Transforming Human Services Organizations Through Empowerment of Staff

Abstract

Empowerment of clients has become a popular goal of social work practice. However, empowerment of social workers in their workplace has received much less attention. In order for human services organizations to transform themselves to meet the challenges that lie ahead, they must empower their staff and genuinely involve them in the process of redesign. While worker empowerment has been embraced by business corporations and other public service organizations, the social work profession has paid little attention to it. This paper examines the prevailing model of worker involvement in organizational change in human services organizations, and suggest that this model be revised in light of new demands and new understanding of organizational change. It identifies and challenges three main assumptions of this approach, and then proposes a new model in which worker involvement is formally sanctioned and is viewed as part of the professional social worker's role. It is also viewed as part of a continuous process of organizational learning and improvement. The paper details two illustrations of how this new model might operate in an actual agency setting. Finally, it discusses the implications of the model in relation to social work education and social work research.

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