Nonprofits and the Job Retention of Former Welfare Clients

Abstract

Legislation has shifted power and authority for welfare policies and programs to the states, with few federal guidelines. However, the intent was clearly to move people from welfare to work. Nonprofit organizations have played a major role in providing jobs for this population, along with the public and for-profit sectors. A critical issue is what nonprofits and other employers, through their human resource (HR) practices, can do to enhance the job retention of former welfare clients. The authors conducted a large-scale empirical study that examined effects of a broad range of HR practices associated with the retention of welfare clients in the nonprofit, for-profit, and public sectors. Results indicate that job retention is higher in the nonprofit sector compared to the others, and that this retention may be a result of HR practices that emphasize investment in and commitment to employees. Implications for public policy are also presented.

An Investigation of the Strategies used by Organizations Participating in the Welfare-to-Work Network Programs and Correlation of the Strategies with the Retention Data to Determine Best Practices for Job Retention among Former Welfare Recipients.

“…Large organizations are more likely than small organizations to report implementing special job retention strategies (Lane & Stevens, 1995) and more likely to provide a greater array of benefits to entry-level employees (Frincke, 2006). Government and nonprofit organizations also report higher job retention among welfare recipients (Perlmutter, Deckop & Freely, 2005). This could be attributed to their investing and committing to the advancement of their employees, in particular, former welfare recipients.…”

“…Relatively few studies (Deckop et al, 2006;Perlmutter, 1997;Perlmutter et al, 2005) have analyzed the retention strategies and their respective relationships to job retention among former welfare recipients. The following sections examine implications of this study to theory, research, and practice and suggest recommendations for future studies.…”

“…To modify Deckop et al's (2006) original 66-item measure to be more in line with the context of this study, 16 additional questions were compiled from the welfare-towork literature (Meisinger, 2006;Perlmutter, Deckop, Konrad & Freely, 2005;Spector, 1998). The nine job retention strategy variables were as follows: (a) wages and compensation (Meisinger, 2006), (b) benefits (Bond & Galinsky, 2003), (c) supervision (Holzer, , 2002, (d) training (Holzer, 1999(Holzer, , 2000Leonard, 1998), (e) communication (Thomas & Ganster 1995), (f) job growth opportunities (Johnson & Corcoran, 2003), (g) work/life balance (Lane & Stevens, 2001a, 2001bPerlmutter, 1997), (h) respect (Piper, 2006), and (i) fairness (Piper, 2006).…”

“…Employers must also be willing to hire former welfare recipients and implement job retention strategies (Tinsley-Gooden & Bailey, 2001). Welfare recipients must be responsible for reporting to daily work on time, and comply with all work-related instructions (Perlmutter, Deckop, & Freely, 2005). These mandates constitute some of the basic requirements of job retention which is the length of time the employee remains on the job during a specified time period (Tinsley-Gooden & Bailey, 2001).…”

“…Employer job strategies would be effective in fostering job growth opportunities among former welfare recipients because a strong positive correlation exists between job retention and job retention strategies (Frincke, 2006;Lidman, 1995;Meisinger, 2006;Perlmutter, Deckop, & Freely, 2005). Organizations that offer work compensation and benefits, provide opportunities for professional growth and development, foster work/life balance, and promote improved communication with employees are more successful in retaining their employees than organizations that do not utilize these strategies (Meisinger, 2006).…”