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31 MARCH 2010
NO 1561
Group care practice
Child care within an organizational
context does not necessarily have to lurch in different directions,
frustrating both clinical or organizational operations. Clinical and
organizational requirements do demand different efforts. They can be
conceived as dialectic rather than counter-productive forces at the
point where either system's pull constitutes a partial investment rather
than a negation of the other system. In other words, clinical demands
for continuous flexibility and basic care decisions in the hands of the
group care workers can be recognized and carried out as basic
organizational
procedures. Organizational uniformity is established through
decentralization of power and responsibility. Management and
organizational supervision are called upon to oversee that care workers
fulfill their clinical obligations to their clientele. At the
same time the care workers can operate among themselves with a high
degree of variation in style within the agreed care and treatment plans.
Parallel to such a clinical/organizational conceptual shift is the organizational stance which demands a universal program policy and which requires care workers and others to formulate concrete and communicable care and treatment programs. Such programs have to define both the definite outcomes expected (objectives) and also the actual care and treatment activities to be pursued with the children and their respective families. Care workers and their supervisory staff have then the opportunity and challenge of defining their territory and operations within these spheres of work (Bakker and Bakker-Rabdau, 1973). Many instances of organizational interference with child care decisions can be traced to the absence of clarity about the nature and boundaries of group care practice, in addition to the tendency of organizational requirements to permeate uniformly all parts of the service. Clear enunciation of care and treatment objectives and procedures could establish the extent to which group care works as a vital part of the organizational machinery.
The above suggestion to define primary care or clinical work within a secondary system or bureaucratic operation is consistent with an organizational perspective which views the parts as a dialectic whole. But the purpose here is not to give greater credence to bureaucratic considerations but rather to call attention to the organizational context which constitutes the supra-system within which clinical work proceeds. Group care workers may feel even greater commitment to their work with the children and, hopefully, a true identification with practice rather than yielding unnecessarily to bureaucratic demands. In reality it is the larger context – the organizational factors – which ultimately shape and determine the nature of group care practice. Consequently, group care work has to be formulated, operated, and evaluated from an organizational perspective. It is within such a perspective that personal (clinical) care and treatment can fully proceed and flourish within a well-organized agency program.
HENRY W. MAIER
Maier, H.W. (1987). Developmental Group Care of Children and Youth: Concepts and Practice. New York. The Haworth Press. pp. 176-177.
REFERENCES
Bakker, C. and Bakker-Rabdau, M.K. (1973). No Trespassing:
Explorations in Human Territoriality. San Francisco. Chnadler and
Sharp.
