Socialarbetares handlingsutrymme i förhållande till metoden Lean

This qualitative essay’s purpose was to interpret the expirience of professional social workers discretion after the implementation of the standardization method Lean. The focus of the study was on: 1) The expirience of changes in discretion from the perspectives of professional social workers and the perspective from managers after Lean implementation; 2) how does the social workers handle the discretionary limits through strategies. The study is based on six semi-structural interviews. Three with professional social workers and three managers in social work. Through thematization and analyzation it showed that the professional social workers did not interpret any discretionary changes with the implementation of Lean. The managers interpretation was of an increase of discretionary power for the professional social worker. Through earlier research we found tendencies of limitation in the discretionary power in planning for the professional social worker in Lean. We found that policies and guidelines implemented politically were more relevant in limiting the discretionary power of professional social workers. The strategies were related to finding loopholes in guidelines to achieve individualized care. The strategies related to Lean were related to managers implementation of the method. They emphasized on the importance of including the social workers in the process of implementation and the work on improvements