What makes probation officers work the way they do?

Ioan DurnescuBudapest, September 2013

University of Bucharest

Probation service in Romania• Relatively new – set up in 2001

• Nearby each county court

• Normally within the building of the county court

• Working with both – juvenile (over 16) and adults.

• Main responsibilities: – pre-sentence reports – offender supervision

Probation staff in Romania• Each service – 5-19 probation counselors

• In 2012 – 292 staff

• Staff structure:• 107 law graduates• 85 social workers• 51 psychology graduates• 14 sociology graduates• Others

• Focus only on the main categories: law, social work and psychology.

• Most of the time: induction training (1-2 weeks) + supervised practice (one year)

The research

• Financed by CNCSIS (contract no. 29/02.08.2010)

• Started in 2011

• Research questions:• What are the staff skills and characteristics used by probation

staff during supervision ?• How were they developed? • What is the impact on the supervision outcomes of different

staff skills and characteristics?

Today

• What are the staff skills and characteristics ?• How were they developed ?

Research• 20 video recordings – from 20 PO: 10 social workers, 6 law

graduates and 4 psychologists.• From 6 services located in different geographical areas.• Employed in 2001, 2004 and 2007• Look at the first session – symbolically the first opportunity to

build up relationship, clarify the roles, define authority etc.

• Normally – evaluation session – takes about 40-90 min.

• Each PO submitted 2 recordings – selected in the analysis the best one (but scores quite close)

ResearchI. What skills and characteristics – coding manual developed on the basis of Raynor and colleagues (2010, 2011), Bourgon and colleagues (2010, 2011), Trotter (2009), Dowden and Andrews (2004) etc. - Scoring – 1-5 where 1 - skill non existing and 5 – very good use of it.- 3 colleagues, consensus scoring

- Skill sets:- Interview organization- space, noise, proximity, psychological atmosphere- Structuring skills – warm up, start/middle/finish, clear direction, summary and next meeting- Relationship skills – role clarification, use of authority, empathy, enthusiasm, closeness,

summarization, paraphrasing, honesty, humor, self discloser, open questions. - Pro-social modeling – rewarding, confronting, respect. - Evaluation – explaining the procedure and scope, clear questions, clarifications, involving the client,

hierarchizing the needs, identifying the strong points, identifying the community opportunities. - Motivational interviewing – support, avoid confrontations, reflecting, amplifying discrepancies and

using the self motivating statements.

General mean scores per skill sets

Interview organization

Structuring skills

Relationship skills

Pro-social modeling

Evaluation skills

Motivational Interviewing

0 0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5 3 3.5 4 4.5

4.3

3.5

3.5

3.6

3.1

3.1

Mean (M)

Mean scores for structuring skills

Beginning,middle and finish

Warm up

Aim is clear

Short summary of previous session

Interview has clear direction

Summarising and plan next meeting

0 0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5 3 3.5 4 4.5 5

3.9

2.2

4.1

2.4

4.7

3.6

Mean (M)

Mean scores for evaluation skills

Explain what supervision is

Explain the dual role

Explain what happens if breached

Explain what is negociable

Explain confidentiality

Clarify the client's expectations

Mean of role clarification

Use normal voice

Describe options and consequences

Display a positive attitude

Firm but fair

Respect

Mean for use of authority

Display understanding

Reflect thoughts

Reflect feelings

Mean for empathy

Enthuziasm

Openness

Use of paraphrazing

Use of summarization

Display honesty

Relaxed and humorous

Use of self-discloser

Use of open questions

0 1 2 3 4 5 6

4.1

3.1

3.3

2.5

1.5

1.3

2.6

4.9

3.4

4.9

4.4

4.8

4.5

4.5

2.7

1.8

2.9

4.2

4.4

3.5

3.1

5

3.7

1

3.8

Mean (M)

Mean scores for pro-social modeling

Praise and reward

Suportive confrontation

Model and Respect

0 1 2 3 4 5 6

2.8

3.1

4.9

Mean (M)

Mean scores for MI

Encouraging self-efficacy

Roll with resistance

Use of reflection

Develop discrepancy

Self motivating statements

0 0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5 3 3.5 4 4.5 5

3.6

4.5

3.1

2.4

1.4

Mean (M)

Discussion

• Quite similar skills with the ones identified in Jersey, Canada or Australia.

• These are the skills but how are they

developed?

• Staff with five different educational background (different skills, different ideologies etc.)

Mean scores by educational background

Inte

rview orga

nizatio

n

Struct

uring sk

ills

Relationship

skill

s

Pro-socia

l modelin

g

Needs ev

aluatio

n

Motiv

atio

nal intr

eview

ing

0

0.5

1

1.5

2

2.5

3

3.5

4

4.5

5

4.3

3.73.5 3.6

3.1

2.8

4.4

3.13.3 3.3

3 3

3.93.7 3.6

3.9

3.33.5

Social Workers

Lawyers

Psychologist

- Scores quite close to each other – a common way of working with offenders

Interviews with staff

What made you work the way you work now?

University

Interaction with clients

Interaction with colleagues

Courses organized by the Ministry of Justice

Mentor

Previous experience

Intervision

Initial supervision

Self learning

0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

8

9

8

7

3

5

2

1

2

Frequencies

Possible explanationsThe differences at the point of employment are evened-out by ‘professional socialization’:

A social worker:

... I used to see the client as a man who needs a great deal of help. I pictured myself as a rescuer and used to ignore or overlook my role as a supervisor. If he didn’t come today and came the day after, there was no problem for me ... After a while I saw that this approach does not work. They started to abuse that and I have changed my approach now: if he does not come today and comes tomorrow he will need to give me good reasons (...) it is possible that my social work training makes me more tolerant but now this has

changed ... (Probation counsellor Bucharest)

A law graduate:

There are no differences between social workers, psychologists and us (lawyers) ...there was a time when this difference was obvious ... we, as lawyers, are more direct and maybe you look sometimes more superficial but the social worker analyses more, discusses more, looks into the beneficiary’s problems. This is what I have learnt from my social work colleagues by watching them. I watched them easily because of the rooms we have to share ... (Probation counsellor Bucharest).

Social learning in the probation service

• Reciprocal observations – facilitated by the architecture• Testing new approaches and learning the from the

results • Bureaucratic routines – exchanging clients• Training classes organized by the MoJ• Friday afternoon social evening• Intervision • ‘Kitchen talk’

‘Kitchen talk’

Conclusion

Developing probation skills is not a simple task – you take a course, you deliver it and expect changes

Change has to take into account existing routines, communication lines between probation staff, office architecture, openness to learning within the organization, informal ways of receiving feedback from the peers etc.

Thanks !!

idurnescu@gmail.comioan.durnescu@sas.unibuc.ro