September is Child Welfare Workforce Development Month. While recognizing the need for ongoing development, we must make sure we are looking to developing ways to support child welfare workers by building capacity.
An unplanned and underfunded strain on unemployment insurance agency systems will inevitably happen again; the question is not if, but when. So how can you ensure you are maximizing the capacity of your existing trained staff and serving as many customers as possible with the resources you have every day?
Capacity is a central concern for Medicaid agencies across the country as they redetermine coverage. The first step towards addressing this is to reduce the workload through ex parte resolutions. However, to truly empower the agency's workforce, it is crucial to equip them with the right tools and eliminate the need to search through multiple systems. While various data options exist, the key lies in proper curation - how we utilize, serve, and refine the data. By doing so, we unlock the full capacity of our existing workforce.
Fueled by increasing demands to improve federal measures and strengthen parental engagement activities and at a time when programs are experiencing significant staff attrition, decreasing budgets, and stagnant collections, child support programs are under extreme pressure to rethink how they serve children and families.
To effectively prepare for, navigate, and manage redetermination and associated program backlogs that will undoubtedly develop in the coming weeks and months as agencies unwind PHE, here are five critical steps agencies can take.
The current state of licensed foster families in the United States could be better, as there is a decrease in available homes. Licensing agencies must increase the capacity of licensing specialists to provide continuous support and simplify the licensing process to increase the number of licensed homes.
Our child welfare systems can feel like we are in a game of Jenga. We are attempting to grow and expand our systems by moving pieces one by one - while stretching our limited capacity. But with each move, the entire system risks collapse, particularly with worker shortages.
Strategies to create a system that is aligned, prepared, and has the capacity needed to meet demand…regardless of the month, 365 days out of the year.
The only way out of the capacity crisis is to serve our customers completely and immediately. And data can now help us do this, when used correctly and applied at the most opportune time.
When the public health emergency (PHE) and pandemic waivers come to an end, agencies must renew all existing Medicaid recipients. For many agencies already struggling with staff capacity to meet existing demand, they will no doubt be overwhelmed. To help agencies prepare for and tackle the wave of renewal workload, we offer specific steps that agencies can take to meet this increased demand.
