DCSF nine step commissioning process
The Department for Children, Schools and
Families (DCSF) framework sets out nine steps that take
commissioners through a process designed to secure better outcomes
for children, young people and their families.
These nine steps provide a more detailed
breakdown of four key commissioning stages – ‘understand,
plan, do and review’. These steps are summarised in the diagram
below.
The diagram highlights the fact that these
steps should form an ongoing cycle rather than a one-off
process.
Commissioners may wish to use this framework
as a basis for discussions with partners, and to guide the
commissioning process.
Read the full framework
The steps, grouped here under the four key
stages are of ‘understand, plan, do and review’ headings, are:
Understand
1. Consider the current pattern and recent
trends of outcomes for children and young people in the area
against national and relevant local comparators.
2. Look within the overall picture at outcomes
for particular groups of children, young people and parents-to-be
(for example disabled, special educational needs, looked-after
children), as they may require a differentiated approach to service
provision or additional support.
3. Use all this data and the views of
children, young people and their families, local communities and
front-line staff to develop an overall, integrated needs
assessment.
4. Agree on the nature and scale of the local
challenge; identify the resources available and set priorities for
action.
Plan
5. Plan the pattern of service most likely to
secure priority outcomes, considering carefully the ways in which
resources can be increasingly focused on prevention and early
intervention.
Do
6. Decide together how best to deliver
outcomes, including drawing in alternative providers to widen
options and increase efficiency.
7 Develop and extend joint commissioning from
pooled budgets and pooled resources.
8. Develop the local markets for providing
integrated and other services, and produce and implement a local
workforce strategy covering service and role redesign, together
with the necessary ways of working to support delivery.
Review
9. Monitor and review to ensure services, and
the joint planning and commissioning processes are working to
deliver the goals set out for them.
