“We live and breathe this system.”

The Probation Service in England and Wales has used Interventions Manager (IM) since 2015. This cloud-based software helps officers to plan, deliver and monitor a range of interventions like accredited programmes and other group sessions.

The Programme Manager for the North West region has 20 years’ experience in the sector. They lead a team of 25, including 17 facilitators that run about 30 group sessions every week:

“We have about 600 cases on the go at any one time, and some of them will be high risk. That’s why Interventions Manager is so important to how we work; we can be sure that nothing’s been missed.”

“We’re not IT experts, and we don’t need to be.”

IM updates the nDelius case management system automatically. It also lets officers search by group as well as individual, which is why they use IM to find the ‘needles in the haystack’. For example, who else was in that session? Who spoke to them last?

IM was designed by experienced probation workers, which the Programme Manager thinks is pretty clear:

“You can see it was built by people who’ve done this job. It’s simple to use, really flexible and I’ve never wanted information that I couldn’t find quickly.”

Knowing all the data is there is helping the service to improve support for victims too. In domestic violence cases, for example, safety officers can update partners about what stage a service user has reached in their training. By explaining what behaviour changes they might expect, they can help to build trust and support both people to move forward.