Nudging social workers towards interpretive vigilance: approaches supporting management of conduct in the workplace

ABSTRACT

In the UK, Government Inquiries into health and social work failures have burgeoned ever more bureaucratic regulatory mechanisms for managing the conduct of professionals. This article draws on the concepts of nudge theory and interpretive vigilance to consider the impact upon the social work profession of mandatory registration (licence) with a regulatory body. The author’s earlier UK-based empirical qualitative study found that, as a regulatory method, registration had perverse consequences contrary to its purpose. A secondary analysis of data identified ‘nudge’ points that encouraged social workers to engage proactively with conduct issues in the workplace. Risks caused by both active and passive failures of ‘interpretive vigilance’ by social workers, who had witnessed concerning conduct of other professionals in workplaces, were identified. Criticisms of nudge theory as ethically dubious are considered in relation to the transparency of nudge interventions. It is proposed that, in the context of international concern about the inefficiency of regulation, nudge theory may be a low cost, light touch, local approach to encouraging social workers to exercise interpretive vigilance to conduct-related risks and to take active collective ownership of conduct management in the work place.

KEYWORDS:

• Nudge
• conduct
• regulation
• social work
• risk

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes on contributor

Lel Meleyal is a lecturer in social work and social care at the University of Sussex. Her research interest is predominantly focused upon decision-making relating to boundaries, boundary transgressions and rule adherence. Drawing upon knowledge from a range of environments, such as aeronautical and petrochemical industries and disciplines such as economics and behavioural sciences, her work seeks to understand how decision-making is informed and how the regulation of professions might harness such knowledge to create regulation that enhances public safety.