Conditions for helping relations in specialized personal social services–a client perspective on the influence of organizational struc-ture

Abstract

This article highlights organizational structure as a factor influencing conditions for helping relations. It is based on a survey study and an interview study, both directed at parents in families that have parallel contacts in different parts of Swedish personal social services (PSS). The aim is to describe and analyse conditions for helping relations when clients with complex needs encounter specialized PSS. Low system trust, people processing dimensions of work, and an organizational and a professional emphasis on formal organizational structures and boundaries were found to constitute unfavourable conditions. Conversely, an occurrence of individual trust, people sustaining and people changing dimensions of work, as well as informal organization and individual social workers’ boundary spanning efforts, constituted favourable conditions. The article concludes that greater understanding of how clients are affected by contextual service conditions can give some pointers towards how to generally improve services for vulnerable and disadvantaged populations.