The Role of Human Caring in Employee Retention in Child Welfare:  Practice Implications from a Two-State Quantitative Study

Alberta J. Ellett
School of Social Work
University of Georgia
Athens GA 30602
(706) 542-5409
aellett@arches.uga.edu
Purpose:   There have been numerous studies of employee burnout in child welfare (CW).  This study was designed to examine the role of personal and organizational culture factors in CW employees' intentions to remain employed.
 
Methodology:  This study was completed with all CW staff in two states in spring, 2000.  Survey methodology was used to obtain responses from 941 CW staff about self-efficacy beliefs, personal levels of human caring, and organizational culture characteristics. Initially, the measures were factor analyzed and reliabilities computed. Subsequently, a two-group discriminant analysis was used to determine which of the personal and organizational  variables best differentiated between the upper and lower quartiles of an Intent to Remain Employed (IRE) measure.
 
Results:  The IRE and human caring measures reflected single measurement factors with reliabilities of .86 and .79 respectively.  A moderately strong, positive correlation (r=.26, p<.0001) was evident between CW staff's intentions to remain employed in CW and human caring.  The two-group discriminant analysis was completed using the personal (self-efficacy and human caring) and organizational culture variables as an independent variable set and the IRE as the criterion.  A single discriminant function correctly classified 72% of the cases.  Interestingly, the human caring measure was clearly the most heavily weighted variable differentiating the two contrasting IRE groups.
 
Implications for Practice and Policy:  This study is the largest known study of employee retention in CW. The findings clearly show the important role that caring plays in human services organizations.  Human Caring, a theory-based construct, has not been previously studied as a viable theoretical construct in social work.  The results have strong implications for colleges/universities preparing CW staff, employee selection, early mentoring to strengthen affective aspects of CW staff caring, and on-going professional development for employee retention.  The full paper discusses the findings in view of these multiple implications.