Introduction
The Administration For Children And Families (AFC) endeavors to deliver quality services to the targeted youths, children and families. These services range from Child support, welfare, foster care, adoption assistance to overall child care programs. In order to achieve this crucial objective, the AFC is composed of an organized human resource management structure which makes it possible for this organization to deliver their services to the concerned parties. In this section of my assignment, I will major my focus on the organization design of AFC in regard to its human resource.
Organizational Design
The Administration For Children And Families was founded back in the year 1991. The assistant secretary for children, youth and families is the head of this organization. The assistant secretary reports to the secretary of the department of Health and Human Services (HHS). In the quest to meet its primary goals of offering support to families, children and the youths who are mostly underprivileged, the AFC has a well defined human resource structure that stretches from the helm of the organization to the grassroots. The administration flow begins from the head, who is the organizations secretary and flows down to the divisional program implementation officer who is responsible for providing leadership in regard to the Child welfare services operations and in the review of programs. The AFC also consists of other administrative components such as the Administration on children, Youth and families (ACYF) which is also responsible of advising the Secretary.
This agency, just like any other agency has its fair share of strengths and weaknesses. The chief strengths that the ACF enjoys is arguably the numerous capable systems that have been put in place to enable them to deliver their services. Some of the most essential and successful monitoring programs are Child and Family Services Reviews (CFSRs) and The Adoption and Foster Care Analysis and Reporting System (SACWIS). These are two rigorous evaluation systems which dig deeper into the agency’s problems, their causes and consequently suggest viable solutions for its smooth running. Another major strength in this agency is that since it operates under the HHS, it therefore enjoys a substantial amount of moral and financial support from both the government and other interested organizations. However, it also experiences some weakness as an agency. In regard to it human resource personnel , there have been an immense outcry by the field workers that there are no enough opportunities for for promotion and also that the agency does not in a regular basis review it’s human resource payments for this particular individuals. I consider this as a key weakness since it demoralizes the agency’s human resource capital especially the ones who are lower in the human resource structure. Another weakness that the agency experiences is the fact that despite the huge increase in the adoption rate over the years, the number of children awaiting adoption are still very high.
Global Linkages and Personnel Management
The Administration for Children and Families (ACF) agency has a large network of international linkages which it closely with in the course of meeting it mandate. Since the ACF is also responsible for provision of the safety, and the financially security of individuals who have undergone human trafficking, it is therefore able to liaise, through the government, with other global institutions which works tirelessly to contain the menace of human trafficking and modern day slavery (Duva & Metzger, 2010). In addition, through its emergency programs, they tend to be in the forefront in supporting affected families and children during catastrophic occurrences. For instance, in the early 2010, after Haiti’s catastrophic earthquake, the Administration for Children and Families (AFC) worked hand in hand with the department of Health and Human Services (HHs) to meet the needs of the more than 25,000 American citizens, 600 evacuees and assisted more than 600 Haitian Children to move through the process of adoption by the American families. Additionally, the HHS and the ACF have been well positioned to take in hand the numerous challenges that are being faced by the Hispanic Communities (www.acf.hhs.gov).
The agency is able to effectively apply its theoretical principles that form its professional objectives into practice. The Administration for Children and Families endeavor to deliver in respect to its mission statement which is to “foster health and well-being by providing federal leadership, partnership and resources for the compassionate and effective delivery” (www.acf.hhs.gov) .It is always dedicated to promote hope and opportunity to all the children, youths and families who are may be in need of human services.
Personnel Recruitment and Hiring Practices
The process of hiring qualified workforce calls for human resource systems that are able to discern between an unqualified, average and very qualified candidates. The Administration for Children and Families has been able to incorporate various processes that clearly outline the qualities that they need in a potential candidate. The first component is under their 2010 Hiring Reform Initiative (HRI 2010) which delineates the role of the hiring managers in the recruitment process. They outline the job of the ACF hiring manager as that of developing a hiring plan, participating in the Job analysis process , evaluate the candidates outcomes and providing a smooth transitional into the federal service. The other component of the hiring process is meant to prove to the public domain that the process has been carried out fairly and in line with hiring policies. There are the pre-consultation periods before the vacancy occurs then followed by finalizing the position’s description which is then followed by the announcement of the opportunity. Applications are received and the applicants notified so as to request for personal action. The whole hiring process is guided by the goals of ensuring that the agency acquires professional and highly qualified manpower that not only have the academic qualifications but also have the desire to assist the underprivileged families, children and the youths.
Employee Skills Training
The human resource personnel in The Administration for Children and Families are mostly ranked according to their prior experience in participation of various voluntary, and poverty alleviation initiatives. A potential candidate must have shown qualities and proof that they have an inner desire to work to work together with ACF to help provide safer, salient ,healthy and economic security to these underprivileged families and children. However, the ACF human resource department incorporates on job skills training to harness the experience and ability of their workers in carrying out their activities. They achieve this through work seminars, webinars and workshops.
Recruiting and Training Recommendations
After an in-depth analysis of the ACF human resource structure, I would recommend that the agency’s hiring managers and supervisors be going through regular training so as to equip themselves with the current preferences and new ideas in the human resource field. In addition , since the agency does not have an online job application system , I would recommend that they consider adopting this mode of Job application since it creates a large pool of [prospective candidates and therefore it would enable the agency to choose the best fitted candidates from a large variety of applicants.
References
Children and families,ACF.Gov, www.acf.hhs.gov . web Retrieved May 13th 2013
Curry, D., McCarragher, T., & Dellmann-Jenkins, M. (2005). Training, transfer, and turnover:
Exploring the relationship among transfer of learning factors and staff retention in child
welfare. Children and Youth Services Review, 27(8), 931-948.
Duva, J., & Metzger, S. (2010). Addressing poverty as a major risk factor in child neglect:
Promising policy and practice. Protecting Children, 25(1), 63-74.
Hiring reform, HHS.gov, http://www.hhs.gov/asa/ohr/site_map.html web Retrieved May 13th
2013
