Annie E. Casey Foundation
Transforming the Way Child Welfare Agencies Provide Services
Launching a peer learning initiative for the social service sector.
Services
- Discovery
- Brand Positioning
- Messaging
- Naming
- Visual Identity
- Marketing Collateral
The Annie E. Casey Foundation wanted to help more of its grantee organizations update their approach to a community-based model of supporting children. They tapped into best practices used by organizations to launch a new peer-to-peer consulting service. The goal is to pair organizations that want to adopt those practices with the providers that exemplified them.
Red Rooster Group laid the groundwork with discovery and messaging for the initiative, developed the name, Provider Exchange, created the logo, and wrote and designed the brochure to launch the initiative.
Discovery
The Need for the Provider Institute
- To provide support for organizations that are trying to evolve, keep up with the changing needs of those they serve, and respond to recent research in the field.
- To provide both the tutorial and cultural transformation support – how to achieve practice improvement and innovation.
- To provide an opportunity to open eyes to other options and help change their thinking – helping organizations see possibilities.
- To share best practices and help guide implementation.
Audiences
- Executive Directors / CEOs
- Boards
- Foundations
- Donors
- Nonprofit Staff
Provider Institute’s Advantages
- Provides agencies with a trusted source to turn to.
- Provides “the playbook” and the people to provide specific guidance.
- The Providers are doing the work every day, so they understand all the ramifications and can steer others around the pitfalls.
- We will be one of the few to have done the work with hands-on knowledge.
- Bringing very relevant work to the sector.
Primary Messaging Concepts
Transformation
The Institute’s fundamental goal is to help agencies transition to residential care to family-based care that may begin with short-term residential treatment.
Peer-to-Peer Support
Connecting agencies directly with high-quality technical assistance and guidance on best practices from fellow agencies.
Family-Centric Care
Focused on helping each child grow and succeed; individual nurturing.
Effective Solutions
Building capacity and effectiveness within agencies to help them improve outcomes and succeed financially.
Key Message Points
- Each provider has specific areas of expertise and is committed to sharing information about transformation in their agencies with their peers.
- The intention is to scale up practices that are effective.
- Hands-on advice from those who have done it. About practical implementation, not just theoretical. Documented in robust toolkits.
- Peer consultations can be individualized to the needs of each agency in a way that is sensitive to agencies’ concerns about change.
- Targeted to organizations that are ready for a transformation.
- Provides different entry points for agencies to engage in the process.
- Providers work collaboratively with other agencies to meet a transformational goal.
Boilerplate Language
Descriptive
The Provider Institute, a group of successful child welfare agencies with specific areas of expertise, is committed to sharing information and providing practical, peer-to-peer support to help fellow agencies make needed organizational changes. The objective is to scale up the most effective practices in community-based care that improve services and outcomes for youth and their families. By providing hands-on support, one Institute provider helps one agency identify and leverage particular services that can best facilitate change over time.
The Provider Institute, a unit of the Annie E. Casey Foundation and the only organization providing this kind of peer-to-peer support, is dedicated to helping agencies achieve better results more quickly and to drive needed change throughout the sector.
Narrative
Child welfare agencies that recognize the value of providing care for children in family settings rather than in congregate care may face a difficult time in transitioning their agencies to this model of service. Facing boards and donors that may be concerned about change and leadership that may lack the knowledge of how to usher in transformation, agencies don’t know where to turn for help.
Until now.
Understanding that agencies would best learn from each other, the Annie E. Casey Foundation marshaled its expertise in the child welfare sector to bring together the best practices for nonprofits around the county that have undergone this transformation themselves. The selected agencies will provide hands-on assistance through “modules of excellence” in service models and administrative functions to other agencies looking for this help.
Called the Provider Institute, this is the only entity providing peer-to-peer support in the sector — an empowering way for organizations to engage in change through the entry point that is best for them, and to learn in a way that respects the needs of their individual organizations.
The approach of working one-on-one with agencies around the country is intended to inspire a sea change across the child welfare landscape, ultimately resulting in better opportunities for tens of thousands of children to recognize their full potential.
Naming
Naming Criteria
Should
- Should position the Institute as a different type of entity (not a nonprofit organization).
- Should connote peer-to-peer learning (or at least not contradict that – not emanating from a single source).
- Focus on outcomes.
- Should be “practical” and about real change and implementation.
Should Not
- Should not use the word “training.”
- Should not sound like the name of a child welfare nonprofit agency or association.
- Should not be associated with Annie E Casey Foundation.
Can
- Can be an evocative name, but also wants to see names that are slightly descriptive.
- Can potentially use a metaphor.
Considerations
- May need to work under the auspice of the Association of Children’s Residential Centers.
Basic Types of Names and Taglines
Descriptive: Names that state the message simply and clearly (Children’s Aid Society, Marin Abused Women’s Services)
Evocative: Names that suggest the message emotionally or psychologically (Kickstart International, Crossroads, Kaboom!)
Abstract: Names that attract the demographic without addressing the message directly, or perhaps not at all (Lighthouse International, Apple, Xerox, Amazon)
The names we are initially exploring for the Provider Institute fall into the Descriptive to Evocative range. Since a name and tagline must work together and complement each other, the following strategies will help us to determine how the two elements can work together.
Viable Name and Tagline Strategies
Typically, a more evocative name might be paired with a more descriptive tagline, and vice versa. And sometimes a descriptive name is paired with a descriptive tagline, thus creating a further level of messaging.
Here are examples of how these three strategies might work for the Provider Institute. The name examples, below, are just that, examples of types of names to illustrate the strategies. The taglines also have been composed just for this illustration, and have not gone through a process of creative development.
Evocative Name with Descriptive Tagline
InterStrength
Providers sharing best practices for optimal outcomes.
Descriptive Name with Evocative Tagline
Progressive Providers Network
Strategizing a better future for every child.
Descriptive Name with Descriptive Tagline
Best Care Collaborative
An inter-agency network of progressive care providers.
Initial Name Ideas
This initial list of naming ideas can be used to gauge your expectations and preferences for the main messaging concepts to be conveyed, the types of names preferred, and specific words that resonate, resulting in a direction to pursue for the next round of name exploration.
Peer to Peer
Peer Exchange
PracticeShare
PeerShare
PeerVision
InterShare
ActionPact
Practice Sharing Institute
Field Practices Network
Agency Practices Network
Effective Solutions
Best Care Collaborative
Best Practices Collaborative
Effective Practice Advocates
Child/Family First
Transforming
Transition Partners
Progressive Providers Network
Progressive Practices Exchange
Care Evolution Institute
Catalyst Collaborative
Peers Forward
New Vision Network
Outcomes
Advocates for Better Outcomes
Best Outcomes Initiative
Brighter Futures Institute
Safe & Well Net
Going Home
Selected Name: Provider Exchange
Visual Identity
“Our partnership with the Provider Exchange® provides technical assistance on models of care and strategies that truly make a difference in the lives of older youth. We are excited about the learnings that will come from this group and the opportunity to share these findings more broadly with our members and the Harvard Kennedy School.”
— Charlotte Haberaecker, President, Lutheran Services in America
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