MAKING THE MOST OUT OF AN ANNUAL WORK PLAN 2017 AIDD Technical Assistance Institute 1
WELCOME & LEARNING OBJECTIVES • Participants will increase their knowledge about developing and updating annual work plans. • Participants will link planned work to actual work implemented and recognize areas for updates. • Participants will be able to link the logic model to the annual work plan. • Participants will explore strategies of effective ways to use the annual work plan. 2 ITACC: 2017 AIDD Technical Assistance Institute
PRESENTERS • Sheila Gritz-Swift, Florida • Heidi Lawyer, Virginia • Sherry Manning, Nevada • Ann Sievert, Wisconsin 3 ITACC: 2017 AIDD Technical Assistance Institute
THE ANNUAL WORK PLAN AND OTHER PROGRAM PLANNING TOOLS • One of the 3 primary program planning tools used by DD Councils : • Five year state plan, • Logic model • Annual work plan 4 ITACC: 2017 AIDD Technical Assistance Institute
WHAT’S THE PURPOSE AND DIFFERENCES OF THESE TOOLS? • The five year plan and logic model both give an overarching view of DD Councils expected activities and outcomes, for a five year period • The annual work plan provides a concise, easy to review , overview of the DD council expected activities and outcomes for a one year period. 5 ITACC: 2017 AIDD Technical Assistance Institute
WHAT ARE THE BENEFITS OF USING WORK PLANS? • Clearly identifies specific actions steps that will lead you to your desired outcomes • Serve as a roadmap to keep you focused and on track with implementation of targeted activities • Help you communicate what you are doing, and why it is important • Clearly identifies the outcomes/deliverables of your work — can use as a justification of funding 6 ITACC: 2017 AIDD Technical Assistance Institute
4 IMPORTANT THINGS TO REMEMBER ABOUT WORK PLANS! #1 Do not just file your work plan away in a drawer — it will be useless ! 7 ITACC: 2017 AIDD Technical Assistance Institute
IMPORTANT THINGS TO REMEMBER ABOUT WORK PLANS! #2 A work plan can only be a roadmap if it is looked at frequently! If not, it is easy to get lost! #3 Keep your work plans visible/easily accessed by staff. 8 ITACC: 2017 AIDD Technical Assistance Institute
IMPORTANT THINGS TO REMEMBER ABOUT WORK PLANS (CONT’D) #4 Frequently check in on your work plan and make changes as needed — e.g., use staff/board meetings as a method for regular check ins. 9 ITACC: 2017 AIDD Technical Assistance Institute
REFRESHER: KEY COMPONENTS OF AN ANNUAL WORK PLAN • Goal statement and • Objective expected outcomes • For each objectiv e: • Areas of emphasis for the • Major activities goal • Expected outputs • Strategies t o be used for • Expected outcomes the goal • Data evaluation and measurement • The key areas the goal • Targeted, projected addresses performance measures • Collaborators 10 ITACC: 2017 AIDD Technical Assistance Institute
OBJECTIVES & MAJOR ACTIVITIES • Objectives: Should include a measurement of the work to be accomplished — e.g., • Increase or decrease • Number or percentile • Major activities: Should give the reader a sense, at a glance, of what major activities will be implemented to achieve the objective 11 ITACC: 2017 AIDD Technical Assistance Institute
OUTPUTS AND OUTCOMES • Outputs: things that can be counted • Outcomes: The desired result/impact of the activities, must be measurable and/or quantifiable 12 ITACC: 2017 AIDD Technical Assistance Institute
EVALUATION ACTIVITIES • Evaluation activities: the way you identify whether or not you are achieving desired outputs and outcomes • Can be quantitative or qualitative 13 ITACC: 2017 AIDD Technical Assistance Institute
LET’S TEST YOUR KNOWLEDGE! • At each table, you will find a bag with some “game pieces” – the game pieces have “good” and “not so good” items written on them; • On the wall, you will find large post-it sheets with the major AWP components listed; • As a team, use the information we just reviewed on each annual work plan component, match the game piece to the element under the “good” and “not so good” categories • You will be given a time limit – place as many correct answers as you can – the table team with the most correct answers wins! 14 ITACC: 2017 AIDD Technical Assistance Institute
ITACC: 2017 AIDD Technical Assistance Institute USING THE WORK PLAN As a tool – in a dynamic manner 15
USING THE ANNUAL WORK PLAN Yearly Guidepost Checkpoint Blueprint Funding Deliverable Amendments Proposals Reviews Midterm Contracts Progress Updates Reviews 16 ITACC: 2017 AIDD Technical Assistance Institute
Notes from Slide 16: There are a number of ways DD Council staff can use the work plan in a dynamic manner. The Florida DD Council would like to share their strategies and effective ways to use the annual work plan… Develop and print out a yearly blueprint based on the Annual Work Plan. This becomes the basis for your funding proposals and contracts; serves as a guidepost throughout the year in your work – contract deliverable reviews, midterm progress reviews, and; is a checkpoint for task force, committees and Council – there may be a need to adjust work via amendments/updates. Yearly blueprint for work to be accomplished Foundation for funding proposals Foundation for contracts Guideposts for Council and Task Force, Committee and/or Subcommittee work each quarter Deliverable Reviews Midterm Review Project Progress Determining need for amendments and update during spring Task Force or Subcommittees… 17
ANOTHER VIEW - VBPD • Annual work plan converted to excel spreadsheet for regular use by Council staff. • Annual work plan is also used to inform the Council members about progress – this helps the Council fulfill their “monitoring” role. 18 ITACC: 2017 AIDD Technical Assistance Institute
ITACC: 2017 AIDD Technical Assistance Institute UPDATING YOUR ANNUAL WORK PLAN 19
UPDATING ANNUAL WORK PLANS • If you are using the annual work plan as a helpful dynamic tool (rather than filing it away until next year), there will be times when you need to update it . 20 ITACC: 2017 AIDD Technical Assistance Institute
WHAT ARE SOME QUESTIONS YOU CAN ASK TO HELP IDENTIFY WHETHER CHANGES ARE NEEDED TO YOUR WORK PLAN? • Are we meeting our desired outcomes ? • Are we getting the results we want with the current strategies we are using? • Are there more effective/creative strategies we could use that we have not tried? • Are our evaluation activities measuring what we want? Is there a more effective way we could measure our results? 21 ITACC: 2017 AIDD Technical Assistance Institute
WHEN SHOULD ANNUAL WORK PLANS BE UPDATED? When you discover that your major activities/ actions are not getting the results/outcomes you want. 22 ITACC: 2017 AIDD Technical Assistance Institute
Notes from Slide 21: If you find that your major activities are not generating the results or outcomes you want – you may need to consider a plan update. Wisconsin Example: We were engaging in a large centralized Employment First Coalition, which was not getting the results we wanted. We decided to switch strategies, and developed many smaller local employment first grassroots groups/ partners, all over the state. The results have been amazing! Because of this we added new outputs, outcomes and evaluation activities to the work plan. 23
WHEN SHOULD ANNUAL WORK PLANS BE UPDATED? When you decide to take on a whole new project/set of major activities, that you think will better assist in meeting the outcomes. 24 ITACC: 2017 AIDD Technical Assistance Institute
Notes from Slide 22: Wisconsin Example: We were not making significant gains in our objective of increasing integrated employment for individuals, so we decided to try a different approach, and target employment providers. We developed a Building FULL Lives in the Community project which provided TA to provides who wanted to move from segregated to integrated employment. Based upon this, we added a whole new set of activities, outputs, outcomes and evaluation activities to the work plan. 25
WHEN SHOULD ANNUAL WORK PLANS BE UPDATED? (CONT’D) • When the evaluation activities are not really effectively measuring the outcomes you want to achieve 26 ITACC: 2017 AIDD Technical Assistance Institute
Notes from slide 23: If your evaluation activities are not effectively measuring the outcomes you want to achieve, you may need to update your work plan – Wisconsin Example: We were doing pre/post surveys for out Partners in Policy Making program that gave us some good information. What was missing was how the Partners used the skills after the program, so we started doing three/six month follow-up surveys. 27
5-YEAR STATE PLAN UPDATE Annual work plan updates are included with 5-year state plan updates. • State plan amendments • Goes back to the Community • Submitted to AIDD by August 15 th • State plan updates • Changes are made and approved within the Council • Submitted to AIDD by December 31st 28 ITACC: 2017 AIDD Technical Assistance Institute
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