Families Together East Lothian

A deliberate shift from reactive, fragmented support toward proactive, community‑embedded practice

The Families Together East Lothian service has been developed as a voluntary, family led support model that builds compassionate relationships, strengthens confidence, and connects families to local resources. Its creation reflects a deliberate shift from reactive, fragmented support toward proactive, community embedded practice. Here, we explore what Families Together East Lothian leaders and practitioners wanted effective early help and family outreach work to look and, importantly, feel like, and how the team went about putting their vision into practice. Developing guiding principles and practice descriptors East Lothian service’s Family Support Workers recognised the need to articulate what effective early-help practice looks and feels like. So they collaborated with the National Support Team to develop a set of guiding principles and practice descriptors. The principles and descriptors describe the values and behaviours that underpin relationship-based, strengths-focused support for children, young people and families across East Lothian. Guiding principles The guiding principles for the Families Together East Lothian service are: Compassion and understanding We will be kind, considerate, and compassionate. We will put families at ease. We will be present and listen to what is being said. Flexibility and family-led support The support will be flexible, family-led, and considerate of families' routines and needs. We will communicate using the language a family is comfortable with. Honesty and transparency We will be honest and realistic about what we can offer. We will maintain transparency in all our communication. Empowerment and potential We will support you and your family to empower yourselves, make changes, and realise your own potential. The benefits of shared guiding principles The benefits of defined and shared guiding principles help practitioners and partners focus on what matters for children, young people and families. They support consistent, respectful and relationship-based practice, provide a foundation for decision making and collaboration, and can be used with families and partners as a tool for reflection and learning. Shared descriptors The National Support also worked with the Family OutreachSupport Workers to identify ten interconnected areas of core practice, from Making Connections and Identifying Strengths to Quality Improvement and Learning and establish descriptors that describe each area of core practice alongside key related key tasks and behaviours. Key tasks and behaviours include: • Listening and building trust • Using tools like the Blossom Tool that supports conversations with families about what is going well, what matters to them, and what support could help them achieve their goals. • and Signs of Safety • Communicating in accessible language • Co creating realistic, family led plans • Collaborating with agencies and communities Create expanding section + Read the Core Practices and Practice Descriptors The ten Core Practices and associated tasks and behaviours developed by Families Together East Lothian are:

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The benefits of shared descriptors Developing descriptors has achieved several outcomes: • Consistency: Ensures families receive a coherent experience regardless of which worker supports them. • Reflection and Learning: Provides a framework for supervision, training, and quality improvement. • Transparency: Makes practice visible and understandable to families and partners. • Empowerment: Validates the professional expertise of FOWs and supports their confidence in relational work. • Measurement: Enables the team to assess consistency and impact using improvement or implementation science approaches. Together, these practices form a relationship based, evidence informed framework that supports early help and continuous learning and define the practice of early help family support in East Lothian. Practice alignment with national frameworks in Scotland Families Together East Lothian puts into practice key national ambitions for children, young people and families in Scotland. How the service fits with Getting it Right for Every Child (GIRFEC): • Identifying family strengths and co-creating plans mirrors the use of My World Triangle, that helps people who work with children and young people think about how to help them, and SHANARRI indicators. • Relationship-based practice and family-led planning are central to GIRFEC’s ethos of collaboration and participation. • Emphasis on communication with agencies and building community networks. • Using data and feedback to adapt and improve support. How the service fits with The Promise: • Prioritising relationships: The Promise places trusted relationships at the heart of care. • Supporting self-advocacy and family-led planning aligns with The Promise’s call for voice, agency, and choice. • Community collaboration as a part of the scaffolding needed. Summing up The development of Families Together East Lothian demonstrates how co design, relational practice, and intentional learning can transform family support systems. Creating shared practice descriptors has not been a bureaucratic exercise. It has been a cultural shift that turned diverse professional experience into a unified, reflective, and evidence-based approach. By articulating what good practice looks like, Families Together East Lothian ensures that compassion, flexibility, and empowerment are not just values but consistent, measurable actions. This clarity strengthens collaboration, builds trust with families, and sustains the long-term vision of Whole Family Wellbeing across East Lothian. Learn about Families Together East Lothian - whole family support focused on what matters most to families