- | Planning Tool
This Home Visiting Workforce Development Action Plan (Action Plan) advances the goal of and develops strategies for “recruiting, training, supporting, and retaining a well-qualified and committed home visiting workforce” (Goal 2 in the Strategic Plan). The Action Plan takes the workforce development objectives and strategies from the Strategic Plan and adds the detailed action steps needed to turn thought into action, and the evaluation metrics to determine whether a strategy is working. The Action Plan builds upon the significant effort already underway by First 5 California (F5CA) to inform policy recommendations that support the state’s efforts to build a cohesive home visiting workforce infrastructure. (author summary)
- | Brief
In this brief, we provide evidence on the Early Head Start home visiting workforce’s mental health, work stress, perception of organizational climate and personal safety, and supervisory and coaching opportunities. We then present findings from a multivariate regression analysis showing how factors associated with job demands—including recent home visitor turnover, work stress, and personal safety in the field—and job supports—including the capacity to offer virtual visits, coaching, supervision, and organizational climate—relate to job satisfaction. As covariates in our analysis, we include characteristics of home visitors and their programs that were found to be important in past research. These findings offer important insights on key correlates of home visitor job satisfaction. The brief provides policymakers and practitioners with evidence about factors associated with reduced burnout in the home visiting workforce. (author summary)
- | Article
Early childhood home visiting is a complex profession that requires knowledge, skills, and passion for working with families experiencing multiple challenges. Research on workforce satisfaction and retention relies primarily on data collected by current home visitors or supervisors of former employees and lacks depth. This current study was developed to better understand motivators that influence home visitors’ satisfaction and aid in workforce retention. Drawing on social exchange theory, a phenomenological approach was used to understand the home visiting experience and the intersection of relevant motivators for current and former home visitors in a midwestern state located in the United States of America. Findings indicated that home visitor satisfaction was heavily influenced by a mixture of positive and negative motivators that were intrinsic or extrinsic. Further, results identified three major themes related to job satisfaction, including a desire to help people, family efforts, and family needs, which intersected with each other and other motivators to impact decisions about staying or leaving the field. These intersections highlighted the importance of understanding unrealized passion, caseload considerations, relationships with coworkers and supervisors, and mindset. Implications for supporting home visitor well-being, job satisfaction, and home visitor retention are discussed. (author abstract)
- | Article
This article explores how staff turnover is a major challenge in early childhood home visiting programs. With this study, we assessed what drivers and dimensions of home visitor professional well-being relate to staff turnover in home visiting. We used survey data from all home visitors in one Northeastern U.S. state (n = 176) and program administrative data. We used survival analysis to determine which drivers and dimensions of home visitor professional well-being were related to staff turnover over a 5.5-year observation period. Home visitors who reported higher program functionality (opportunities for growth and achievement, role clarity and cooperation among colleagues) were more likely to remain at their organization. Home visitors with more prior experience in home visiting were more likely to remain, while those with greater intent to leave were more likely to leave their organization. Home visiting leadership may promote staff retention in their programs by enhancing opportunities for growth and achievement, role clarity and cooperation among colleagues in their programs. (author abstract)
- | Planning Tool
This resource is a combination of two items related to trauma informed supervision. The first section has strategies for “tuning” in as a supervisor and the following section has questions you can use to assess how trauma informed the supervision is. This is not an exhaustive list but it can be helpful in doing a personal assessment. (author summary)
- | Planning Tool
This resource includes ideas and questions to help supervisors implement Trauma Informed Care (TIC) in supervision.(author summary)
- | Brief
As a part of the Region X Innovation grant, this study seeks to identify the current strengths, gaps, and unmet needs in the home visitor workforce in Region X. In particular, it has been designed to help inform workforce recruitment, retention, and professional development needs to help ensure the well-being and effectiveness of home visitors in the region. (author summary)
- | Report
This report presents the first findings from the Mother and Infant Home Visiting Program Evaluation (MIHOPE), the legislatively mandated national evaluation of MIECHV. (author summary)
- | Article
Background – The Florida Maternal, Infant, and Early Childhood Home Visiting (MIECHV) program delivers evidence-based home visiting services to over 1400 families each year. Home visitors are integral in providing resources for families to promote healthy pregnancy, child development, family wellness, and self-sufficiency. Due to the nature of this work, home visitors experience work-related pressures and stressors that can impact staff well-being and retention. Objectives – The purpose of this study was to understand primary sources of work-related stress experienced by home visitors, subsequent effects on their engagement with program participants, and to learn of coping mechanisms used to manage stress. Methods – In 2015, Florida MIECHV program evaluators conducted ten focus groups with 49 home visitors during which they ranked and discussed their top sources of work-related stress. Qualitative analysis was conducted to identify emergent themes in work-related stressors and coping/supports. Results – Across all sites, the burden of paperwork and data entry were the highest ranked work-related stressors perceived as interfering with home visitors’ engagement with participants. The second-highest ranked stressors included caseload management, followed by a lack of resources for families, and dangerous environments. Home visitors reported gratification in their helping relationships families, and relied on coworkers or supervisors as primary sources of workplace support along with self-care (e.g. mini-vacations, recreation, and counseling). Conclusions for practice – Florida MIECHV home visitors across all ten focus groups shared similar work-related stressors that they felt diminished engagement with program participants and could impact participant and staff retention. In response, Florida MIECHV increased resources to support home visitor compensation and reduce caseloads, and obtained a competitive award from HRSA to implement a mindfulness-based stress reduction training statewide. (author abstract)
- | Article
The current, unprecedented scaling up of evidence-based home visiting makes it crucial to elucidate the factors and processes that promote successful program implementation. One key factor is the well-being of the workforce. Scant attention has been paid to the ways in which early childhood home visitors may be affected by their work with low-income, high-risk families, however. This mixed methods study examined Early Head Start(EHS) home visitors’ compassion satisfaction, secondary traumatic stress, burnout, and job withdrawal, and their associations with home visitor, family, and work characteristics. Data included survey questionnaires (N = 77) and individual interviews (n = 7). A subset of home visitor survey data (n = 27) was linked with data from EHS families (N = 102) to examine the associations between home visitors’ well-being and EHS families’ psychosocial risks. Overall, EHS home visitors demonstrated moderate to high compassion satisfaction and more variable levels of secondary traumatic stress. The home visitors’ occupational stress and well-being were associated with home visitor, family, and work characteristics. For example, home visitors’ secondary traumatic stress was associated with EHS families’ psychosocial risks. Home visitors’ burnout was associated with job withdrawal. Both quantitative and qualitative data showed that home visitors were exposed to varying levels of EHS family risk and trauma, and that some home visitors were deeply affected by this exposure. (author abstract)