Chapter 13

Intervention

Creating Alliances

The Power of Alliances

• Among clients sharing the same issues and interests

• Within clients' support networks

• Among clients and their service providers

• Among professionals (indirect benefit for clients)

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Developing Alliances Through Groups

• Creates synergy

• Groups become new resources

• Stimulating ideas, feelings, and experiences

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Groups and Empowerment

• Vehicles for – Personal growth– Skill development– Environmental change

• Traditional vehicle for empowering those who are oppressed

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Facilitating Group Functioning

• Workers use skills to– Conceptualize and initiate the group– Develop the system of mutual aid essential to

the group's success– Mediate interactions among group members

and between the group and its environment

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Mutual Aid in Groups: Mutual Aid Processes

• Sharing data

• Dialectical process

• Lend courage

• Similar experiences

• Reciprocal effects

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Mutual Aid in Groups: Mutual Aid Processes

• Holds members accountable

• Individual problem solving

• Rehearsal

• Strength in numbers

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Self-Help Groups

• Individuals with similar concerns join together as resources for one another

• Facilitated by peers

• Resources for – Helping individuals with specific issues – Strengthening sense of belonging

• Integral to empowerment

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Social Action in Groups

• Mezzo- and macro-level change

• Emerges from the processes of mutual aid

• Participants identify interconnections between – Personal difficulties – Public issues

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Social Support

• Offers protection from stress

• Provide opportunities to– Participate in social activities– Establish relationships– Enhance interpersonal skills

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© 2013 Pearson Education, Inc. All rights reserved.

Worker's Roles in Encouraging Social Support

• Designing conducive environments– Enhancing social relationships

• Enhancing interactional skills– Clients who recognize their interpersonal

skills & abilities carry confidence into relationships

• Activating natural helpers– All communities contain natural helpers

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Case Management: Client-Service Alliances

• Case management services– Organize, coordinate, and sustain a network

of formal and informal supports and activities

• Intent: Optimize functioning

• Focus: People with multiple needs

• Approach: Individual or team

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Impetus for Case Management

• Deinstitutionalization

• Decentralization of services

• Clients with multiple needs

• Fragmentation of services

• Nature of informal social supports

• Press to contain costs

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The Purpose of Case Management

• Facilitate client’s services & coordinate continuum of client-centered care

• Client-Focused Microlevel Tasks

• Service Delivery Mezzolevel Tasks

• Policy Practice Macrolevel Tasks

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Case Management: Activities with Clients

• Outreach

• Planning clients and other professionals

• Linking clients with resources

• Advocacy

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Case Management: Delivery System Activities

• Coordinating services– Ensure that services are responsive to clients’

needs

• Relating to other professionals– Workers use skills to enhance the

relationships of clients with resource systems

• Building responsive networks of services

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Workers' Resources for Case Management

• Knowledge about the consumers

• Knowledge about programs and services– Eligibility requirements– Costs– Restrictions – Application procedures– Availability

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Case Management: Critical Issues and Ethical Dilemmas

• Who's in charge of decision-making?

• What are the implications of managed care?

• How do case managers preserve confidentiality?

• How effective are case management services?

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Service Delivery Alliances

• Building interagency coalitions

• Teamwork

• Well-conducted meetings – State purpose– Follow an agenda– Complete business within the specified time

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Service Delivery Alliances

• Alliances within Organizations – Supervision; Peer review ; Consultation

• Job Stress and Burnout– Working effectively within bureaucracies – Shaping the work environment – Stress management

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Professional Memberships & Technology

• Collegial support – Cushions effects of stress; Reduces isolation – Assuages effects of burnout

• Professional affiliations – National Association of Social Workers– Canadian Association of Social Workers

• Alliances Through Technology

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© 2013 Pearson Education, Inc. All rights reserved.