Mississippi Implementation Project Mississippi Department of Human Services
Statewide Implementation of a Family Centered Practice Model: Increasing Readiness and Managing Change Through the implementation project, “Readiness for Family Centered Practice,” the Mississippi Department of Human Services (DHS) is developing the organizational capacity to plan, implement and sustain its Family Centered Practice model. The project is oriented around three primary activities at the county, regional and state levels: 1) assessing organizational culture, climate, health and readiness; 2) teaming to develop and implement change strategies and organizational improvements; and 3) promoting a learning organization to support change. To build state and regional capacity to manage the change process and to cultivate organizational learning, the Mississippi project is conducting a variety of initiatives at different levels of its child welfare system. The project has first completed a system wide Comprehensive Organizational Health Assessment (COHA), which gathered and analyzed baseline data on the Division of Family and Children’s Services’ health and functioning at the county, regional and state levels. To address organizational culture and climate improvement initiatives and to develop grassroots solutions to organizational challenges the Mississippi project has begun implementing the Western Workforce Model, and, in particular, the model’s “Learning Circles,” in two pilot counties. This model engages direct service staff in researching and implementing recommendations for improvement. At the state level, the Mississippi project is mobilizing its state office staff to design and carry out interventions to address organizational challenges that are affecting state level functioning, capacity and workforce health. At the regional leadership level, the Mississippi project has initiated a series of “Learning Labs” with the regional directors to solidify their work as a team and support their ability to lead organizational change. Taken together, the activities described above are intended to augment Mississippi DHS’s capacity to institutionalize its new practice model and strengthen its overall ability to spearhead and sustain positive systems change. Statewide Implementation of a Family Centered Practice Model: Increasing Readiness and Managing Change [pdf]
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