Workforce Development

Effective family engagement—or the active, ongoing collaboration with families, children, youth, and other stakeholders—is at the heart of child welfare. It is the recognition that families are the experts on their children and are partners in the child welfare process. Agency leaders and program managers strive to continuously improve family engagement skills among their staff and understand that holding families at the center of the work of child welfare is vital.

Listen to this podcast to learn about secondary traumatic stress —the stress or trauma symptoms that a professional may experience as a result of working with children and families who themselves have been traumatized— also referred to as secondary trauma or vicarious trauma.

Child welfare agencies often experience barriers to developing and maintaining a competent, committed, and diverse workforce. Although multiple strategies have been developed to address these challenges, isolated interventions often struggle to yield positive results. Learn more about the workforce development framework in this podcast.

The podcast 'Workforce Part 2 – A State’s Approach to Change' shares an example of how one state changed its approach to staff development, as well as provides insight on the “must-haves” and lessons learned in moving away from isolated interventions and toward a targeted and cohesive strategy.

When state and local child welfare agencies collaborate with schools of social work, the results can benefit both parties by properly preparing future - and current - child welfare professionals and helping ensure curricula remains topical and relevant to the current needs of the field. Listen to this podcast to learn more.

Learn on this podcast about how the decision to embrace a system-wide workforce development approach may come from agency leaders, but sometimes the best ideas to deliver and sustain change can come from staff directly serving on the frontlines of child welfare.

Child welfare agencies all over the country are experiencing high staff vacancies and turnover—especially at the practitioner level. There are several strategies child welfare agencies can explore to address recruitment, retention, and other workforce-related challenges in child welfare.

The more our child welfare agencies reflect the communities they serve, the better they can understand and address the needs of children, young adults, and families in their jurisdictions. A diverse and culturally competent child welfare workforce can help agencies provide culturally responsive services, identify biases and barriers families face, and build trusted relationships.

Explore strategies and resources to help child welfare agencies be intentional in their equity work to strengthen a diverse workforce and improve outcomes for children, young people, and families.