For the past two decades, national policy in Sweden has repeatedly argued that social services should follow the principles of evidence-based practice (EBP) and that intervention effects should be informed by research. Conversely, there is a recurring critique against the “EBP movement” concerning a too narrow view of evidence and limited applicability in social services. Despite these differences, common perceptions advocate a need for local and systematic production of knowledge about the significance of interventions for service users. Individual-based systematic follow-ups (ISF) of interventions aggregated at group level could be a relatively undisputed path towards an increased knowledge base of social services.

Therefore, the article examines and problematizes different dimensions of how ISF is practiced and how results come into use in social services. The research was conducted within social service units providing non-institutional treatment for children, young people, and families in two Swedish municipalities. Both have several years of experience using the ISF models LOKE (Local Evidence) and FIT (Feedback-Informed Treatment) respectively. The empirical material consists of 8 observations, 45 documents, and 21 interviews with family therapists, heads of units and departments, executive directors, and development officers.

The findings reveal a wide range of types of use of ISF, which both overlap and presuppose each other and where the use differs depending on the user’s organizational level and role. Although the results are rarely used for development purposes in distinct ways, it is noted that the ISF models and their results play important roles within the organizations, for example strategic, legitimacy-enhancing and conceptual perspective-giving, which also affect work within the units.

Ways of producing local systematic knowledge in social services have gained attention. In Sweden, individual-based systematic follow-up (ISF) has emerged as a way to follow-up on interventions and produce local knowledge. Practitioners are responsible for collecting and compiling as well as interpreting and taking action based on ISF results. This article aims to understand how knowledge is produced within the ISF practice by looking at when and how practitioners reflect on ISF results. The research was conducted within social service units providing non-institutional interventions for children and families in two Swedish municipalities, with experience from working with the models LOKE (Local Evidence) and FIT (Feedback-Informed Treatment). The material consists of 8 observations, 45 documents, and 21 interviews with family therapists, heads of units and departments, executive directors, and development officers. The findings show how individual and collective reflections are central in producing knowledge from ISF results and why conditions for reflection need to be organizationally facilitated. It is oriented towards sense making within the context of practitioners’ daily work in relation to their knowledge and experience. Collective reflection on ISF results, undertaken with colleagues or service users, suggests a co-production of knowledge. However, depending on the ISF model, certain perspectives become more or less prominent, for example the degree of service user involvement. This is important to take into account when choosing an ISF model to implement in practice.