The following article was written by our partners at Housing First Nederland.
The eight core principles of Housing First are the foundation of Housing First Nederland’s work. But we also know that in practice, “fidelity drift” is a constant risk. This isn’t a lack of will, it’s often a failure of alignment. Even with the best intentions, our systems can get misaligned. A support provider’s recovery-oriented work can be stalled by a housing partner’s rigid intake process, or a municipality’s funding stream may not be flexible enough for adaptable support.
The problem isn’t that our partners are failing. It’s that we often lack a shared understanding, a common language, to keep our complex systems aligned toward the same goal.
In the Netherlands, we decided to build a tool that can help to create that shared understanding.
The Dutch context
The Netherlands is at a pivotal moment. Our government has an ambitious National Action Plan on Homelessness, aligning with the Lisbon Declaration.
This National Action Plan marks a huge milestone. It accelerates the shift toward ‘Wonen Eerst’ (Housing First as a systems approach), a transition we have actively encouraged and lobbied for over many years. The plan marks a definitive departure from the traditional ‘staircase model.’ It adopts an approach to eradicating homelessness that prioritises housing. A critical and necessary step.
While we boost this system-wide expansion, we also believe it is still vitally important to safeguard the fidelity of the specific Housing First practice. These two goals – a broad systems approach and a high-fidelity model – are equally important. Why? First, because we know high fidelity leads to unprecedented results for people with histories of long-term homelessness. Second, because high-quality implementation strengthens the legitimacy of the system-wide Housing First approach. If the practice works, the system listens.
This new systemic view also has a powerful side-effect: it makes partners like housing corporations and municipalities, rethink their role. After all, if homelessness is first and foremost and always a housing problem, why should only the support services be responsible for the quality of implementation?
This is precisely why we needed a new tool: one that shifts the burden of fidelity away from just the Housing First support workers and towards a shared responsibility between support services, housing corporations, and municipalities. Success depends on all three.
The solution: a framework for shared conversation
This challenge is why Housing First Nederland, in partnership with the Hogeschool Utrecht (Utrecht University of Applied Sciences), developed the Kwaliteitskader Housing First (Fidelity Framework for Housing First). This framework is not a test to pass or fail. It is a tool for joint reflection and learning. To ensure accurate assessment – and the power to execute change – we encourage participation from both practitioners (execution) and management (policy) from every partner organisation.
The mechanism is simple but powerful:
- Colour-scoring (green/orange/red): A simple, visual way to get a pulse check on each indicator: ‘On track’, ‘In development’, or ‘Not in order’.
- Reflection: This is the heart of the process. It’s a space to discuss why a score was given, share experiences, and explore different perspectives.
- Action points: An invitation to translate the conversation into a concrete plan of approach, turning ‘what can be improved?’ into ‘how can we do this?’.
How we built it
The fidelity framework was built in co-creation with Hogeschool Utrecht (University of Applied Sciences Utrecht), and various field experts. We began with an international review and consulted with the international Housing First research network (part of FEANTSA). We were particularly inspired by the structure of the British ‘Staying on Track’ framework from Homeless Link, and the work done in Scotland involving local stakeholders in their ‘Check Up’ process. This international foundation gave us a strong starting point.
The most crucial step for the Dutch context was to run three separate focus groups with professionals from support services, housing corporations, and municipalities. This process ensured the indicators were relevant, fair, and meaningful to everyone at the table. It was then tested and validated in practice in Dutch cities, including Utrecht and Ede, to ensure it was ‘road-ready’.
Joint reflection on all principles
The real innovation of the framework is the process of joint reflection. This tool guides all three partners – support, housing, and municipality – to reflect together on their shared responsibility for upholding all the principles. For example, the separation of care and treatment becomes a three-way discussion about how the municipality’s financing is structured and how the housing corporation’s rental contract is truly a separation between housing and support.
This shared accountability is then hard-wired in the final two sections:
- Collaboration: This enables to reflect upon the health of the partnership itself. It asks concrete questions like: Is there commitment to the Housing First principles at both the strategic and operational levels of all three partners? Is there a mutual understanding of each other’s roles and responsibilities? Are partners willing to be flexible with their own internal procedures to serve the shared goal?
- Quality monitoring: This makes quality a living and joint process. It asks: Do staff of all partners stay well-informed about the Housing First principles? Do partners come together annually to jointly evaluate the quality of the practice and set improvement actions? To make this easier, Housing First Nederland has developed a specific Fidelity Framework Session. By bringing us in as an independent expert to lead the analysis, we ensure the conversation remains focused on actionable improvements.
Our Invitation
The fidelity framework gives teams a structure to move beyond siloed perspectives and toward shared, constructive problem-solving. It creates shared ownership for delivering a high-fidelity service so people can live sustainably.
In the end, fidelity isn’t a destination; it’s a practice. And as our new framework makes clear, it’s a practice you can only do together. We are excited to share this journey and our new tool with our partners across Europe.
Download the complete fidelity framework here (in Dutch).