State CASA Organizations Strengthen Program Staff Leadership Skills Through Training

The Georgia and Texas state CASA organizations are building leadership skills in their local CASA program staff with statewide trainings. Though the initiatives of the two states vary in the details, the results have been similar: Program staff give the training high marks, indicating that they feel empowered by the knowledge gained and more connected to their peers around the state.

2011 Georgia CASA Leadership Academy

The January ice storm may have delayed graduation for 23 Georgia Leadership Academy participants, but nothing could diminish the group’s enthusiasm for this new initiative.

The Georgia CASA Leadership Academy, a six-month training delivered in partnership with Dale Carnegie Training, included 21 CASA program directors and two Georgia CASA staff members. All participants completed an application that enabled them to share their leadership strengths and challenges.

Over the course of the training, participants attended a kick-off event, three full days of training and a working graduation event. In addition, each staff member had a 360-degree assessment both before and after the training, completed by the board chair or supervisor, fellow employees, CASA volunteers and others. In-class work was augmented by several out of class assignments, two Dale Carnegie leadership books and a final project that included a management plan and innovation project.

State Director Duaine Hathaway championed the development of the Leadership Academy to his board of directors, which approved funds for the training, because he believes that program staff need an opportunity to step back and think about the challenges they face in their daily work.

“I come from a corporate world,” said Hathaway. “I know that we all get caught up in our own way of seeing things. I saw this training as an opportunity for program staff to engage in a bigger sphere of thinking, to gain a new perspective on their work.”

Program Operations Director Jennifer King summed up what she observed to be the three primary benefits to participants: Newer staff gained needed confidence; long-timers were re-energized; and everyone benefited from the shared experience and resulting support for their respective leadership journeys.

The leadership momentum will continue in Georgia with monthly calls, annual or semi-annual trainings on topics related to leadership and additional opportunities for those who were interested but unable to participate.

Texas CASA Leadership Program

For many years, Texas CASA has provided training opportunities to program staff through events including annual conferences, spring executive director retreats and quarterly program management trainings for new directors.

“We have a pretty rigorous training schedule,” says Program and Training Specialist Deedra Baker.

In 2010 the state organization held its first leadership training for CASA executive directors. Recognizing that heads of the 69 Texas CASA programs have varying levels of leadership experience, Baker decided to focus the annual executive directors’ retreat on leadership development skills. She chose the book The Leadership Challenge, by Jim Kouzes and Barry Posner, as their guide and contracted with facilitators to deliver the two-day training.

The Leadership Challenge training is built around five principles, including that leadership is everyone’s business and leadership is learned. These and other tenets resonated with Baker.

“Our work is all about modeling leadership skills, enabling others to act, encouraging and appreciating staff and volunteers,” said Baker. “These are all skills of a leader, but many of our program staff have risen through the ranks and arrived with little or no leadership experience.”

In 2011, Baker built on the success of the previous year’s executive director training. She contracted with a second group, Pacific Accord, to develop a training to be offered in conjunction with Texas CASA Day at the Capitol. Where the 2010 training focused on skill-building, in 2011 participants spent a day and a half focusing on thoughts and behaviors that might hold leaders back. The material presented in 2010 and 2011 is being incorporated into other trainings as well in an effort to sustain these key concepts that better position all CASA leaders to share and realize their visions for children.

The 2010 and 2011 trainings were both evaluated extremely well by participants. Baker plans to continue to offer leadership trainings every year.