A few days ago I was fortunate to present at a conference in New Mexico for community corrections workers in juvenile justice transition programs.  They were a fun group, and the State is moving the programs in really good directions.  The major paradigm shift is from a "do as you are told" philosophy to a "setting goals and doing with, or coaching" philosophy.  If they are able to succeed in this change, then their young people create more successful lives.

The prescribing, or do as you are told approach only produces between 30 and 35 percent commitment and adherence to the goals in almost any human interaction.  When people work together to establish goals and strategies that number doubles to around 70 percent.  This holds true any time we are working with someone over the age of puberty.  The failure to recognize this contributes greatly to much of our failure in our parenting, human services programs, businesses and any other relationship-based process.  This can be an especially painful and costly failure both in corrections and in Child Welfare.

The greatest human need is a sense of personal significance, and doing what others want at the cost of our own will violates that need.  We only do what someone wants us to do if we perceive there is something in it for us.  Furthermore, we always balance the benefit of complying against the price of the loss of personal freedom involved.  So even if we start out being motivated, if we have no input we lose that motivation over time. 

One of the major side effects of the ignorance of this principle in Child Welfare is the high rates of children being inappropriately removed from families in some states.  Child Welfare agencies which set up services which don't address the needs of birth parents, then make the birth parents jump through hoops which produce even more chaos in the lives of families.  This sets families up to lose their children.  These approaches damage everyone, and are expensive in both human and monetary terms.

Agencies which partner with parents and develop unique solutions tailored to each family preserve families and actually contribute to the welfare of the families, children and the community as a whole. Unfortunately as agencies become busier, there is a tendency to ignore or rush through the collaborative processes and go back to simply telling families what to do.  When this is combined with reduced funding for supportive services, children are removed from families at higher rates.  This isn't due to the families lack of love for their children.  That doesn't change.  What changes is the type of service approach offered to families and the inability of families to comply with insane service requirements.  In short, the preservation goals are sabotaged by the strategies of the Child Welfare agency, and everyone suffers, especially the children and families.

Where collaborative teaming approaches are consistently implemented in Child Welfare practice, and that teaming is extended to individualized family service strategies, most children can stay in their families and a genuine service to the community exists.  When these approaches break down, the same agencies can and do actually cause harm.