Supporting Children and Families Through Trauma: A Qualitative Exploration of the Change Promotion Aspects of the Co-Creating Well-Being Initiative

Abstract

ABSTRACT This study investigated a regional foundation’s Co-Creating Well-Being initiative, a multi-year effort to increase human service agencies’ capacity in trauma-informed care, human-centered design, and diversity, equity, and inclusion. This research examined the change promotion process inspired by an innovative grantmaking model and the barriers and facilitators for organizational change. A stratified sampling approach was applied to recruit representatives from N = 33 agencies. Thematic analysis was used to develop a change promotion model featuring four main themes: pre-existing conditions, receptivity to opportunities for change, adoption to change, and early outcomes. Macro-level influences of COVID-19 and calls for racial justice accountability are discussed. PRACTICE POINTS Selecting leaders who have positive reactions to organizational change along with active participation in the change process helps foster capacity building in human service organizations. Enabling interactional justice, manifested as informational justice, which highlights equal access to thorough information on policies and decisions, and interpersonal justice, which highlights respectful treatment, could create a supportive climate for systems-level changes regarding capacity-building training. Implementing and sustaining capacity building requires regular organizational assessments that identify issues in order to adjust organizational systems and structure to respond to changes in external contexts and incorporate these changes into the design and implementation of change.