How relevant is the role of values in child protection practice? A national survey of statutory child protection staff 2009: Preliminary findings

Abstract

A survey of those working in Australian statutory child protection authorities was undertaken by the Australian Catholic University as part of a larger project at the Australian National University: Community Capacity Building in Child Protection (http://ccb.anu.edu.au). The purpose of the project is to explore new ways for supporting families and young people so that they can develop the skills, confidence and resources they need to flourish without continuing intervention from the state. Child protection authorities are expected and do intervene when they have reason to believe children are unsafe or neglected. Too often, however, the outcome is that these families stay in the system instead of developing capacity to move on with their lives free of state intervention. The survey described in this paper represents one part of the project: the views of those who work at the heart of the system in statutory child protection agencies. The survey was funded through an Australian Research Council Linkage grant (LP0669230). This report is based on survey responses from 859 public service employees working in a statutory child protection context in eight offices in Australia’s states and territories. Child protection staff in each of these offices were invited to log on to a web survey set up by the Australian Catholic University. The invitation was sent to a senior official in each state and territory and was circulated to staff by a designated officer. The survey comprised 100 questions about the values that child protection workers held and practiced, the beliefs that guided their practice, the supportiveness of their work environment, their overall satisfaction with their jobs and their intention to remain in their jobs in the immediate future. Participants were introduced to the idea of values in the following way. Values relate to the principles, goals and ways of doing things that people use to make judgments about what is happening in their world. Values are part of the professional code of conduct of individuals. They are also part of the policies and procedures of organizations, reflected in organizational mission and vision statements. We know little about how well the expression of values that are embedded in professional codes of conduct mesh with the expression of organizational values through rules and procedures. This survey explores this issue through asking those employed in statutory child protection agencies what they think of their organization’s values, how they describe their own values, professionally and personally, and how they practice their values in their day to day work.