Family Investment Administration (DHR)
As the Deputy Executive Director, Family Investment Administration, DHR, Ann Flagg began her career in May 2014 as the Director, Maryland Office for Refugees and Asylees before transitioning into her new position in June of 2015. As the current DED for the FIA, Ms. Clark assists the Executive Director with overseeing multiple programs such as: Refugee Assistance, Medicaid Eligibility, Homeless Programs, Emergency Food Programs, Temporary Disability Assistance and SNAP. As the DED, Ann is primarily responsible for advisement to the DHR Secretary on policies, regulation and legislation as well as quality assurance of each program. To qualify for this 501(c)4 –Human Service position, a minimal requirement 5 years in an Executive public assistance
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environment and a Bachelor’s degree. Ann was able to meet these requirements by earning her Bachelors in Sociology from Towson University and her impressive resume of: Serving as the Director of Budget and Quality Management for catholic Charities, Program Manager with Bank of American Neighborhood Excellence Initiative and Principal Employee Engagement Specialist, Constellation Energy; all accomplished between July 2008 to her transition to DHR in 2014. In her current role as the Deputy Executive Director, Ann is primarily responsible for assisting the Executive Director with 345 employees over 7 departments. While managing does consume most of her day using a “hands on” approach with teaching and educating staff on a continuous basis has reduced turn over and the looming air of a stressful environment from which she first walked into. Taking the time to properly ensure her staff trains and manages their own staff is extremely important with creating a cohesive team to effectively assist and guide the public with the offered services provided by DHR. In an industry that services people in need, need is always in demand, so to measure success is a difficult tricky line to dance on. Ms. Flagg finds that setting a vision for the department then setting obtainable goals over time success can be determined. As an example one of her most difficult goals was to improve Customer Service and department moral. This was her vision. She started with an obtainable goal of alleviating as much frustration as possible within each department. This goal was broken down to educating staff, working directly with staff so they truly understand their role in the DHR and within their respective department. By ensuring each staff member truly understands and can deliver on their job descriptions over the course the year Ann has been with DHR turn-over has decreased by 20% and employee satisfaction surveys, of which original distributed received a score of 2 out of 5 has now increased to 3 out of 5; while Ann says she certainly would like to see 5 out of 5 she will continue to work with the staff until she reaches her goal. Which coincide with the Mission and vision outlined in the DHR strategic plan; basically, a happy workforce is a productive workforce. The challenges Ann faces on a regular basis as the Deputy executive Director with DHR is the constant red tape, when faced with policy changes or fighting to change antiquated policies she says life can be difficult around the office.
With technology advancing more and more every day the policies and regulations are about thirty years behind and DHR needs to catch up. Most of the programs DHR offers requires an insurmountable amount of documentation on the applicants part whether it be 5 years of bank statements for Long Term Care Medical Assistance, or pay stubs for Income verification or a 15 page lease to verify housing documentation is needed for just about anything and regulations currently only allow for certain documents to be emailed, uploaded or scanned which means hard copies must be delivered to the office then stored in a warehouse causing filing chaos which in turns leads to lost documentation which in turn leads to poor customer service which then in turn leads to more paper work being submitted to the office to be added to the stack of other duplicated records. This is a major problem currently with the system. Red tape. If all documents were allowed to be scanned, uploaded or emailed then all the chaos could potentially stop and the processes currently in place could be streamlined more effectively, and as a bonus money from the $1.8 Billion budget would not have to be set aside for document warehouse storage …show more content…
fees. At this time, Ann Flagg, reports to and works directly with the Executive Director of the Family Investment Administration Rosemary Malone, and provides research as well as policy and procedures specifically for unaccompanied refugee minors.
She serves on the local Board of Directors: Office of Special Projects as the Family Investment Administration Representative. Her role is to communicate on behalf of the Board of Directors for the Office of Special Projects to The Family Investment Administration Executive Director, Rosemary Malone. This division is responsible for the Maryland Office for Refugees and Asylees, HealthCare Initiatives Homeless Services and Special Grants. There are 4 goals included with the DHR Strategic Plan according to MDHR 2012-2015 Strategic Plan (p.7): 1. DHR is recognized as a national leader among public human service agencies.
2. Maryland residents have access to essential services to support themselves and their families
3. Maryland residents are safe from abuse, neglect and exploitation.
4. Maryland children live in permanent homes, and vulnerable adults live in the least restrictive
environments. The overall budget for DHR is $1.8 Billion per year; however, the Family Investment administration received $2.5 Million of which 25.4 % is from Maryland State General Funds and 70.6% is from Federal grants. This allows for all programs to run for one fiscal year. The question posed to Ms. Flagg was who competes with DHR as far as funds and services are concerned. Her Answer “No One. Sure there are plenty of programs out there that will assist individuals with applying for benefits but the benefits are received through DHR so I suppose you could say DHR is a monopoly on human services.” Even though DHR has a stronghold on Public Assistance programs There are many things to consider, such as:
Strength: The Stability of the organization and the amount of services that can be provided in one centralized location
Weakness: Available resources and trained staff are often not able to keep up with the needs of Maryland residents
Opportunities: To work with local legislation and regulation writers to advance the Administration with the speed of technology
Threats: The amount of training, knowledge and attention to detail required at each level of the administration can be overwhelming and the Administration may lose valuable employees from being overworked and underappreciated.
To achieve success as a nonprofit leader you must love what you do. If you don’t love what you do you will never make it. The passion for working for and towards something you personally believe in will be the difference you need to survive in this industry. I salute Ann C. Flagg for a job well done in a never ending industry!
environment and a Bachelor’s degree. Ann was able to meet these requirements by earning her Bachelors in Sociology from Towson University and her impressive resume of: Serving as the Director of Budget and Quality Management for catholic Charities, Program Manager with Bank of American Neighborhood Excellence Initiative and Principal Employee Engagement Specialist, Constellation Energy; all accomplished between July 2008 to her transition to DHR in 2014. In her current role as the Deputy Executive Director, Ann is primarily responsible for assisting the Executive Director with 345 employees over 7 departments. While managing does consume most of her day using a “hands on” approach with teaching and educating staff on a continuous basis has reduced turn over and the looming air of a stressful environment from which she first walked into. Taking the time to properly ensure her staff trains and manages their own staff is extremely important with creating a cohesive team to effectively assist and guide the public with the offered services provided by DHR. In an industry that services people in need, need is always in demand, so to measure success is a difficult tricky line to dance on. Ms. Flagg finds that setting a vision for the department then setting obtainable goals over time success can be determined. As an example one of her most difficult goals was to improve Customer Service and department moral. This was her vision. She started with an obtainable goal of alleviating as much frustration as possible within each department. This goal was broken down to educating staff, working directly with staff so they truly understand their role in the DHR and within their respective department. By ensuring each staff member truly understands and can deliver on their job descriptions over the course the year Ann has been with DHR turn-over has decreased by 20% and employee satisfaction surveys, of which original distributed received a score of 2 out of 5 has now increased to 3 out of 5; while Ann says she certainly would like to see 5 out of 5 she will continue to work with the staff until she reaches her goal. Which coincide with the Mission and vision outlined in the DHR strategic plan; basically, a happy workforce is a productive workforce. The challenges Ann faces on a regular basis as the Deputy executive Director with DHR is the constant red tape, when faced with policy changes or fighting to change antiquated policies she says life can be difficult around the office.
With technology advancing more and more every day the policies and regulations are about thirty years behind and DHR needs to catch up. Most of the programs DHR offers requires an insurmountable amount of documentation on the applicants part whether it be 5 years of bank statements for Long Term Care Medical Assistance, or pay stubs for Income verification or a 15 page lease to verify housing documentation is needed for just about anything and regulations currently only allow for certain documents to be emailed, uploaded or scanned which means hard copies must be delivered to the office then stored in a warehouse causing filing chaos which in turns leads to lost documentation which in turn leads to poor customer service which then in turn leads to more paper work being submitted to the office to be added to the stack of other duplicated records. This is a major problem currently with the system. Red tape. If all documents were allowed to be scanned, uploaded or emailed then all the chaos could potentially stop and the processes currently in place could be streamlined more effectively, and as a bonus money from the $1.8 Billion budget would not have to be set aside for document warehouse storage …show more content…
fees. At this time, Ann Flagg, reports to and works directly with the Executive Director of the Family Investment Administration Rosemary Malone, and provides research as well as policy and procedures specifically for unaccompanied refugee minors.
She serves on the local Board of Directors: Office of Special Projects as the Family Investment Administration Representative. Her role is to communicate on behalf of the Board of Directors for the Office of Special Projects to The Family Investment Administration Executive Director, Rosemary Malone. This division is responsible for the Maryland Office for Refugees and Asylees, HealthCare Initiatives Homeless Services and Special Grants. There are 4 goals included with the DHR Strategic Plan according to MDHR 2012-2015 Strategic Plan (p.7): 1. DHR is recognized as a national leader among public human service agencies.
2. Maryland residents have access to essential services to support themselves and their families
3. Maryland residents are safe from abuse, neglect and exploitation.
4. Maryland children live in permanent homes, and vulnerable adults live in the least restrictive
environments. The overall budget for DHR is $1.8 Billion per year; however, the Family Investment administration received $2.5 Million of which 25.4 % is from Maryland State General Funds and 70.6% is from Federal grants. This allows for all programs to run for one fiscal year. The question posed to Ms. Flagg was who competes with DHR as far as funds and services are concerned. Her Answer “No One. Sure there are plenty of programs out there that will assist individuals with applying for benefits but the benefits are received through DHR so I suppose you could say DHR is a monopoly on human services.” Even though DHR has a stronghold on Public Assistance programs There are many things to consider, such as:
Strength: The Stability of the organization and the amount of services that can be provided in one centralized location
Weakness: Available resources and trained staff are often not able to keep up with the needs of Maryland residents
Opportunities: To work with local legislation and regulation writers to advance the Administration with the speed of technology
Threats: The amount of training, knowledge and attention to detail required at each level of the administration can be overwhelming and the Administration may lose valuable employees from being overworked and underappreciated.
To achieve success as a nonprofit leader you must love what you do. If you don’t love what you do you will never make it. The passion for working for and towards something you personally believe in will be the difference you need to survive in this industry. I salute Ann C. Flagg for a job well done in a never ending industry!