Social Welfare Administration

Social Welfare
Social Welfare can be defined as the group of assistance programs designed to
ensure the well being of a nation’s citizens. In other words, it is a system that
aims to provide quality care to society participants.

Administration
Administration is a cooperative human effort towards achieving some common
goals. Thus every group activity involves administration, whether it is a family,
factory, hospital, university, or a government department. Whenever two or
more people cooperate in view of doing a thing that cannot be taken up alone,
the concept of administration appear.
Concept of SWA
Social welfare administration is a process through which social policy is
transformed into social services. It involves the administration of
government and nongovernment agencies.

John C. Kidneigh (1950) defines social welfare administration as the

“process of transforming social policy into social services…. a two way
process: (i). …transforming policy into concrete social services and (ii) the
use of experience in recommending modification of policy. The definition
here emphasis is that administration is the process of transforming
policies into action programmes for the betterment of the society
Concept continue
• Rosemary Sarri (1971) has outlined the activities of social welfare administration as follows:
i) Translation of social mandates into operational policies and goals to guide organizational
behaviour;
ii) Design of organizational structures and processes through which the goals can be
achieved;
iii) Securing of resources in the form of materials, staff, clients etc. for goal attainment and
organizational survival.
iv) Selection and engineering of necessary technology.
v) Optimizing organizational behavior directed towards increased effectiveness and
efficiency; and
vi) Evaluation of organizational performance to facilitate systematic and continuous solution
to problems.
Features of social welfare Administration
• Social welfare administration deals with social welfare agencies and helps them to achieve their objectives for the target
groups for which they are working. It is specifically concerned with identification of social objectives, the formulation and
implementation of proposed programmes to achieve the objectives laid down.
• From functional point of view, social welfare administration includes three perspectives of social problems: (i) restoration
of impaired social functioning; (ii) provision of resources, social and individual, for more effective social functioning; (iii)
prevention of social dysfunction.
• Despite variations in size, scope, structure and types of programmes, every agency has a governing board as an apex body
for final decision-making. The board is generally represented by the community it intends to serve.
• Social welfare administration requires optimum utilization of its available resources together with active community
participation, so that the ultimate goal of programmes can be achieved properly.
• Social welfare agencies have to allocate certain portion of their resources for survival so that the organization can continue
to exist. But this should not limit their capacity to achieve quantitative and qualitative growth.
• Social welfare agencies generally function in a cooperative manner and ensure participation of all the members in
administration of their activities.
• There is a growing trend in these agencies to recruit professionally qualified manpower. It has helped in introducing
professional approach in their functioning.
Scope of Social Welfare Administration
• POSDCoRB view
This is a narrow view of social welfare administration and takes into account
mostly the execution of the government’s sponsored programmes. In other
words this view corresponds with the managerial view.
According to Henry Fayol the main categories of administration are: (i)
Organisation (ii) Command, (iii) Coordination, and (iv) Control.
P.M. Queen says that the study of administration deals with ‘men, material and
methods’.
L. Gulick has given a magic formula in a word ‘POSDCoRB’ with each letter
describing one technique. Gulick’s approach is ‘technique-oriented’ rather than
‘subject oriented
POSDCoRB
• Planning: Planning means working out broad outline of the things that need to
be done and the method to be adopted to accomplish the purpose set for the
enterprise.
• Organisation: It is the establishment of the formal structure of authority
through which the work is sub-divided, arranged, defined and coordinated for
the defined objective.
• Staffing: Staffing is the process of filling all positions in the organisation with
adequate and qualified personnel. Thus it means whole personnel, bringing in
and training the staff and maintenance of favourable condition of work.
• Directing: It is the continuous task of making decisions and embodying them in
specific and general orders and instructions and thus guiding the enterprise.
POSDCoRB continues
• Coordinating: It means integration of several parts into an orderly whole
to achieve the purpose of the undertaking. In other words, coordinating
means the all important duty of inter-relating the work of various
divisions, sections and other parts of the undertaking.
• Reporting: It is keeping those people informed to whom the executive is
responsible about what is going on. In other words reporting means
keeping both the supervisors and subordinates informed of what is going
on and arranging for collection of such information through inspection,
research and records.
• Budgeting: It is all that goes with budgeting in the form of fiscal planning,
accounting and control.
Contents of SWA
• Social Problems : Assessment of its causes, prevention and treatment through
public participation and effective implementation of social legislation.
• Social Services : Social services are meant for general public through provision of
health, education, housing etc. and make them more effective for the upliftment
of disadvantaged and vulnerable.
• Social Security : To make and implement effective social assistance and social
insurance provisions. It aims to compensate for the loss of income due to
unemployment, disability or death caused by accident and old age through social
insurance and social assistance.
• Social Policy : To make effective social policy for the welfare of underprivileged
sections of the society, to achieve the goals of welfare state through social action.
Principles of SWA
• Principle of Acceptance
Executive and staff members are encouraged to accept one another
and act in harmony
This does not rule out criticism, evaluation and suggestions for
improvement but does mean that all executives and staff members feel
a basic security as an individuals, with rights as well as responsibilities.
This principle not only helps to resolve differences among executives
and staff members it also establishes cordial relations among them
Principle cont.
• Principle of Community and Client Needs
Need of the community and the individual within it are always the basis for the existence of
social service or SWO and the provision of the programs.
Therefore, it is essential that SWA must develop service and programs keeping in mind the
need of clients and targeted community.
This requires data and information of community and client.

Principle of Social Work Values

The values of social work, such as worth and dignity of individuals, social justice, social
equality, empathy are the foundation upon which social welfare adminstrators develop
programmes or services and made available to persons who need them.
Purposeful relationship between community and agency
Principle cont.
• The Principle of Agency purpose
The purpose of the social welfare organizations must be clearly
formulated, stated, understood and utilized before formulating the
policy and translating to services or programmes.
Clearly stating purpose means the clear step towards effective
implementation of the services or programme.
Otherwise, GOALs might not be achieved.
Principle cont.
• Principle of cultural setting
The culture of the community must be understood in as much as it influences
the way needs are expressed and the way services are authorized, supported
and utilized by the people who need them.
A community consists of people belonging to varied culture settings and it is
possible that people from different cultural setting may have different needs.
Sometimes, it is observed that some people with a specific cultural setting do
not come forward and express their needs. Therefore, it is necessary that the
SWO must study and understand the need of people belonging from different
cultural settings.
Principle cont.
Principle of Purposeful relationship
The social welfare organizations need to establish a purposeful relationship among its
staff members, executives and the community.
For this, it is essential that the very purpose of the existence of the social welfare
organizations must be clearly stated and expressed to its stake holders.
Once the purpose is expressed it becomes very easy to establish purposeful relationship.
The Principle of Agency Totality
The agency must be understood in its totally and wholeness.
SWA needs to understand first of all the philosophy and goals of social welfare
organizations, followed by its objectives, financial status, organizational culture,
established procedures, conventions and practices.
Principle cont.
Principle of Professional responsibility
Social welfare administrator being a trained professional, is responsible for
the provision of high quality professional services based on standards of
professional practice.
Has to see that projects and programs are implemented as per the
guidelines and set procedures by the BOD of organization.
Principle of Participation
The success of SWO is depended upon the participation of its stakeholders,
i.e. members, BOD, staffs including client or beneficiaries.
So, try to get maximum contribution of stakeholders.
• Principle of growth
Growth of all the constituents of social welfare organizations, namely, BOD
and staffs.
The growth and development of all the participants is the one of the
primary functions of the social welfare administrator.
As a SWA, s/he should be able to provide challenging work assignments,
thoughtful supervision and opportunities for individual and group learning.
Principal of being in service.
As long as SWA are in service they are responsible for helping individuals,
families, groups and community.
Principle cont.
• Coordination
In the present age of super specialization, various programmes or
service in welfare sector are being provided by different types of social
service or social welfare organization.
If, these organizations operate in isolation, optimum utilization of their
programmes or services is impossible.
It is therefore, considered essential that if all kinds of programmes or
services in a particular area are provided through one organization with
single window, the work of social service or social welfare organizations
will be easier and definitely effective.
Principle cont.
• Principle of programmes adjustment
Programmes or services to be effective have to be changed with the
needs of client or beneficiaries. This, therefore, is the duty of SWA to
introduce changes in the services or programmes to suit the
beneficiaries or clients as and when necessary by bringing innovations
in services or programmes.
Principle of putting social policy into practice
Principle of adaption to local problems
Principle of democratic decision
Program vs Project
Program Project
A program implies a set of projects which are linked A project refers to the temporary activity, which is
to one another, in a sequential manner to attain undertaken to create a distinct product or service,
the combined benefits that has certain objective

Focus on context Focus on content

Time horizon: Long term Time horizon: Short term
Multiple functional unit Single functional units
Strategic in nature More technical in nature
Produce outcome Product output
Success is measured by the extent to which Success can be measured in terms of product
program meets out the needs and benefits, for quality, timeliness, cost effectiveness, compliance
which it was conducted and degree of beneficiaries satisfaction.
Project
Management
Cycle
• PMC is the process of
Planning, Organizing,
Coordinating and Controlling
of project effectively and
efficiently from start to the
end in order to achieve pre-
defined objectives.

• PMC involves the series of

activities that is followed
through stages of project
completion to achieve its
goal.

• Four major phases of PMC

Initiation Phase
• This is the beginning phase of the project.
• Project has not been formed yet
• This is the phase where literature review and secondary data analysis is done.
• It includes information such as
- Purpose, vision and mission of the project
- Project description
- Summary milestones of the project
• The problem is identified and checked if the project can solve it
• Basically, the feasibility of the project is assessed and identified.
Initiation Phase
• Undertaking the feasibility study of the project
• Assessing the scope of work of the project
• Identifying the key deliverables
• Identifying stakeholders of the project
• Comparing the potential costs and benefits of the project
Planning Phase
• Planning phase is an important phase of the project. The better the plan,
easier will be the execution.
• In this phase, we need to break down larger activities into smaller tasks.
• Plans for conducting the project are formed in detail.
• SMART ( Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic and Time Bound)
Goals and Objectives are set.
• Includes planning of resources, risk, finances etc.
• Roles and responsibilities of the staffs are clearly defined.
• Plan is also documented for the further purpose.
Two parts in planning phase
• Strategic Planning: Develop strategy and approach of project.
• Implementation Planning: Develop details of how the project will be
implemented.

- Creating a project plan

- Creating workflow documents or process maps
- Estimating budget and creating a financial plan
- Gather resources
- Anticipating risks and potential quality roadblocks.
Execution Phase
• Project executive is the phase where plan is now brought into action,
after the final approval and completion of all planning.
• A series of activities is carried out to meet the goals.
• Monitoring of the work goes side by side during execution.
• Monitoring is done to ensure that the activities are moving on track,
as planned.
• Moreover, it will also involve immediate rectification and changes
required to meet the overall goal and objectives of the project.
• This phase also involves mid-term evaluation of the project
Execution Phase cont.
• Create taks and organizing workflow
• Provide necessary guidance, briefing and trainings to the team members.
• Regular communication with the team members
• Monitoring of the quality of work
• Managing budget

(Things to ensure during this phase)

Time management, Cost management, Quality management, Change
management, Risk management, Issues management etc
Termination Phase
• As the project is temporary it has to come to an end.
• Closure phase provide final deliverables, release project resources,
and determine the success of the project.
• At the end evaluation report is also created that would evaluate the
overall success of the project and are useful for future references as
well.
• Analysis of project performance, team performance.
• Closing finances and budgetary aspects of the project.