SHANARRI and The Promise: Supporting Scotland’s Commitment to Looked-After Children

The SHANARRI wellbeing indicators and The Promise share a common goal. Both aim to improve the lives and outcomes of children and young people, particularly those with care experience.

While SHANARRI provides a structured way to understand and measure wellbeing, The Promise calls for a deeper, more consistent commitment to ensuring that support is shaped around each child’s needs, relationships and experiences.

What The Promise Means for Practice

The Promise, published in 2020, sets out Scotland’s commitment to transforming how it supports looked-after children. It highlights the importance of:

Building strong, trusting relationships
Listening to children and young people
Providing stable, nurturing environments
Reducing unnecessary bureaucracy
Improving outcomes across all areas of life

These principles align closely with the SHANARRI indicators, particularly Nurtured, Respected and Included.

Strengthening SHANARRI Through The Promise

The Promise reinforces the importance of applying SHANARRI consistently in practice. It highlights that frameworks alone are not enough. What matters is how they are used day to day.

This means:

Ensuring that wellbeing is understood holistically
Recording information in a way that reflects real experiences
Using insight to inform decisions and support
Focusing on outcomes rather than process

For many organisations, this requires changes to how information is captured and shared.

The Challenge of Consistency

One of the key challenges identified by The Promise is inconsistency in how information is recorded and used. When systems are fragmented, it becomes harder to understand a young person’s journey and ensure that support is coordinated.

This can lead to:

Gaps in understanding of wellbeing
Missed opportunities for early intervention
Increased administrative burden on staff
Difficulty evidencing outcomes

Addressing these challenges is essential to delivering on the commitments set out in The Promise.

Supporting a Relationship-Based Approach

The Promise places strong emphasis on relationships. Young people should feel supported, listened to and valued by the adults around them.

For professionals, this means balancing the need for recording and reporting with the need to build meaningful relationships.

Geco Connect supports this by simplifying how SHANARRI is applied in practice. By organising observations within the wellbeing indicators and reducing duplication, it allows professionals to spend less time on administration and more time supporting young people.

Turning Commitment into Action

Both SHANARRI and The Promise provide a clear direction for improving outcomes. The challenge is turning that direction into consistent, everyday practice.

This requires:

A shared understanding across teams
Clear and consistent recording of wellbeing
Strong communication between professionals
The ability to evidence progress over time

When these elements are in place, organisations are better able to deliver on their commitments and support meaningful change.

See SHANARRI in Practice

If you would like to see how organisations are aligning SHANARRI with The Promise and strengthening their approach to wellbeing, Geco Connect can help.

Book a demo to see how it works in practice.