1. Contact us
If you would like to discuss Social Care Services, please contact:
Chris Rayment twitter.com/OPMglobal
Tel: +44 (0) 1865 207 300 facebook.com/OPMglobal
Email: chris.rayment@opml.co.uk youtube.com/opmglobal
Skype: chris.opm linkedin.com/company/oxford-policy-management
For further information about OPM and our other offices, visit our website at www.opml.co.uk
Social care services issues we address Services we offer
Social care system reforms at local,
national and regional levels.
Capacity building and organisational
development.
Social care governance and management.
Stakeholder engagement.
Social care regulation and quality
assurance.
Policy analysis, research and development with a
multi-sectoral perspective.
Evaluation and impact analysis of policy and practice,
including mixed methods surveys, data analysis and
participatory research.
Support to strategic and operational planning.
Design of service delivery frameworks, including evidenced-
based models of good practice.
Design and development of integrated intervention models
and approaches (e.g. child protection, family support, social
care services for older people and people with disabilities).
Support for the effective and sustainable implementation
of large-scale service delivery programmes.
Design and delivery of training and education for social
care professionals.
Development of policies and operational frameworks for
quality assurance and performance measurement.
Design and implementation of monitoring and evaluation
frameworks and systems.
Clients we have provided services for
• Asian Development Bank
• UNICEF
• European Union
• UK Department for International Development
• USAID
• International NGOs
• Private foundations
• National governments
OPM works with a range of clients
including national and subnational
governments, international aid agencies,
civil society and non-governmental
organisations, the private sector and
local communities to combat social
and economic disadvantage.
We bring together, through our
international offices, the best global and
national expertise across a wide range of
policy domains to deliver responses that
are appropriate to local circumstances.

2. www.opml.co.uk
Social Care Services
The critical role of social care services in the wider social policy landscape is an issue that governments,
donors and other development partners are becoming more and more interested in. This is being driven,
in part, by an increasing recognition of the rights and diverse needs of children, persons with disabilities
and older people, as evident in the Sustainable Development Goals.
Social care services aim to prevent and respond to temporary and longer term challenges and vulnerabilities
experienced by individuals, with a particular focus on care and protection. Whilst social care services interventions
may be funded by or include some elements of cash assistance, social care services are in-kind services distinct
from cash transfer programmes. Examples of social care services include alternative care for children, early
intervention and rehabilitation services for persons with disabilities, and personal care services for older people.
Social work in a variety of forms is a key discipline at the heart of social care services organisation and delivery.
In some settings, social care services have been heavily driven and provided by external actors and/or non-
governmental organisations. In others – typically as economies develop and social policy matures – governments
are assuming responsibility for the formal planning and delivery of social care services, very often as an integral
component or pillar of national social protection systems.
Key questions that governments and development partners are continuing to explore include: What is the demand
for social care services? What are the expected short-term benefits for individuals, families and communities?
What are the anticipated longer term social and economic impacts of providing social care services, and the cost of
inaction? What types of social care services are effective and appropriate in different settings? How should social
services be planned, organised and paid for? Which government sectors and civil society actors should be involved
in the provision of services? How can social care service delivery be effectively coordinated and integrated across
sectors to achieve intended outcomes?
These are questions OPM can help answer.
In Focus
Image top-middle: © DFAT/Kathryn Outhred I creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/legalcode

3. Oxford Policy Management Sustainable solutions for reducing social and economic disadvantage
Some examples of our experience across the policy cycle
Monitoring
and
evaluation
Organisational
reform
Capacity
building
Using a combination of qualitative and quantitative methodologies, we are
evaluating a major US-funded project in Uganda, which has the aim of
preventing the avoidable separation of 43,000 children from their families
and reuniting 2,000 children living in institutional care back into a family
environment.
In Ghana, where the government has shown a strong commitment to
strengthening the national child protection system, we are evaluating the
relevance, effectiveness, efficiency and long-term sustainability of a set of
child protection interventions that have been piloted in 20 districts across
the country.
A rolling challenge for governments and partners seeking to develop or
strengthen social care services is ensuring that appropriate human resources
are deployed for the successful achievement of intended policy goals.
We carried out a capacity and institutional assessment of Zimbabwe’s
Department of Social Services (DSS), focusing on its effectiveness in
responding to the needs of Zimbabwe’s orphans and vulnerable children and
delivering on its statutory mandate of child care and protection. Learning from
this assignment subsequently informed the development of a methodological
framework for use in capacity gap analysis across East and Southern Africa.
We provided evidence-informed policy advice to the Ministry of Civil Affairs in
China exploring how social work can help improve social assistance programmes
by supporting a shift towards a social development approach, facilitate the
graduation of social assistance recipients into sustainable livelihoods and ensure
that the system is better able to meet growing and changing social needs. This
work included supporting the design of studies and surveys in seven provinces,
providing policy recommendations based on expert analysis.
We help governments to deliver social care services that are tailored towards
the needs of the individual and which support them in the family and community.
This usually involves significant changes to existing practices and the way that
services are conceived, procured, delivered and monitored.
We assisted the Kyrgyz Government in delivering on its social and child
protection policy commitments. This included carrying out assessments of a
number of residential care institutions, including those caring for children with
profound disabilities, and developing detailed transformation and alternative/
substitute service development plans.
In Tajikistan we developed and piloted a methodological framework to support
the commissioning or transformation of services, serving also as a tool for
setting, improving and monitoring service delivery standards.
In Croatia, we provided technical expertise to the Ministry of Social Policy and
Youth and to regional authorities across the country to develop transformation
plans for residential social care institutions for children and adults, and evidence-
driven plans for community-based social services development.

4. Sustainable solutions for reducing social and economic disadvantage Oxford Policy Management
Research
Policy
options
Policy
development
The Asian Development Bank (ADB) engaged OPM to advise the Government
of Mongolia on the design of a wide-ranging national disability reform,
which aims to ensure inclusiveness and strengthen appropriate integrated
services for persons with disabilities (PWD). OPM’s multidisciplinary team
designed and facilitated a consultation and engagement process with national
stakeholders, including PWD and national Disabled Peoples’ Organisations.
We produced detailed plans that will trigger and guide a significant strategic
investment by the ADB and the government over several years. The
framework for the reform includes: strengthening disability diagnosis and
screening to facilitate the shift towards a social model of disability, improving
service delivery for PWD including children, improving access to the physical
environment, improving work and employment prospects for PWD through a
dual offer and demand approach, and raising awareness to change negative
attitudes towards PWD.
For over 25 years, significant attention has been given to introducing
innovative social services in countries of Central and Eastern Europe and the
Commonwealth of Independent States (CEE/CIS) which, in combination with
other forms of social protection, have the potential to prevent and appropriately
address unnecessary child and family separation.
In order to better understand the extent to which national social protection
policies have proven to be effective, we carried out a multi-country study which
assessed strengths and challenges, showcased promising practices and made
recommendations for regional application, drawing heavily on the experiences
of those requiring or receiving social assistance.
We also completed a review of Family Support Services in East Kazakhstan.
In addition to documenting the development process to lessons learned and
promising practices, the team provided expert advice and support to ongoing
policy and practice reforms at national and subnational levels.
We carried out a situational analysis of the strengths, gaps, opportunities and
challenges of the social care sector in Uganda, proposing recommendations
and policy options for further strategic development. This included developing
an overarching conceptual framework and articulating a set of directions to
underpin a national strategy for social care within the wider social protection
framework, with an emphasis on integrated child care reform. The need for
family-based alternatives for children who require care and support away
from their families was clearly identified as a priority by stakeholders involved
in the consultation process.
Our findings and recommendations were published by the Ugandan Ministry
of Gender Labour and Social Development and comprehensively reflected
in the 2014 Uganda Social Protection Sector Review, the purpose of which
was to inform ongoing operational planning for delivery of the Uganda Social
Protection Policy.