Measuring organizational effectiveness to develop strategies to promote retention in public child welfare

Public child welfare agencies are under pressure to improve organizational, practice and client outcomes. Related to all of these outcomes is the retention of staff. Employee intent to remain employed may be used as a proxy for actual retention. In this study public child welfare staff in one Midwestern state were surveyed using the Survey of Organizational Excellence (Lauderdale, 1999) and the Intent to Remain Employed (Ellett, Ellett, & Rugutt, 2003) scales to assess the extent to which constructs such as perceptions of organizational culture, communication and other areas of organizational effectiveness were associated with intent to remain employed. A number of statistically significant relationships were identified which were presented to the public agency for use in the development of strategies for organizational improvement. Data were also analyzed regionally and based on urban/suburban/rural status to enable development of targeted approaches. This case study presents an example of how ongoing measurement of organizational effectiveness can be used as a strategy for organizational improvement over time in the child welfare system.