Independent Audit & Investigation

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Audit and review and investigation services is a broad descriptor for a range of knowledge, experience, and skills we bring to this valuable partnership process and its positive impact on the safeguarding culture.

The work includes; 

• Independent safeguarding audit.
• Independent case review.
• Independent and confidential safeguarding investigation (includes professional conduct).
• Independent `position of trust `risk, suitability assessment and coaching.
• Independent safeguarding cultures work.

The above categories are not exhaustive, so please ask if there is a piece of work that we may have the skills and experience to deliver.

What is our Independent `position of trust` risk and suitability assessment ?

After a police investigation has completed and when thresholds for criminal charge have not been met.  This still leaves the question of responding to unsuitable behaviour. 

This is where Woodland Baines can support in assessing the suitability risk and providing the organisation with an evidentially sound report for balance of probability decisions.

Woodland Baines are also commissioned to meet with volunteers or employees who consistently engage in unsuitable behaviour which nevertheless does not meet the allegations harms threshold.  

We then craft and deliver a bespoke package of suitability coaching to help really get under the skin of the behaviour and increase the chances of turning things around or providing evidentially sound opinion about how the organisation may respond next.

Our independent audit and review services offer a third eye perspective, inform internal assurance activity and help you understand and calibrate your organisational and professional blind spots. 

If you are willing to feel vulnerable, these services also offer an organisational opportunity for accelerated learning, growth, and support.

In our experience, each audit or review is a completely unique piece of work. There is no such thing as an off the shelf solution. 

This is why co-production is so important, and it starts right from the enquiry stage. 

We know the right questions to help you;

• Think through what you want to achieve and why.
• Pinpoint the relevant stakeholders and who the audit outcomes are for.
• Ascertain and agree what the terms of reference should be.

This helps us find the right approach, identify the right strands of thematic inquiry, and draw on the appropriate statutory, regulatory, best practice and evidence-based research metrics.

Our independent investigation service is rooted in decades of professional investigative experience. We also train others in safe and effective investigative interviewing (including vulnerable victims and witnesses) alongside sound and balanced evidential reporting. 

• We create safe and supportive spaces for those drawn into an investigative process.
• We support organisations managing complaint processes with a through, fair and independent investigation.
• We provide comprehensive and robust evidence files as part of reporting to aid the organisations outcomes decisions which result from independent investigation.

The Woodland Baines difference, put simply, is about how we want to approach life, and how we want to approach our life’s work. We never work with associates or forge organisational alliances where others are not in alignment with the commitments we have made. We are committed to ensuring the voice of children and people affected by exploitation and abuse is at the heart of what we do.  We aim to put the needs of the sector, those who have a duty to safeguard and protect above pure profit. We want to deliver exceptional quality services that are accessible, and affordable for all.

And applied to audit and investigation services it means;

• We will always create a safe and nurturing space for everyone when we are carrying out this work.

• We know it requires a willingness for work or behaviour to be scrutinised, and we want to honour the courage this takes.

• We will never compromise professional standards. Creating an environment that supports children to find their voice, and reporting their wishes and feelings accurately, is non-negotiable.

Because we want to deliver exceptional quality, we co-work or team-work where it is appropriate at no extra cost. 

This means that we employ a broader range of disciplinary perspectives, and deliver more comprehensive triangulation, higher nurture, and a more comprehensive range of developmental recommendations.