Vocational Rehabilitation Program (Combined or General)

2015-2020 Workforce Strategic Plan

The CDOR developed a 2015-2020 Workforce Strategic Planfocused on hiring, developing and retaining staff with the right skills and competencies to achieve the vision, mission, and goals of the department. The development of the Plan is a continuation of CDOR’s 2012-2015 Recruitment and Retention Plan that documented the Human Resources Branch’s ongoing collaborative activities with internal and external stakeholders.

The CDOR has completedfour of the six initiatives were identified through the collaborative process: Recruitment Outreach and Marketing, Onboarding, Performance Management Enhancement and Leadership Development. The remaining two initiatives, Recognition and Mentoring, will be completed in 2020. The initiatives are intended on recruiting and empowering employees through development opportunities, coaching and mentoring, knowledge sharing, recognizing achievements, and fostering a values-driven culture. The six initiatives are:

1. Recruitment Outreach and Marketing – Develop and implement an outreach and marketing strategy to establish CDOR as an employer of choice to attract high-performing diverse candidates.  A recruitment committee was convened to address challenges in attracting, hiring, and retaining the Senior Vocational Rehabilitation Counselor, Qualified Rehabilitation Professional (QRP) Classification. Marketing strategies include developing new exciting content to be used in brochures, posters, billboards, and a variety of online platforms.  Outreach strategies include targeting university partnerships through campus recruiting and hiring events, classroom presentations, internships, and alumni engagement.
2. Onboarding Program – Develop an onboarding program for supervisors and managers to use with new staff to learn about a wide-cross section of the Department – its mission, core values, culture, program areas, resources and overall expectations.
3. Performance Management Enhancement – Develop and implement a training framework to provide managers with increased knowledge and skills pertaining to talent management activities such as proactive recruitment and retention, conducting and supporting effective individual development plans, and productive employee relations.
4. Leadership Development – Develop a formal leadership development program that allows managers the opportunity to enhance their personal and professional development.  The program will provide the department with an opportunity to grow and retain its high potential staff and support the transfer of knowledge as part of DOR’s succession planning efforts.
5. Recognition Program – Develop a program consisting of informal and formal recognition that reinforces the department’s mission, values, and strategic objectives to help attract and retain high-performing staff.  
6. Mentoring Program – Develop a mentoring program to provide educational and experiential opportunities for staff to enhance their personal and professional development.

Current and Projected Needs for Qualified Personnel

To meet the current needs for qualified personnel, CDOR’s Staff Development Unit will continue to collaborate with other CDOR Sections to develop employee competencies, knowledge, skills and abilities; provide staff retraining; and comply with mandatory training requirements. The Staff Development Unit will provide logistical support for internal and external training.
 
The CDOR plans to offer a variety of training to support current professional development needs including:

• Academies for VR Counselors, Service Coordinators, Business Specialists, and Office Technicians. These academies will increase the capacity of personnel to provide services to consumers and will also enhance existing knowledge of personnel duties.
• Quarterly knowledge–based trainings.
• Training on the medical aspects of disability.
• Continual training for VR Counselors.

To meet the projected needs of personnel, the Staff Development Unit will rely on a number of tools including CDOR’s:

• Triennial Comprehensive Statewide Assessment
• Staff Development Unit Statewide Training Needs Assessment
• State and Strategic Plans
• Workforce Strategic Plan
• Employee Engagement Survey
• Blackboard Learning Management System

The Staff Development Unit will identify projected training needs through analysis of audit findings, program reviews, policy inquiries, and an evaluation of WIOA. Delivery of training regarding services to youth, use of labor market information, and Pre–Employment Transition Services will be priority.

The Staff Development Unit will utilize Blackboard Learning Management System to track mandatory training, assign competency-based training, and coordinate external training requests for Department personnel.

The Staff Development Unit will support continuing education by offering a variety of methods and topics including rehabilitation technology, documentation, case assessment and post–secondary education. The Staff Development Unit will also coordinate additional classes focusing on Section 508 compliance.

Higher Education Institutions and Professional Associations

The CDOR offers volunteer internships for VR students looking to gain experience and get a first–hand look at rehabilitation counseling at CDOR. The CDOR partners with the Council on Rehabilitation Education universities to conduct “How to Apply to the CDOR” workshops that help the Council on Rehabilitation Education university students navigate the civil service application process. The CDOR also partners with the Council on Rehabilitation Education universities and professional associations to promote CDOR career opportunities to their databases.

Personnel from Minority Backgrounds and Individuals with Disabilities

The CDOR is focused on developing a diverse workforce that incorporates disability awareness, etiquette and inclusion best practices in service delivery and working with external stakeholders. The CDOR will focus recruitment on people with disabilities, including individuals who have received services from DOR, through outreach to consumers and stakeholders and employees with disabilities or knowledge of the unique challenges and experiences of individuals with disabilities.

A recruitment team, comprised of a designated recruiter for each District, has been created to plan and implement activities to ensure that outreach to potential candidate pools include individuals with disabilities, with a focus on individuals with disabilities identified as underserved, and educate CDOR consumers and external stakeholders of career opportunities with the CDOR. Additionally, CDOR created a recruitment outreach contact database with national and California disability rights organizations and networks to increase recruitment reach to persons with disabilities.

The CDOR will also analyze feedback provided in the 2019 Employee Engagement Survey to determine how the CDOR workforce perceives the work environment for all employees, including personnel from diverse backgrounds and those with disabilities.

Disability Inclusion and Advisory Committee

The CDOR established the Diversity and Inclusion Advisory Committee (DIAC) in 2000-2001 to conduct focused outreach to unserved and underserved individuals and consumers, and to diversify CDOR employee applicant pools to ensure a diverse workforce in order to meet consumer needs. The Committee meets quarterly to identify outreach and diversity gaps and determine potential solutions for consideration by CDOR’s Executive Leadership Team.

The DIAC established a diversity office and identified a need for counselors that had the language skills to cater to diverse populations. The diversity office developed strategies to hire staff members who were multilingual and can be trained to become qualified counselors.

The DIAC developed a Cultural Competency Training, a diversity and inclusion training with a focus on disability awareness and cultural competency. The training will give staff an opportunity to develop foundational diversity and inclusion knowledge and demonstrate practical ways to implement inclusive behaviors into their work.

The training was piloted in the CDOR San Joaquin District in 2018 and used interactive activities, a multimedia presentation, and experiential learning opportunities to help increase their knowledge in the area of cultural competency, expand their skill base in delivering culturally competent services, and identify behavioral changes that can contribute to a culturally competent work environment. The participants were asked to evaluate the training and serve as a focus group for the development and implementation of future trainings.

The senior management team (deputies, assistant deputies, and district administrators) experienced the training in March 2019 and recommended that it should be rolled out to all District staff.

The DIAC also assisted with an engagement under which the San Joaquin district participated in the E3: Educate, Empower, Employ Targeted Communities project (Project E3) conducted by the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. The purpose of Project E3 is to provide technical assistance to State VR agencies and their partners, to address barriers to VR participation and competitive integrated employment of historically underserved groups of individuals with disabilities.

Project E3 activities include knowledge development; targeted community identification by State VR agencies; and intensive, targeted, and universal technical assistance (including information dissemination through their website, and National-State VR agency forums and meetings).

For the future, the Committee’s goals are:

1. to provide diversity and inclusion training to all field staff;
2. develop awareness on the population that each district is serving;
3. develop reports that inform local leadership of their strengths and weaknesses in serving diverse populations;
4. build a model to serve unserved and underserved populations; and
5. share best practices between districts.