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Organizational Change Work Group

Overview

The Organizational Change Work Group includes action-research projects on changing paradigms in human service organizations and the study of volunteer-oriented, nonprofit community organizations as learning organizations. Participants include: Kimberly Bess, Doug Perkins, Paul Speer, Susan Brooks, Laurie Hauber, Lynette Jacobs-Priebe, Michael Nelson, Patricia Conway, Courte Voorhees, Emily Thaden, Leslie Collins, and Diana Jones .

Philosophy

Organizations such as community centers, human service agencies, health services, and government departments play a vital role in community well-being. These organizations implement programs and policies that impact the psychological, economic, social, and health status of the population. As such, they constitute essential sites of social intervention. Our philosophy is based on values for personal (self-determination, health, caring and compassion, meaning and spirituality), relational (sense of community, collaboration and democratic participation, respect for diversity), and collective (social justice, support for community structures) well-being.

Methodologies

Our main approach is action research. We generate knowledge in a participatory way, using quantitative and qualitative methods, and strive to involve all stakeholders in the design and implementation of the research. Once we collect and analyze data we feed it back to our organizational partners in order to make use of the information. We engage in both process and outcome evaluations.

Sample Research Projects

1. New SPECs: Shifting the paradigm in health and human services. This is a three-year action research project designed to promote a new approach based on Strengths, Prevention, Empowerment, and Changing community conditions (hence the acronym SPEC). The project is a partnership among five local health and human service organizations. After the first year of the project, there are already concrete changes such as new strategic plans for various partners, new programs, revised mission statements, innovative funding proposals, and participatory structures within each agency.
   
2. VIP: Vision Implementation Project with a state social services organization. This is an emergent organizational change project that is designed and implemented by organizational members to raise voice and choice for front-line workers.
   
3. Learning Communities & Community Organizations: Funded by the Learning Sciences Institute, this two-year project (2002-2004) explored the role of learning in nonprofit community organizations. We examined learning, participation, power, and decision-making processes at both the individual level of leaders, staff, and volunteers and organizational levels. A database of 2,361 community-based, nonprofit human service, volunteer, and member organizations throughout Nashville was compiled, quantitative survey data gathered from 270 organizations, and in depth qualitative case studies conducted of 18 organizations representing nine types: social/family/senior services, youth/recreational, faith-based, school-based, neighborhood, immigrant/international, environmental/community development, political/advocacy, and labor.
4. Monitoring Change in the Network of Organizations Addressing Youth Violence.
   Doug Perkins, Kimberly Bess, Paul Speer, and Dan Cooper are conducting a three-year study monitoring and analyzing changes in the network of nonprofit organizations and public agencies addressing youth violence in Nashville. They will focus on (1) organizational relationships at the city level, (2) the external networks of each of 12 middle schools participating in a bullying and violence prevention experiment, and (3) change in the resources each organization devotes to youth violence prevention and in the approaches taken, with particular attention to ones that are strengths-based, primary preventive, empowering, and focused on changing root causes of violence in the community. The study is part of the Nashville Urban Partnership Academic Center of Excellence funded by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control. For more information, please visit the NUPACE home page.

Sample Publications

Prilleltensky, I. (in press). "Promoting well-being: Time for a paradigm shift in health and human services." Scandinavian Journal of Public Health.

Evans, S., Hanlin, C., & Prilleltensky, I. (in press). "Blending Ameliorative and Transformative Approaches in Human Service Organizations: A Case Study." Journal of Community Psychology.

Totikidis, V., & Prilleltensky, I. (in press). "Engaging community through a Cycle of Praxis: Multicultural Perspectives on Personal, Relational, and Collective Wellness." Community, Work, and Family.

Morsillo. J., & Prilleltensky, I. (in press). "Social Action with Youth: Interventions, Evaluation, and Psychopolitical Validity." Journal of Community Psychology.

Perkins, D.D., Bess, K., Cooper, D.G., Jones, D. Armstead, T., & Speer, P.W. (in press). "Community organizational learning: Case studies illustrating a three-dimensional model of levels and orders of change." Journal of Community Psychology.

Speer, P.W., & Perkins, D.D. (2003). "Community organizations, agencies and groups: Significance for children and teens." In J.W. Guthrie (Ed.), Encyclopedia of Education (2nd Ed.)(pp. 431-441). New York: Macmillan.