The rules at your agency go beyond warning you not to harm clients or community members. They represent the values of an organization and how the leaders of that organization put those values into action in the real world.

Employee Handbook, Training, and Continuing Education

One way the agency formally communicates agency culture is through the employee handbook, initial training, and opportunities for continuing education. When you joined your educational program, you likely were given a program handbook, and some colleges and universities have an additional handbook for those who participate in the field experience program. Those handbooks explain the program expectations, requirements and potential consequences of not following those requirements.

The employee handbook you receive at your agency should include the same kind of information along with material about hiring practices, employee benefits, and other requirements as dictated by the laws, statutes, codes, and licensing requirements for the agency. The handbook, along with the job description, is a contract between the agency and the employee that describes what the employer will provide and what they expect from their worker. Healthy organizations tend to update their handbooks regularly and make copies available electronically and in hard copy.

Onboarding, or the process of hiring and starting a new employee or intern, is another key indicator of agency culture. Best practice is for the new person to have a formal orientation to the agency on their first day. This usually involves filling out additional paperwork, reviewing the agency handbook, and an introduction to policy manuals. When this process is organized and welcoming, it communicates that the employee or intern is valued and important. That doesn’t always mean the person isn’t valued when the process is not organized, but it is something of which to be mindful. Think back to your experience on your first day at your site. What specifically did the agency do to help you feel welcome and wanted? Was there a designated place for you to sit or put your belongings? Were you given an agency email account? Did team members express excitement about your internship? Did they remember your name the next day? Were you given access to the tools you need to be a successful intern?

Another way an agency demonstrates culture is through continuing education. Human services is a constantly evolving field. New interventions and treatment modalities are always being developed, and to stay effective, helping professionals need to seek out new learning opportunities. Agencies that include monies for continuing education demonstrate that they value their employees and support and expect growth. Agencies who are not able to send employees to formal trainings or conferences can host brown-bag lunch conversations or book club discussions. There are many ways for agencies to invest in their employees’ ongoing education without spending money.

Policies, procedures, and practice

One of the most overlooked tools for assessing an agency is policy and procedural manuals. Before you stop reading, let me explain why. Policies tend to exist for one of two reasons. The first option is that the policy is required by a governing or licensing body—for example, it is the law that all employees who work in a child-serving agency pass a criminal history screening, and every agency must have a written policy. The second reason for a policy to be developed is that something happened either in that agency or a similar one that created concern, and a policy was developed. These second-reason policies are what describe the agency history and cultural practices.

Another way to think about policies is that they represent the macro level of human services. The policies provide the bigger framework in which the work takes place.

For example, not all organizations are required to have a policy regarding DEI, yet some choose to develop a policy to communicate to employees, services users, and the general public their commitment to DEI practices and education. Another example is an agency that had a policy that banned potlucks. Upon investigation, the policy had been developed by the previous human resources director who had gotten sick after an agency potluck and, out of fear of a lawsuit (and personal discomfort), developed and implemented a policy. That story tells a great deal about how decisions and policies were developed in that agency and who had the power to change agency culture without input. (The policy was eventually repealed and replaced with a safe food handling policy that absolved the agency of responsibility if someone got sick after a potluck.)

Policies are important because they provide structure to tell an employee what they must and must not do. They are formal, and they are reviewed and monitored periodically for appropriateness and need (e.g., the potluck policy.) Policies also keep an agency safe from legal action when an employee acts outside of the policy parameters. In private agencies, policies are approved by the BOD before they can be implemented and legally bind the agency to specific actions (or non-actions.) This helps lower the cost of insurance, which keeps the overhead expenses low, hopefully keeping them under that 25% rate. In public agencies, the process is more detailed and specific because it involves the legislature and other regulatory bodies, laws, statutes, and administrative codes, which we will talk about in a later section. For these reasons, policies are designed to be specifically vague to avoid the need for editing. The employee knows what they must do, and must not do, but not what they can do, or how to do what the policy is requiring. That is the role of the procedures.

Procedures take the policy and fill in the space between the must and must nots. Procedures represent the mezzo level of human services. Practices take the big-picture policies and offer a bridge to connect them to day-to-day activities. Procedures give you the step-by-step process of what to do. For example, in criminal history screenings, the policy states that the results must be approved before employment begins, while the procedure will provide specific instructions on what forms to fill out and submit, how to appeal false findings, and the frequency of repeat screenings. Procedures explain how to implement the policies. Procedures do not require board approval, which allows them to be amended to meet the changing needs of an organization. While procedures are specific, they can’t be all-inclusive for every potential situation or variation that develops. That is the role of practices.

Practices are how procedures really happen. Practices represent the micro level of human services. Practices are how those policies are carried out by individual agency personnel. For the criminal history example, policy states that the screening occurs prior to employment, and procedure provides where to access the form and where to process the form and get fingerprinted. That works well until there is an anomaly—an unpredicted complication. The perfect applicant lives two states away and cannot get fingerprinted at the site stated in the written procedure. The practice of obtaining fingerprints must be individualized for that one applicant. Practice allows the agency to be in compliance with the policy and maintain the spirit of the procedure but be individualized enough to meet the needs of a specific service user or employee.

Remember these three statements to help you distinguish between policy, procedure, and practice:

• Policy is the rule.
• Procedure is the process of implementing the rule.
• Practice is the rule in action.

Here are some questions about organizational structure that you as an intern might find helpful:

• How would you describe the culture of the agency?
• What are the DEI efforts and conversations in the agency?
• When was the employee handbook last updated?
• Who was involved in developing the employee handbook?
• Who writes/develops the agency job descriptions?
• How are policies and procedures developed?

Understanding the organizational structure can help give you a bigger picture of how the organization operates.

What Are the Rules? Licenses and Attributions

“What are the Rules?” by Sally Guyer MSW and Elizabeth B. Pearce is licensed under CC BY 4.0.