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Working together to manage workloads in Croydon

How Croydon developed a new approach to caseload and workload management.

Croydon is a large south London borough with a child population of 90,000 under-18s, which is the highest in London (Office for National Statistics Census 2021). It has high deprivation levels and more than 1,000 looked-after children placed by other local authorities. Croydon has high numbers of families in temporary accommodation, increasing pressure on social work services.

As a result of these factors, the borough has one of the highest levels of requests for support in London, and children’s social care does not always have capacity to respond. This means social workers can have high caseloads and staff turnover is high.

Using data to secure resources

Senior leaders made the business case for extra funding and resources to meet demand by using business intelligence to model demand and planning ahead. This involved:

  • analysing demographics and socioeconomic data: examining factors like housing quality and population trends to understand service demand
  • tracking referral trends: assessing the quality of referrals from partners like schools and the police.
  • identifying patterns, such as cases linked to domestic abuse or substance misuse which helped understand the issues driving demand for social work support
  • ongoing evaluation: regular performance reports track casework and ensure timely support for children. Case audits provide insight into demand, while financial modelling helps plan resources and build reserves for demand rises

Croydon’s strong business intelligence and commercial division played a key role in providing evidence for extra teams and resources to manage workloads.

Managing workloads effectively

Keeping workloads manageable is a constant challenge for leadership teams. Retaining experienced social workers depends on strong leadership, good administrative support, high quality supervision, and a positive work environment. Demand can rise at any time, so Croydon has put strategies in place to make workloads manageable, improve service quality and support staff retention by:

  • prioritising urgent cases: increased triage and oversight ensure the most urgent needs come first
  • using specialist teams: dedicated teams handle complex cases like early permanence and pre-birth assessments. This balances specialisation with overall system capacity, giving practitioners broad experience while managing workloads and reducing the impact of working with trauma continuously
  • providing administrative support: service coordinators take on tasks like arranging meetings and managing communications, freeing social workers to focus on families
  • holding weekly service manager meetings: face-to-face meetings help track children’s needs, ensure smooth transitions, and prevent delays

Retaining social workers

High workloads make staff retention a challenge, but Croydon remains an exciting and rewarding place to work. Croydon has 80% of children’s social care staff in permanent roles. The council focuses on strategies to keep social workers engaged and supported by:

  • creating a positive workplace: leaders listen to staff, address concerns, and provide the resources and support they need
  • strengthening team communication: regular face-to-face meetings between managers and teams ensure staff feel supported and heard
  • providing specialisation opportunities: social workers can develop expertise in areas like early permanence, pre-birth assessments, and legal practice, improving job satisfaction and career progression
  • improving administrative support: this helps reduce workloads and lets social workers focus on families
  • prioritising staff wellbeing, development, and support: Croydon helps retain experienced social workers and maintain high-quality services practice

Managing challenges

Croydon continues to experience challenges from budget cuts while managing increasing demand. This has impacted early help services significantly. As well as the effect on help services, pastoral support in schools has been reduced, leading to increased demand for social work services.

To help manage demand for services, Croydon have a strategy in place to ensure that the most critical needs are met first. This includes:

  • increasing triage and oversight to prioritise urgent needs
  • extending assessment times for non-urgent assessments
  • internally reallocating staff to different teams to help manage demand, with additional oversight to provide more support
  • occasionally providing minimal levels of service to some families for short periods of time where capacity to meet demand is reduced

Next page: Using new approaches to workload management in Cambridgeshire

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These resources have been developed by Research in Practice in collaboration with DfE.
Published: 24 September 2025
Last updated: 24 September 2025