Leadership Development: A Pathway to Transforming the Public Child Welfare System

Abstract

Calls for systemic reform within public child welfare have been consistent, yet the system has struggled to respond adequately. This article discusses the issue of system reform by examining perspectives of caseworkers and supervisors on organizational readiness for change. It presents data from semistructured qualitative interviews with 29 public child welfare employees. The findings indicate that organizational leadership is the core determining condition for

Do the Components of Strengths-Based Supervision Enhance Child Welfare Workers' Satisfaction with Supervision?

“…Similarly, new leadership models are emerging that move from transactional to transformational approaches that focus on optimism, empowerment, and a collaborative team approach (Middleton, Harvey, & Esaki, 2015). Recent work looks at the role of leadership in influencing the change process, something that is also of great relevance for child welfare supervisors (Gentles- Gibbs, 2016). From an implementation science perspective, clinical supervision is essential when adopting a new practice model (Frey et al, 2012).…”

“…Inadequate training and insufficient supervision (Barth et al, 2008) exacerbate the stressful conditions and could lead to job dissatisfaction and turnover (Chen & Scannapieco, 2009). In addition, state child welfare agencies face the challenges of adhering to ever-changing state and federal policies and have to manage change effectively (Gentles- Gibbs, 2016) while trying to keep up with the rising number of children in care. These organizational difficulties have created numerous issues within the organizational structure, and one of the gravest is perhaps retention of staff.…”