Core principles underlying the empowerment and family support approach to family development:
- All people, and all families, have strengths.
- All families need and deserve support. The type and degree of support each family needs varies throughout the life span.
- Most families are not dependent on long-term public support. Neither are they isolated. They maintain a healthy interdependence with extended family, friends, other people, religious organizations, community groups, schools and agencies, and the natural environment.
- Families come in many forms and from many kinds of backgrounds – these may not be the same as the family worker’s. Family workers need to gain an understanding of these differences in order to work and communicate skillfully with families.
- The deficit model of family assistance, in which families must show inadequacy in order to receive services (and professionals decide what is best for families), is counter-productive to helping families move toward healthy self-reliance.
- Changing from the deficit model to the family development approach requires a whole new way of thinking about social services, not simply more new programs. Individual workers cannot make this shift without corresponding policy changes at agency, state, and federal levels.
- Families need coordinated services in which all the agencies they work with use a similar approach. Collaboration at the local, state, and federal levels is crucial to effective family development.
- Families and family development workers are equally important partners in the empowerment process, with each contributing important knowledge. Workers learn as much as the families from the process.
- Families must choose their own goals and methods of achieving them. Family development workers’ roles include assisting families in setting reachable goals for their own self reliance, providing access to services needed to reach these goals, and encouragement.
- Services are provided in order for families to reach their goals, and are not themselves a measure of success. New methods of evaluating agency effectiveness are needed that measure family and community outcomes, not just the number of services provided.
- For families to move out of dependency, helping systems must shift from a “power over” to a “shared power” paradigm. This allows workers to interact with families as equal partners who, with appropriate support and equal responsibility, have the capability to set and achieve their own goals and a healthy self-reliance.
Core principles adapted for supervisors and leaders :
- All supervisors, staff members, and colleagues have strengths.
- All supervisors and staff members need and deserve support in the work environment. The type and degree of support needed varies throughout the span of employment.
- Most successful staff members are not dependent on everyday supervision; neither are they independent in their functioning. They maintain healthy interdependence with their colleagues, supervisors, and collaborators.
- Staff come from many kinds of backgrounds – these may not be the same as the leader’s. Supervisors need to gain an understanding of these differences in order to work and communicate skillfully with staff.
- The deficit model of supervision, in which staff members must show performance problems to receive supervision, and in which the supervisor decides what’s best for staff members, is counterproductive to helping them move toward healthy self-reliance.
- Changing to a strengths-based model of supervision requires a new way of thinking about the supervisory relationship. Supervisors cannot make this shift without corresponding changes in how they work with their department heads or more senior administrators.
- Staff members need to implement a consistent approach in which all departments use a similar supervisory philosophy. Collaboration between departments is crucial to agency functioning, and staff that feel disempowered collaborate less successfully than those whose strengths are valued.
- Supervisors and staff members are equally important partners in the supervision process, with each contributing important knowledge. Supervisors learn as much as staff members from the process.
- Staff members must participate in setting their own goals and methods of achieving them. Supervisory roles include assisting staff members in setting reachable goals for their performance and self-reliance, providing access to resources needed to reach their goals, and offering encouragement.
- Supervision is provided for staff members to reach their goals, and is not in itself a measure of success. New methods of training and evaluating supervisors and staff members are needed that measure outcomes and effectiveness of the supervisory partnership, not just the number of contacts.
- For staff members to feel valued and committed, the supervisory system must shift from a power-over to a shared-power paradigm. Supervisors have power because they participate in the distribution of valued resources (status, promotion, recognition). They can then use those resources to support staff members, rather than exert power over them.