policy maker administrator.docx

7/27/2019 policy maker administrator.docx

1/3

Social Workers in Administration

Many career paths lead social workers into administration. Frequently,

these are social workers who concentrated on the more macro aspects of

the profession while in school. Often administrative social workers find

employment in private nonprofit agencies as Chief Executive Officers

(CEOs), executive directors, or program directors. Many also find work in

government agencies as heads of various government divisions, program

directors, or even commissioners of entire departments. Social workers at

the top levels of management are responsible for many administrative tasks.

For example, they ensure their agency conducts regular strategic planning,

which often involves community needs assessment. They oversee program

development, which includes program design, fundraising, and program

evaluation. Social administrators are responsible for staff development,

including hiring, evaluation, and termination. Social administrators are also

involved in policy advocacy and community education as well as interagency

collaboration.

Administrators of private nonprofit agencies assist with board development

for their organizations. This typically includes working with existingboard members to recruit and train

new board members. Social workers in

nonprofit management, given the importance of volunteers in nonprofit organizations,

must also take responsibility for recruiting, developing, and managing

volunteers.

In addition, nonprofit administrators spend a great deal of their time in

fund-raising. Funds are raised in many ways. Vehicles for fund-raising

include grant writing, grass-roots events such as walkathons and road races,

annual campaigns to solicit individual donations, planned giving involving


2/3

bequests, and capital campaigns to raise money for the development of new

facilities.

Social workers who go into administrative practice often enjoy developing

and administering new programs to meet emerging community needs. Given

their macro perspective, they like working with larger systems. And they enjoy

collaboration, coordination, and leadership. But if you have a macro perspective,

yet dont want administrative responsibilities, maybe social welfare policy

development would be a better match for you.

Social Workers in Policy Practice

Social welfare policy defines the context in which social services are developed

and delivered. Many social workers, particularly those who concentrated

in macro practice as students, find employment in policy practice.17

Policy practice in social work, by definition, involves the formulation, enactment,

implementation, and assessment of social welfare policies. While

some social workers in policy practice hold elected offices, social workers

more often find jobs as policy planners or policy analysts. Some work for

elected officials or in government agencies at the national, state, or local

levels, while many others work in private nonprofit agencies, especially

large nonprofit agencies at the national and state levels, agencies such as

the Childrens Defense fund, the Child Welfare League of America, or United

Way of America. Social workers firsthand knowledge of the needs of various

client populations is highly valued by policymakers in national, state,

and local government.

Social workers engaged in policy work carry out a variety of specific

tasks. They help to define social problems, analyze the values underlying


3/3

such problem definitions, set policy goals and objectives in relation to the

problems, outline policy options for achieving these goals and objectives,

consider various criteria for evaluating policy options, and ultimately, decide

on final policy proposals to advocate and implement. Social workers

involved with policy development sometimes are only involved in the

research and analysis that goes into developing proposals, while at other

times they make direct recommendations as to which policy options they

consider best. This is because social workers knowledge of how health and

human services are produced, distributed, and consumed is critical to the

policy development process.18

For this and other reasons, social workers in

policy practice enjoy the opportunity to develop

and influence policies that affect many people.

If policy practice as well as case work,

group work, and community organization are

not for you, social work offers employment in

still another area: research.

policy maker administrator.docx

Documents