Decision making under uncertainty in child protection: creating a just and learning culture

Munro, Eileen ORCID: 0000-0003-4828-2791 (2018) Decision making under uncertainty in child protection: creating a just and learning culture. Child and Family Social Work. ISSN 1356-7500

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Abstract

The argument is made for having a positive error culture in child protection to improve decision making and risk management. This requires organizations to accept that mistakes are likely and to treat them as opportunities for learning and improving. In contrast, in many organizations, a punitive reaction to errors leads to workers hiding them and developing a defensive approach to their practice with children and families. The safety management literature has shown how human error is generally not simply due to a ‘bad apple’ but made more or less likely by the work context that helps or hinders good performance. Improving safety requires learning about the weaknesses in the organization that contribute to poor performance. To create a learning culture, people need to feel that when they talk about mistakes or weak practice there will be a constructive from their organization. One aspect of reducing the blame culture is to develop a shared understanding of how practice will be judged and how those appraising practice will avoid the hindsight bias. To facilitate a positive error culture, a set of risk principles are presented that offer a set of criteria by which practice should be appraised.

Item Type:	Article
Official URL:	https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/13652206
Additional Information:	© 2018 John Wiley & Sons Ltd
Divisions:	Social Policy
Subjects:	H Social Sciences > HN Social history and conditions. Social problems. Social reform H Social Sciences > HQ The family. Marriage. Woman
Date Deposited:	29 May 2018 15:30
Last Modified:	11 Dec 2024 21:38
URI:	http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/id/eprint/88108

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