Robin Spath - Academia.edu (original) (raw)
Papers by Robin Spath
Administration in Social Work, Jun 1, 2010
FORCES for GOOD What makes great nonprofits great? Not large budgets. Not snazzy marketing. Not p... more FORCES for GOOD What makes great nonprofits great? Not large budgets. Not snazzy marketing. Not perfect management. The answer is not what you might think. Great nonprofits spend as much time working with Institutions outside their four walls as they do managing ...
Groupwork, Dec 20, 2012
Work groups offer the potential to infl uence the structure, policy and procedures in agency prac... more Work groups offer the potential to infl uence the structure, policy and procedures in agency practice. Skilfully led work groups engage workers in a process where problems are identifi ed and explored and collaborative solutions are developed and implemented. A case example of a work group mobilized by a child welfare worker to restore parent child visitation rooms will be used to illustrate the planning process, recruitment of work group members, development of a common purpose and goals and facilitation of sessions throughout the stages of the group's work. Implications for practice focus on group leadership skills that enhanced the work, resulting in the success of the project and agency change. Barriers to the work will be discussed with suggestions for future projects.
Child Welfare for the Twenty-first Century, 2014
Achieving Permanence for Older Children and Youth in Foster Care, 2009
Journal of Public Child Welfare, 2013
This article examines the factors that can affect job satisfaction, organizational culture and cl... more This article examines the factors that can affect job satisfaction, organizational culture and climate, and intent to leave at a public child welfare agency. Findings from focus group data collected from direct line, middle, and senior managers revealed a passive defensive culture. The authors discuss concrete organizational interventions to assist the agency in shifting to a constructive oriented culture through enhancements in communication, including supervision and shared decisionmaking, recognition and rewards, and improvement in other areas related to working conditions.
Http Dx Doi Org 10 1080 15548730903347812, Dec 1, 2009
Journal of Public Child Welfare, Vol. 3:331353, 2009 Copyright © Taylor & Francis Group, LLC... more Journal of Public Child Welfare, Vol. 3:331353, 2009 Copyright © Taylor & Francis Group, LLC ISSN: 1554-8732 print/1554-8740 online DOI: 10.1080/15548730903347812 ... CARY E. JENSON University of Maine, Orono, ME, USA ... BARBARA A. PINE and ROBIN SPATH ...
Child welfare, 2013
This article examines the factors that can affect job satisfaction, organizational culture and cl... more This article examines the factors that can affect job satisfaction, organizational culture and climate, and intent to leave at a public child welfare agency. Findings from focus group data collected from direct line, middle, and senior managers revealed a passive defensive culture. The authors discuss concrete organizational interventions to assist the agency in shifting to a constructive oriented culture through enhancements in communication, including supervision and shared decisionmaking, recognition and rewards, and improvement in other areas related to working conditions.
Groupwork, 2008
ABSTRACT Work groups offer the potential to influence the structure, policy and procedures in age... more ABSTRACT Work groups offer the potential to influence the structure, policy and procedures in agency practice. Skilfully led work groups engage workers in a process where problems are identified and explored and collaborative solutions are developed and implemented. A case example of a work group mobilized by a child welfare worker to restore parent child visitation rooms will be used to illustrate the planning process, recruitment of work group members, development of a common purpose and goals and facilitation of sessions throughout the stages of the group's work. Implications for practice focus on group leadership skills that enhanced the work, resulting in the success of the project and agency change. Barriers to the work will be discussed with suggestions for future projects.
Child welfare, 2013
This article examines the factors that can affect job satisfaction, organizational culture and cl... more This article examines the factors that can affect job satisfaction, organizational culture and climate, and intent to leave at a public child welfare agency. Findings from focus group data collected from direct line, middle, and senior managers revealed a passive defensive culture. The authors discuss concrete organizational interventions to assist the agency in shifting to a constructive oriented culture through enhancements in communication, including supervision and shared decisionmaking, recognition and rewards, and improvement in other areas related to working conditions.
Children and Youth Services Review, 2010
The purpose of the study was to explore the contribution of personal and agency factors to job sa... more The purpose of the study was to explore the contribution of personal and agency factors to job satisfaction, organizational commitment and retention indicators (intention to leave, preference for leaving, and looked for a job) in a state child welfare agency with fewer than eight percent turnover for five years. On balance, results from this analysis reveal that child welfare staff are satisfied with their jobs and dedicated to their work. Most significant is the finding that approximately 50% of the staff report that they would prefer to leave, but salary and benefits are a strong incentive to stay. Organizational culture appears to be the contributing factor to this finding. Implications for policy, practice and research are discussed.
Children and Youth Services Review, 2011
A major challenge in child welfare is whether a program (or service) developed and successfully i... more A major challenge in child welfare is whether a program (or service) developed and successfully implemented in one jurisdiction, especially another country, will attain the same outcomes for children and families in another jurisdiction? This paper presents the" DCE ...
Child & Family Social Work, 2004
Journal of Public Child Welfare, 2009
Children and Youth Services Review, 2009
This article reports selected findings from a five-year, comprehensive evaluation of a program de... more This article reports selected findings from a five-year, comprehensive evaluation of a program designed based on principles and practices found to be most predictive of successful family reunification. The study reported here matched families in the program with families receiving standard state reunification services. Findings indicate that program and non-program children were nearly equally likely to be reunified. However, program children were reunified or achieved an alternative permanent placement sooner, and experienced fewer moves while in care than children in the comparison group. Moreover, program families were less likely to experience a re-referral to child welfare authorities after they were reunified.
Journal of Community Practice, 2008
... With these policy changes, there has been increased attention and research on reunifying fami... more ... With these policy changes, there has been increased attention and research on reunifying families (eg, see Connell, Katz, Saunders, & Tebes, 2006; Festinger, 1996; Fraser, Walton, Lewis, & Pecora, 1996; Hines, Lee, Osterling, & Drabble, 2007; Landsverk, Davis, Ganger ...
Child & Family Social Work, 2004
This paper discusses the case study approach to programme evaluation in the human services and it... more This paper discusses the case study approach to programme evaluation in the human services and its multiple benefits to the evaluator and to the various stakeholders in the programme being evaluated. Of particular importance is the use of a case study to examine programme processes which then inform the design of the outcome study of programme effects. Following a brief overview of the case study approach in research and its applications, the authors delineate its benefits and illustrate these using the evaluation of a model programme designed to reunify families separated by a child's placement in foster care. The results of the case study more clearly defined the programme's processes for both the researchers and the programme staff, and illuminated the desired outcomes which then were delineated in measurable terms. The result was a design for an outcome evaluation that was consistent with programme goals, processes, and intended benefits. The case study also facilitated communication and collaboration between the researchers and the programme's stakeholders, provided important information for agency decision-makers, and contributed greatly to the potential for the success of the overall evaluation.
Administration in Social Work, Jun 1, 2010
FORCES for GOOD What makes great nonprofits great? Not large budgets. Not snazzy marketing. Not p... more FORCES for GOOD What makes great nonprofits great? Not large budgets. Not snazzy marketing. Not perfect management. The answer is not what you might think. Great nonprofits spend as much time working with Institutions outside their four walls as they do managing ...
Groupwork, Dec 20, 2012
Work groups offer the potential to infl uence the structure, policy and procedures in agency prac... more Work groups offer the potential to infl uence the structure, policy and procedures in agency practice. Skilfully led work groups engage workers in a process where problems are identifi ed and explored and collaborative solutions are developed and implemented. A case example of a work group mobilized by a child welfare worker to restore parent child visitation rooms will be used to illustrate the planning process, recruitment of work group members, development of a common purpose and goals and facilitation of sessions throughout the stages of the group's work. Implications for practice focus on group leadership skills that enhanced the work, resulting in the success of the project and agency change. Barriers to the work will be discussed with suggestions for future projects.
Child Welfare for the Twenty-first Century, 2014
Achieving Permanence for Older Children and Youth in Foster Care, 2009
Journal of Public Child Welfare, 2013
This article examines the factors that can affect job satisfaction, organizational culture and cl... more This article examines the factors that can affect job satisfaction, organizational culture and climate, and intent to leave at a public child welfare agency. Findings from focus group data collected from direct line, middle, and senior managers revealed a passive defensive culture. The authors discuss concrete organizational interventions to assist the agency in shifting to a constructive oriented culture through enhancements in communication, including supervision and shared decisionmaking, recognition and rewards, and improvement in other areas related to working conditions.
Http Dx Doi Org 10 1080 15548730903347812, Dec 1, 2009
Journal of Public Child Welfare, Vol. 3:331353, 2009 Copyright © Taylor & Francis Group, LLC... more Journal of Public Child Welfare, Vol. 3:331353, 2009 Copyright © Taylor & Francis Group, LLC ISSN: 1554-8732 print/1554-8740 online DOI: 10.1080/15548730903347812 ... CARY E. JENSON University of Maine, Orono, ME, USA ... BARBARA A. PINE and ROBIN SPATH ...
Child welfare, 2013
This article examines the factors that can affect job satisfaction, organizational culture and cl... more This article examines the factors that can affect job satisfaction, organizational culture and climate, and intent to leave at a public child welfare agency. Findings from focus group data collected from direct line, middle, and senior managers revealed a passive defensive culture. The authors discuss concrete organizational interventions to assist the agency in shifting to a constructive oriented culture through enhancements in communication, including supervision and shared decisionmaking, recognition and rewards, and improvement in other areas related to working conditions.
Groupwork, 2008
ABSTRACT Work groups offer the potential to influence the structure, policy and procedures in age... more ABSTRACT Work groups offer the potential to influence the structure, policy and procedures in agency practice. Skilfully led work groups engage workers in a process where problems are identified and explored and collaborative solutions are developed and implemented. A case example of a work group mobilized by a child welfare worker to restore parent child visitation rooms will be used to illustrate the planning process, recruitment of work group members, development of a common purpose and goals and facilitation of sessions throughout the stages of the group's work. Implications for practice focus on group leadership skills that enhanced the work, resulting in the success of the project and agency change. Barriers to the work will be discussed with suggestions for future projects.
Child welfare, 2013
This article examines the factors that can affect job satisfaction, organizational culture and cl... more This article examines the factors that can affect job satisfaction, organizational culture and climate, and intent to leave at a public child welfare agency. Findings from focus group data collected from direct line, middle, and senior managers revealed a passive defensive culture. The authors discuss concrete organizational interventions to assist the agency in shifting to a constructive oriented culture through enhancements in communication, including supervision and shared decisionmaking, recognition and rewards, and improvement in other areas related to working conditions.
Children and Youth Services Review, 2010
The purpose of the study was to explore the contribution of personal and agency factors to job sa... more The purpose of the study was to explore the contribution of personal and agency factors to job satisfaction, organizational commitment and retention indicators (intention to leave, preference for leaving, and looked for a job) in a state child welfare agency with fewer than eight percent turnover for five years. On balance, results from this analysis reveal that child welfare staff are satisfied with their jobs and dedicated to their work. Most significant is the finding that approximately 50% of the staff report that they would prefer to leave, but salary and benefits are a strong incentive to stay. Organizational culture appears to be the contributing factor to this finding. Implications for policy, practice and research are discussed.
Children and Youth Services Review, 2011
A major challenge in child welfare is whether a program (or service) developed and successfully i... more A major challenge in child welfare is whether a program (or service) developed and successfully implemented in one jurisdiction, especially another country, will attain the same outcomes for children and families in another jurisdiction? This paper presents the" DCE ...
Child & Family Social Work, 2004
Journal of Public Child Welfare, 2009
Children and Youth Services Review, 2009
This article reports selected findings from a five-year, comprehensive evaluation of a program de... more This article reports selected findings from a five-year, comprehensive evaluation of a program designed based on principles and practices found to be most predictive of successful family reunification. The study reported here matched families in the program with families receiving standard state reunification services. Findings indicate that program and non-program children were nearly equally likely to be reunified. However, program children were reunified or achieved an alternative permanent placement sooner, and experienced fewer moves while in care than children in the comparison group. Moreover, program families were less likely to experience a re-referral to child welfare authorities after they were reunified.
Journal of Community Practice, 2008
... With these policy changes, there has been increased attention and research on reunifying fami... more ... With these policy changes, there has been increased attention and research on reunifying families (eg, see Connell, Katz, Saunders, & Tebes, 2006; Festinger, 1996; Fraser, Walton, Lewis, & Pecora, 1996; Hines, Lee, Osterling, & Drabble, 2007; Landsverk, Davis, Ganger ...
Child & Family Social Work, 2004
This paper discusses the case study approach to programme evaluation in the human services and it... more This paper discusses the case study approach to programme evaluation in the human services and its multiple benefits to the evaluator and to the various stakeholders in the programme being evaluated. Of particular importance is the use of a case study to examine programme processes which then inform the design of the outcome study of programme effects. Following a brief overview of the case study approach in research and its applications, the authors delineate its benefits and illustrate these using the evaluation of a model programme designed to reunify families separated by a child's placement in foster care. The results of the case study more clearly defined the programme's processes for both the researchers and the programme staff, and illuminated the desired outcomes which then were delineated in measurable terms. The result was a design for an outcome evaluation that was consistent with programme goals, processes, and intended benefits. The case study also facilitated communication and collaboration between the researchers and the programme's stakeholders, provided important information for agency decision-makers, and contributed greatly to the potential for the success of the overall evaluation.