Purpose – The purpose of this paper was to examine the impact of a highly structured, formulation focused consultation process on knowledge and attitudes towards personality disorder and on perceived practice with personality disordered offenders. Consultation was delivered by the Yorkshire/Humber regional Pathway Development Service (PDS). This pilot study sought to inform the development of this service and the support offered to probation Trusts across Yorkshire/Humber to implement the national Personality Disorder Offender Pathway. Design/methodology/approach – Consultation was offered to a number of offender managers working in the Yorkshire/Humber region. The impact of the consultation on their knowledge and understanding of personality disorder in general was examined as was their attitudes to working with this population and their perceived confidence and competence in delivering supervision to each individual. Findings – The findings from this small pilot study would suggest that the structured format used by the Yorkshire PDS was helpful in enhancing the probation officers’ knowledge and understanding of personality disorder as well as their perceived confidence in and attitudes towards working with individuals with a personality disorder. Originality/value – The study indicates that the structured format used by the PDS is of value and may be applied to the support offered to probation Trusts across Yorkshire/Humber as they implement the community specification of the national Personality Disorder Offender Pathway.

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to highlight the findings of a service evaluation project assessing the impact of team consultation to criminal justice staff working with personality disordered offenders. Design/methodology/approach – A qualitative design using content analysis of focus groups and individual semi-structured interviews. Findings – Criminal justice staff report increased awareness and understanding, use of a person-centred approach, development of formulation skills and defensible practice following team consultation. Practical implications – This paper will be of interest to practitioners who offer and/or receive consultation for work with offenders with personality disorder. Suggested changes to team consultation formats may be of interest to services involved with the Offender Personality Disorder Pathway. Originality/value – This paper contributes towards the emerging literature on the role of consultation and formulation on workforce development for individuals with personality disorder. It also contributes to the evaluation of the services offered by this specialist team as they support probation Trusts across Yorkshire/Humber to support the community specification of the national Offender Personality Disorder Pathway.

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to outline the qualitative evaluation of a training package delivered to offender managers (OMs) working to support the implementation of the national Offender Personality Disorder (OPD) pathway and to examine qualitative changes in the way participants approach case material pre- and post-training. Design/methodology/approach In total, 21 pre- and 21 post-training responses to a case vignette were recorded and used in the analysis. OMs were asked what they would like to know more about and what would they focus on with the individual in the vignette. The responses were matched and the vignettes pre- and post-training were identical except for the name of the (fictional) offender. Findings The responses were subjected to a thematic analysis and, whilst themes were similar both between questions and within each question over time, post-training responses focussed more on the offender’s relationship with the OM and showed a greater appreciation for the relevance of internal motivations (not just what but why). This tendency was less evident in all responses regarding risk/offending. Originality/value The OPD pathway is focussed on learning. The work is innovative and this paper adds to the body of early evidence which will hopefully inform future developments. In particular, the importance of involvement of probation stakeholders in the design and delivery of training is highlighted. In addition, it is expected that future research will focus on the impact of continued supervision for the participants in this study and, as such, this paper forms the beginning of a process of evaluating how and when various workforce development interventions are effective.

This article aims to articulate how criminal justice staff may inadvertently make errors of logic when working with offenders with personality disorder. The aim of this article is also to consider ways of working that might help criminal justice staff to meaningfully engage and motivate clients with personality disorder, properly identify strengths and avoid making these fundamental errors of logic. A way of working is, therefore, outlined which attempts to facilitate consideration of the offender’s inner world, their logic and their experience. As such, this article promotes a psychologically informed approach to criminal justice practice.

The Offender Personality Disorder (OPD) Pathway initiative has been in operation now for over a year and a number of different projects are working across the country to support its implementation. These projects involve health and probation working in partnership to enhance the case management of offenders who present in a way that is consistent with a personality disorder diagnosis. In other words, agencies are working together as never before to share expertise, to collaborate and co-produce risk assessments and sentence plans and to support offenders more effectively, particularly Downloaded from at times of transition. So what is the impact? This paper uses real life case examples to report some of the innovative practice developments that have come about during the first year of one such project (in Yorkshire/Humberside). It also uses qualitative data from focus groups with offender managers to explore the impact of working differently. The paper will highlight some of the helpful and challenging aspects for offender managers of working in partnership with a different organisation and organisational culture and will look at how the formulation-led, psychologically informed influence from health has affected both their personal and professional life. The paper will go on to discuss what we consider to be some of the challenges for the project in the coming months and years, and how the project intends to adapt to meet them.