more users that will handle parts of the journey and data related to this service
- there is an assisted digital plan for the foster families making diary entries, and a clear way they can gain access to the service if they do not have an email address or can not access the internet
What the team needs to explore
Before their next assessment, the team needs to:
- the team has been unable to test the service with the children who the ‘manage’ part of the service revolves around. As a large aim of this service is about better placements for children, the team must consider how they can involve the children in future user research and get feedback from them
- come up with a plan around how to get every local authority and relevant organisation to use this service as it will not be mandatory
- Continue to develop the assisted digital plan for foster families, including an easy way for them to get help from a person virtually when using the service online
6. Have a multidisciplinary team
Decision
The service met point 6 of the Standard.
What the team has done well
The panel was impressed that:
- all the core team roles had been assigned
- the team were working in an agile manner with sprint planning and design iterations on both services
- the team had adapted well to working completely remotely during the pandemic, utilising slack, Trello and miro to work collaboratively whilst being remote
What the team needs to explore
Before their next assessment, the team needs to:
- hire a performance analyst for the beta stage
- begin to consider how the service can be continuously improved once in a public beta
7. Use agile ways of working
Decision
The service met point 7 of the Standard.
What the team has done well
The panel was impressed that:
- the team had utilised key findings from the two discovery phases it prototyping to key services in alpha
What the team needs to explore
Before their next assessment, the team needs to:
- explore ways to move parts of the service more rapidly into public beta
- test with more senior-level stakeholders in the beta phase
8. Iterate and improve frequently
Decision
The service met point 8 of the Standard.
What the team has done well
The panel was impressed that:
- the team had conducted four rounds of iteration on the diary service
- the team had already begun working with a range of users and had clear plans to expand this further into the beta phase
What the team needs to explore
Before their next assessment, the team needs to:
- carry out user acceptance testing where possible alongside user research
- explore how user feedback in the beta phase will help iterate the service
9. Create a secure service that protects users’ privacy
Decision
The service met point 9 of the Standard.
What the team has done well
The panel was impressed that:
- the team understands the sensitivity around the data the service will hold on children and foster families.
- the team has done a rigorous study identifying the potential threats for the service, and data stored, including anti personas.
- the team has explored different avenues for identity management, user access, authentication and authorization, following the least privilege principle so that users can only access data relevant to performing their role.
- the team has ensured no real data can be accessed outside the production environment.
What the team needs to explore
Before their next assessment, the team needs to:
- explore which potential options for consent can be best presented to the users.
- complete their Data Protection Impact Assessment and ensure resources are available to act upon its recommendations.
- continue the work started in Alpha evaluating potential threats and risks to the service and testing those, and their mitigation plans, in Beta.
10. Define what success looks like and publish performance data
Decision
N/A at alpha point 10 of the Standard.
What the team has done well
The panel was impressed that:
- N/A
What the team needs to explore
Before their next assessment, the team needs to:
- hire a performance analyst and work with them to explore what success looks like
11. Choose the right tools and technology
Decision
The service met point 11 of the Standard.
What the team has done well
The panel was impressed that:
- The team has explored different languages, frameworks and services. different environments, ensuring the non-production environment has no access to real data.
- The service team has adopted a monolithic first approach to help them prototype and increase productivity.
- the service team is aware of the current technology used by Local Authorities to manage their foster placement systems which have helped inform their approach for the integration with their Content Management Systems.
- the service team is working on the integrations needed with local authorities, and is following industry standards developing a RESTFul API produced for that purpose. They are also developing a client that can be deployed in their Content Management Systems to facilitate integration with the service.
- the team has ensured relevant documentation is accessible and up-to-date.
What the team needs to explore
Before their next assessment, the team needs to:
- test their integration plan with enough local authorities to ensure that it is fit for purpose as different local authorities will have different technical resources in place and no local authority should find itself at a disadvantage.
- test how often data replication is needed and what impact it will have on the service availability and performance.
- have a plan to ensure how to make use of the vast amount of unstructured data currently available within local authorities.
- ensure automated testing and deployment is achieved in Beta.
- define and test an offline plan.
- define and test a disaster recovery plan and build redundancy into their deployments, including restoring data from the backups.
- Test that local authorities’ users are comfortable using their own Content Management System and the new service ‘Find a foster family’ service.
- ensure consent is presented in a clear way to users (i.e. foster families) if their data is to be shared across multiple local authorities.
12. Make new source code open
Decision
The service met point 12 of the Standard.
What the team has done well
The panel was impressed that:
- infrastructure-as-Code is being used and GitHub is the team’s main code repository: https://github.com/DFE-Digital/childrens-social-care-architecture
What the team needs to explore
Before their next assessment, the team needs to:
- continue to make any new source code open and reusable.
13. Use and contribute to open standards, common components and patterns
Decision
The service met point 13 of the Standard.
What the team has done well
The panel was impressed that:
- the team made extensive and appropriate use of Government Platform services including GOV.UK PaaS and Notify
- employed the use of the GOV.UK Design System for common patterns and controls
What the team needs to explore
Before their next assessment, the team needs to:
- ensure the decision to use GOV.UK PaaS over DfE Azure will not negatively impact the support the service will receive in the future.
- explore whether any architecture components might potentially be reused from other government services to avoid duplication.
- ensure the development team has the right expertise with the technology choices made in Alpha (an example is Ruby on Rails).
- consider making contributions to relevant libraries/frameworks if relevant.
14. Operate a reliable service
Decision
The service met point 14 of the Standard.
What the team has done well
The panel was impressed that:
- the team has worked on how to make deployment secure and what mitigations might be needed
- the team have fully mapped out the space in which the service will operate including all the pinch points of the current user experience
- the teams alpha phase has covered a wide range of what is feasible in the current fostering landscape
What the team needs to explore
Before their next assessment, the team needs to:
- formalise a plan for support, monitoring and alerting that will be shared with and approved by the wider DfE relevant technical support teams and agree SLAs to operate the service in a sustainable way. This would include understanding how the service will be supported in and out of regular hours and fielding queries.
- regular penetration and load testing should be anticipated to check how secure the system is and how well it can cope with demand.
- ensure relevant documentation is accessible and up-to-date.
- carry out quality assurance testing as part of the ongoing service development.
- develop a plan describing how the service will be supported.