COMMUNITY ACTION PARTNERSHIP

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2007 Award for Excellence in Community
Action Pathways to Excellence Initiative An
Overview CAPLAW National Training
Conference June 20, 2007 Building High
Performance Community Action Agencies through
Excellence and Continuous Improvement
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A Little History

• National Report What is a Community Action
  Agency? A Review of Current and Past Legislation
  Issued Summer 2000
• Partnership President Paul Dole, established
  Standards of Excellence Task Force -- Designates
  Bill Powell as Chair Winter 2001
• Input and Comments solicited system wide via
  focus group sessions, and initial CAA Standards
  and Award Application Process Developed 2001 -
  2002

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• Partnership Board Approves CAA Standards of
  Excellence/Award Application Process March 2002
• Standards of Excellence/Initial Award
  Applications Released New York September 2002
• First CAA Award Recipients (Four Agencies)
  Announced July 2003
• Pathways to Excellence Initiative Announced May
  2004

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Why Should We Enroll in the Pathways to
Excellence Initiative?
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Its about Organizational Transformation How
committed are we to improving our agency? Are we
ready to move from a compliance focus to an
excellence focus?
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Organizational Transformation
New System
Refinement Improvement
Alignment
Awareness
Old System
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Concepts to Remember
Key Concept - Excellence vs. Compliance
Excellence
Maximum Level of Performance
versus
Compliance
Minimum Level of Required Performance
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Concepts to Remember
Concept 2 - Continuum of Excellence
Approach/Deployment
0
100
25
50
75
Early Stages Many Gaps
Basics Met Some Gaps
Fully Responsive No Gaps World Class
Well Developed Few Gaps
Not Addressed
Results
Good To Excellence
Good Results Trends
Exemplary Results
No Results
Some Good
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Concepts to Remember
Concept 3 Culture of Excellence

• Every Organization Can Improve
• You Cant Improve What You Dont Measure
• Continuous Improvement is a Commitment and a
  Process for Achieving Excellence
• The Focus is always on Customer Needs and
  Expectations

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How Good are We? Compared to What? How Can We
Improve? Where do We Start?
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Award/Pathways to Excellence Goals

• 1. Visibility Showcase excellence in our CAA
• system
• 2. Recognition Identify and promote our best
• organizations
• 3. Reward Achieving excellence is worth it.
• 4. Sharing Proliferate best practices and
• excellence -- nationwide
• 5. Learning Make it easy for every CAA to
  improve

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The 2007 Award/Pathways to Excellence in
Community Action uses the Malcolm Baldrige
Criteria for Performance Excellence tailored to
the language and operations of the CAA system.
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Award/Pathways Excellence in Community Action
Linking the Standards of Excellence (for
Agencies) and the CCAP Body of Knowledge (for
Individuals) To Build CAA Capacity for Achieving
Excellence
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Defining an Excellent Organization Eleven Core
Values

• Visionary leadership
• Focus on the future
• Customer-driven excellence
• Organizational and personal learning
• Valuing employees and partners
• Agility/flexibility/innovation
• Management by fact (not intuition)
• Public responsibility and citizenship
• Focus on results and creating value
• Systems perspective

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Two Opportunities
1. Award for Excellence in Community Action
.. Are you ready for national
recognition? 2. Pathways to Excellence
Capacity-Building Initiative ..
Are you ready to begin your journey
toward improvement and excellence?
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But We Just Arent Ready to Compete for the
Award ...! No Problem!
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Pathways to Excellence Initiative

• Building Capacity for Excellence
• - Getting Started - Focus is on the
  Self-Study
• - Diagnostic process -- Using 34 National CAA
  Standards
• - Identifying Strengths/Areas of Improvement
• Benefits
• - Staff Team Training / One-year timetable
• - Comprehensive Peer Expert Review and
  Feedback
• - Answers the question How Are We Doing --
  Now?
• - Sets Agency Priorities for Improvement
• - Assesses Readiness for the Award for
  Excellence

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2007 Organizational Self-Study
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You cant achieve Excellence if you dont first
determine where you need to begin! The
comprehensive self-study, peer review, and
feedback report accomplishes this.
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The Self-Study Answers the Key Question
How Are You Doing as an Agency - Right
Now?
Compared to What.?
(Answer Compared to each of the 34 CAA Standards
which represent best-in-class CAA practices!)
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2007 Award /Pathways Self-Study
7 Categories
34 Standards/ Requirements
97 Self-Study Questions
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Self-Study Process

• Nine Months to conduct the agency-wide
  self-study.
• The organization responds to 97 questions
  organized within the 7 categories and 34
  Standards of Excellence.
• The agency describes what it does and documents
  how well it currently meets each of the 34
  Standards.
• This Self-Study is submitted for review by CAA
  peer-experts.
• The peer-review team evaluates the Self-Study and
  develops comments on each of the 34 Standards of
  Excellence.
• A detailed Feedback Report is provided within 3
  months of submission.

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• Your agency must honestly answer the following
  questions
• (1) Is our agency achieving excellence on a
  day-to-day basis throughout the organization and
  can we prove it?
• (2) Are we willing to rigorously examine what
  we do and how well we do it?
• (3) Are we committed to improvement?

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• What are the Standards of Excellence?
• The CAA Standards of Excellence describe 34 of
  the very best practices of
• the very best Community Action Agencies.
• These Standards help answer the question What
  does an Excellent
• Community Action Agency look like?
• The bar is set exceedingly high, as excellence
  represents the very highest
• operational benchmarks for Community Action
  agencies to strive for.
• The Standards seek to stretch the limits of CAA
  performance.
• Do not confuse these Standards with traditional
  compliance requirements,
• which represent operational minimums.
• The thirty-four Standards are distributed within
  a framework of seven
• categories of excellence.

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2007 Self-Study FrameworkSeven Categories of
Excellence

• 1. Organizational Leadership
• 2. Strategic Planning and Direction
• 3. Customer, Constituent, and Partner Focus
• 4. Measurement, Analysis, and Perf. Mgmt.
• 5. Human Resource Focus
• 6. Organizational Process Management
• 7. Organizational Results

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The Excellence Framework
Organizational Profile Environment,
Relationships, and Challenges
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2 Strategic Planning
Human Resource Focus
7 Business Results
1 Leadership
6 Process Management
3 Customer Focus
4 Measurement, Analysis and Knowledge Management
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2007 Standards of Excellence
What does an excellent CAA look like what does
it actually do day in and day out to be
excellent? Reference 2007 Standards of
Excellence Handout
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1.0 Organizational Leadership

• Examines how senior leaders address mission,
  values, direction, and performance and if they
  empower staff, and promote innovation and
  learning within the organization.
• Also examines how your organization is governed,
  and addresses the CAA Board, the Code of Ethics
  and the Promise, community advocacy, and
  low-income constituency involvement.

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1.0 Leadership - Standards
1.1 Leadership Focus 1.2 Mission Statement, Code
of Ethics, Community Action Promise 1.3 Board
Structure/Function 1.4 Committee/Advisory Group
Roles/Actions 1.5 Community Advocacy 1.6
Low-Income Involvement
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2.0 Strategic Planning and Direction

• Examines how you assess needs, set longer
  term/strategic direction and develop and update
  operational plans.
• Examines the strategic plan and whether it
  serves as a living document that guides your
  agencys near- and longer-term performance.

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2.0 Strategic Planning Standards
2.1 Strategic Plan and Deployment 2.2 Plan
Development/Updates 2.3 Mobilizing New
Resources/New Programs/New Partnerships 2.4
Strategic Measures of Success
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3.0 Customer Focus

• Examines how your agency identifies, listens to,
• and respond to the voices of customers, partners,
  and
• stakeholders of the organization.
• Examines how your organization builds
  relationships
• with internal and external customers and how
  feedback
• and measured data (level of satisfaction) is used
  by
• the organization for improvement.

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Customer Focus Standards
3.1 Customer/Constituent/Community Knowledge 3.2
Customer/Constituent Feedback System 3.3
Internal Improvement 3.4 Partnership System
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4.0 Measurement, Analysis, and Performance
Management

• Examines your agencys information technology
  and how it is used to deploy a performance
  management system and
• How you analyzes and use performance data and
  information for short- and long-term
  improvements.

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4.0 Measurement, Analysis, and Performance
Management Standards
4.1 Information System Technology 4.2
Measurement and Analysis of Organizational
Performance 4.3 Performance Management and
Improvement System
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5.0 Human Resource Focus

• Examines your staff learning and work systems
  success in enabling all employees to develop
  their full potential.
• Also examines how you build a healthy and safe
  work environment that is supportive of
  performance and organizational growth.

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5.0 Human Resource Standards
5.1 Policies, Procedures, and Personnel
Systems 5.2 Employee Performance Management 5.3
Employee Engagement/Participation/Well-Being 5.4
Staff Development and Learning System 5.5
Low-Income on Staff
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6.0 Organizational Process Management

• Examines your key administrative support and
  program/service delivery systems and processes
  and how you manage them to achieve overall agency
  growth and success.

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6.0 Process Mgmt Standards
Administrative Support Processes 6.1 Financial
Systems 6.2 Infrastructure Support 6.3
Purchasing/Procurement 6.4 Communications/Public
Relations
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6.0 Process Mgmt Standards (cont)
Program/Service Delivery Processes 6.5 Intake,
Eligibility, Assessment, Case Management, and
Follow-up 6.6 Project Management
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7.0 Organizational Results
Examines your agencys performance and
improvements in six areas
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Results Standards
7.1 Agency Outcomes - Program/Service
Delivery Results 7.2 Customer/Client
Results 7.3 Human Resource Results 7.4
Partner/Stakeholder Results 7.5
Financial/Accountability Health 7.6 Community
Recognition/Innovation Focus is also on
integration and use of ROMA Results
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Why Begin?

• Start doing the things that most affect
  performance/results!
• Stop doing the things that do not!
• Align People, Processes and Resources!
• Focus on Results, Impacts, and overall agency
  success!

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Lets Keep it As Simple As One, Two, Three
(3) Take Action
(2) Identify Our Vital Few
(1) Conduct an Organizational Assessment

• Set a structured path to continuous improvement.
• Set measures to track agency progress.

• Use the Feedback Report to identifying gaps
  between where we are and where we want to be (to
  achieve each Standard).
• Set priorities/next steps.

• Measure/Benchmark where your agency is at this
  point in time compared to each Standard.

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Contacts

• Community Action Partnership National Office
• 202 -265-7546 Avril Weisman or Lisa Holland
• Visit web site www.communityactionpartnership.com
  
• Click on Excellence download the Application
  Form
• Contact Jim Boyd, Award/Pathways Consultant
• 512-451-7448 or email xjboyd_at_swbell.net