HomeMy WebLinkAbout09092019 City Council Laydown - Seaview Report Community Services
PERFORMANCE & QUALITY IMPROVEMENT
FOURTH QUARTER REPORT
APRIL - JUNE 2019
302 Railway Ave. Seward, Alaska 99664 Phone: 907.224.5257
PO Box 1045 Seward, Alaska 99664 Crisis Line: 907.224.3027
Domestic Violence Crisis Line: 907.362.1843
National Accreditation
SeaView first applied for and received national accreditation from the Council on Accreditation (COA)
in 2015. To become accredited, an agency must demonstrate that it is meeting or exceeding national
standards for all the services it provides, as well as its administrative practices.
The process is quite extensive. It takes months, and sometimes years in preparation for an initial review.
Preliminary evidence is submitted online, followed by a four-day site review that is repeated every four
years. The site reviews are completed by a team of expert peer reviewers who have significant
background and experience in the services and standards for the organization under review. The results
are then presented to a Commission that decides if an agency will be accredited.
This year the team was a highly qualified group of three, two of whom also serve as Commissioners for
the Council on Accreditation. They performed an extremely thorough look at our organization. Twenty-
four staff and ten clients were interviewed. We had an excellent response rate for the stakeholder survey.
Of the surveys sent, the following percentages responded: 27.4% from community, 5.9% from
consumers, 33.3% from contractees, 90.3% from staff, 100% from supervisors and 100% from the
Governing Board. The results from this survey will be reviewed by the SeaView PQI Committee and
utilized to identify areas of opportunity for improvement. We thank everyone for participating and
providing feedback that can help our agency to continuously improve!
During the accreditation exit interview and daily reviews with the Executive Director, feedback was
provided by the COA team and is shared below:
Services are fantastic!
Clients are glad SeaView is in their lives.
When clients were asked where they would be without SeaView's services, two indicated that they would
be dead, two more stated they would be in jail, and another shared that their whole life has changed to
the positive as a result of the services they have received at our agency.
One client drove all the way from Anchorage to tell, with tears in her eyes, what SeaView's services
meant to her.
At the assisted living home, the reviewer noted how comfortable the staff were interacting with the
residents and were especially impressed that former residents were welcomed into the home to
participate in activities there.
The DVSA program(Domestic Violence/Sexual Assault), led by strong,passionate, visionary staff, meets the over-
growing needs of this isolated community, connecting victims with resources to meet all of their needs during
traumatic times in their lives through most excellent outreach, crisis intervention, advocacy, assessment, safety
planning and education.
Clients (survivors) attest to the value of these services with statements such as:
Saved my life entirely.
I went from the lowest point in my life to the best point in my life.
There is only support here -no judgement.
I want to go to work here to help other women like me.
I learned that emotions are information. I have peace with my strength and my decisions.
Impressed with the clinical services. The interaction with the psychiatrist on the team is rare, unique, a benefit to
SeaView's service population and a delight to see how SeaView goes about it.
Because of ethical management and leadership, this agency has been able to not only survive but thrive
during one of the toughest times in its history. Mission is always in the forefront of decision-making.
The community trusts and honors this agency for its passion and commitment to their fellow citizens.
A small, strong, diverse dedicated Board of eight, along with a caring, trustworthy leader as CEO, have literally
saved this organization through a very tough non-profit environment so that much-needed services to the
community can continue well beyond its SO year history. Policies and procedures are in excellent order. A
comprehensive Strategic Plan leads the way. The Board works well with the staff and CEO. Without this strong
governance, these community services would no longer be available. Kudos to all involved!
The agency's audit is sound. Dollars are used wisely, and much work and good service is being done with a small
budget. Mission is the key here.
Even with the tremendous challenges of retention, seasonality of the workforce, and isolated
environment, this new HR team has been able to engage passionate, mission-driven, coinpetentstaffwith
retention as its focus.
Licensed clinical staff have increased from one to six in just two years.
SeaView has a basis ofstrength in its performance and quality improvement process. The weakest is the
organization of it. A longer plan is needed.
From the COA review, the one area of opportunity for SeaView to improve is the organization of its
quality improvement process. SeaView has begun work immediately to develop a more robust plan and
has changed the organizational structure to refine the process. A new PQI Committee and PQI
Committee Coordinator were appointed this quarter to develop and implement a new plan. One important
element that will be included in the new plan is the formalized collection of regular input from our
stakeholders through surveys and sharing how stakeholder input has been utilized to identify and address
areas of opportunity for us to improve. We look forward to this continuous engagement with our
stakeholders!
Staff Satisfaction
Staff comprise one of the major stakeholder categories for our agency. Staff retention is very important
to SeaView and to our other stakeholders. Retention contributes to overall consistency in provision of
services and in developing a strong team of experienced providers. SeaView's goal is to maintain a
turnover rate less than the national average for our specialty services.
One component of SeaView's staff retention plan is an annual staff survey to be used as a tool to indicate
job satisfaction and to solicit suggestions for improvement. Another tool used to obtain input relating to
retention are Exit Interviews. This quarter, the PQI committee reviewed SeaView's annual staff
satisfaction survey and 2017-2019 Exit interview statistics to identify trends.Analysis of the 2019 survey
and Exit interview statistics indicated a desire by staff to have more communication and transparency.
Several suggestions were received and SeaView is implementing additional communication measures in
response to input from staff. Our goal is to see improvement for communication measures in the next
annual staff survey.
1) An all-managers monthly meeting will begin in July.
2) Steps will be taken to introduce a staff newsletter to better inform staff.
3) Steps will be taken to start a staff suggestion box to open an anonymous method for input.
4) Steps will be taken to have a more consistent quarterly all staff meeting with the possibility of rotating
meeting times each quarter to accommodate staff on evening and overnight shifts.