scholarly journals The Changing and Challenging Environment of Nonprofit Human Services: Implications for Governance and Program Implementation

2016 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 63-76 ◽  
Author(s):  
Steven Rathgeb Smith ◽  
Susan D. Phillips
Keyword(s):  
Child Protection ◽  
Human Service ◽  
Human Services ◽  
Business Models ◽  
Community Care ◽  
Service Providers ◽  
Safety Net ◽  
Order Effects ◽  
Human Service Agencies ◽  
Service Agencies

AbstractNonprofit human service agencies are an essential part of the social safety net and their role in many policy fields such as community care, workforce development, and disability services is growing. The funding, delivery and entire configuration of human services systems is in transition in the US, as in many other countries, albeit with great variation depending upon local and regional circumstances. Consequently, nonprofit human service agencies need to develop sustainable program and business models that are also responsive to the heightened expectations on transparency and accountability. In addition, policymakers and government officials will need to work closely with nonprofit human service agencies in order to ensure effective and efficient service delivery. Drawing on evidence from the policy and nonprofit literatures, this brief offers a set of hypotheses about the implications, and possible paradoxes, for the nonprofit sector that are likely to emerge from the increasingly competitive environment among service providers and corresponding pressure by public and private funders for more collaboration among agencies. We explore both public policy for nonprofits in human services and strategic responses by this sector, considering the first order effects designed to enable nonprofits to adapt to a reconfigured model, and the second order effects in which governments and nonprofits address the consequences of the first round. These effects are likely to vary by organizational size and by service field, resulting in quite different outcomes and relationships with government for large multi-service agencies and those in highly regulated fields such as child protection versus small nonprofits, particularly in fields such as community care with closer connections to the informal sector.

Client Empowerment in the Human Services: Personal and Professional Agenda

1989 ◽  
Vol 25 (4) ◽  
pp. 499-521 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yeheskel Hasenfeld ◽  
Mark A. Chesler
Keyword(s):  
Human Service ◽  
Human Services ◽  
Service Providers ◽  
Professional Lives ◽  
Life Chances ◽  
Human Service Providers ◽  
Human Service Agencies ◽  
The Social ◽  
Action Researcher ◽  
Autobiographical Accounts

The authors juxtapose autobiographical accounts of their personal and professional lives to examine the interplay of their personas and work in the social sciences. Chesler is an action researcher and change agent who focuses primarily on young people and their parents and on those providing them human services. Hasenfeld is an academic who focuses primarily on relations between clients and human service providers and on the systemic changes needed to improve these relations. They share domain assumptions, particularly a belief in the “good” society based on justice, social equality, and respect for diversity, are committed to improving the life chances of the oppressed and disadvantaged, and believe that empowering the clients of human service agencies is crucial to improving the effectiveness and responsiveness of such organizations.

Should the nurse change the light globe?

2009 ◽  
Vol 45 (4) ◽  
pp. 361-381 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anne-Maree Sawyer ◽  
David Green ◽  
Anthony Moran ◽  
Judith Brett
Keyword(s):  
Human Service ◽  
Public Management ◽  
New Public Management ◽  
Community Care ◽  
Administrative Supervision ◽  
Human Service Agencies ◽  
New Public ◽  
Human Service Delivery ◽  
Professional Workers ◽  
Service Agencies

Over the last two decades New Public Management, de-institutionalization and the growth of community care have radically altered the landscape of human service delivery in Australia. As a consequence of these changes, human service agencies have been compelled to develop mechanisms for regulating and managing the risks involved in frontline community care — and the management of risk is now pivotal to the practices of professional workers in this field. British research suggests that the emphasis on risk gives rise to greater monitoring and administrative supervision of workers and a focus on managerial rather than therapeutic skills. This article presents some early findings from an Australian study that finds a very different picture. Based on interviews with 24 social workers and nurses employed in community care, we found that these workers expressed a strong sense of agency when interpreting and negotiating the risk management policies of their respective organizations, and were focused primarily on the needs of their clients rather than bureaucratic procedures.

Right to Resources or Competency?

1996 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 125-132
Author(s):  
Carol A. Westphal
Keyword(s):  
Social Work ◽  
Managed Care ◽  
Service Delivery ◽  
Human Service ◽  
Service Providers ◽  
Care Service ◽  
Public Funding ◽  
Review Of The Literature ◽  
Human Service Agencies ◽  
Service Agencies

As public funding for human service agencies shrinks, privatization of service delivery becomes more prevalent, and efficiency is prioritized. A review of the literature identifies the response during the 1980s cutbacks in funding as an increase in the use of lay resources. This article will address the relevance and concerns this response might invoke for service providers today as privatization moves us into private, nonprofit, and more extensive managed care service delivery. Interviews were conducted with professionals and students of social work regarding use of lay resources and incorporated into the discussion and recommendation portions of the article.

Human Services workers’ experiences of rapidly moving to Telehealth

2020 ◽  
Vol 45 (4) ◽  
pp. 236-240
Author(s):  
Rachael Sanders
Keyword(s):  
Human Service ◽  
Human Services ◽  
Work Life ◽  
Strong Sense ◽  
Common Method ◽  
Work Life Balance ◽  
Life Balance ◽  
Work From Home ◽  
Human Service Agencies ◽  
Service Agencies

AbstractAs a way of restricting the spread of COVID-19, methods of social distancing were instituted in most places that people gather, including workplaces. As such, human service agencies have implemented novel ways of delivering services to clients, with a common method being telehealth. For some practitioners this was unchartered waters and required rapid adaption to their everyday practice. I was interested to hear about their experiences and what useful learning came from it. I spoke, informally, with 13 people across four settings in a regional city in Victoria, asking them about the problems, positive changes and innovations that emerged. There were reports of challenges to overcome as well as benefits that may well become long-lasting. Practitioners adapted quickly and successfully to telehealth, with only minor problems that they managed to iron out quite quickly. They were mindful of people’s differing levels of capacity and access to technology and learned to be gentle and kind to themselves and others as they adapted. Some people came to realise that they like to work from home because it improves their work-life balance. Others, however, are keen to return to the workplace; highlighting the importance for flexibility based on individual circumstances. There was a strong sense of improved communication between agencies as they were better able to connect via telehealth compared with former in-person practices.

When An Anthropologist Supervises Human Services Field Placements

1991 ◽  
Vol 22 (1) ◽  
pp. 11-14
Author(s):  
Therese Dillon Warden
Keyword(s):  
Human Service ◽  
Human Services ◽  
Value Systems ◽  
Field Placement ◽  
Pragmatic Development ◽  
Field Placements ◽  
Human Service Agencies ◽  
The Sixties ◽  
Human Services Organizations ◽  
Service Agencies

A strategic use of modified ethnography by Human Service field placement students' functions to raise the students' awareness regarding the existence, as well as characteristics and purposes of values and value systems in Human Services Organizations. The advent and growth of thousands of Human Service agencies in every community in the U.S., in conjunction with the paraprofessional movement in the sixties, has necessitated the parallel development of a corresponding career ladder. Field placements or internships have evolved as an integral part of education for individuals entering the Human Services field. Their philosophical and pragmatic development has been influenced in all phases by individuals from a multitude of disciplines. Social anthropologists have a great deal to offer the Human Services field and, in this instance, input into a rational protocol for a field placement regimen.

Exploring Policy Implications of Ethics of Care and Justice in Care Work and Human Services Organizations

2021 ◽  
pp. 193672442110274
Author(s):  
Christa J. Moore ◽  
Patricia Gagné
Keyword(s):  
Child Protection ◽  
Human Service ◽  
Human Services ◽  
Ethics Of Care ◽  
Human Service Organizations ◽  
Policy Implications ◽  
Service Organizations ◽  
Care Work ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Bureaucratic Constraints

Much attention has recently been focused on the efficacy of cross-sector collaboration within the field of human services in response to increasing rates of child maltreatment and subsequent foster care entries nationwide. Our research includes 200 hours of participant observation, in-depth, semi-structured interviews with 65 professionals broadly involved in the protection of vulnerable children and the support of their parents, and an analysis of 45 case files. It was carried out in a rural region of Kentucky between May 2015 and July 2017. We used established principles of analytic induction to analyze our data. In this study, we explore perceptions of power, authority, inequality, and bureaucratic constraints that emerge during organizational processes of interagency collaboration among multidisciplinary human service organizations situated within the child welfare system. We argue that ethics of care and, subsequently, care work are constrained by power dynamics, primarily embedded in bureaucratically structured human service organizations as well as in policy mandates that embody ethics of justice. We conclude that the tensions between bureaucratic constraints and professional workers’ desire to care for and serve clients often disrupt and undermine organizational missions and policy goals targeting child protection. We indicate the need to examine these structural dynamics at a policy level and provide recommendations with policy implications.

Cultural Competence in Three Human Service Agencies

1998 ◽  
Vol 83 (1) ◽  
pp. 107-112 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard H. Dana
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Competence ◽  
Human Service ◽  
Baseline Data ◽  
Minority Populations ◽  
Culturally Competent ◽  
Human Service Agencies ◽  
Service Agencies

This paper summarizes findings from applications of the Agency Cultural Competence Checklist in three human service agencies. This checklist was developed on the basis of published literature and culture-specific agencies were chosen to document checklist findings in settings known to be culturally competent. As anticipated, all three agencies were culturally competent in attitudes, although the range of services differed. This paper provides some baseline data for using the checklist in mainstream agencies in which predominantly Euro-American providers serve minority populations.

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