2014 Employee Recognition Awards - Human Services
GOLD - Maria Bauer
As a Benefits Representative Supervisor in the Customer Service Center, Maria demonstrates an amazing ability to solve extraordinary problems by thinking outside the box. She regularly takes the lead on assignments that require research and testing in order to make the job easier for all staff, while still ensuring that the needs of customers are met. Maria has worked collaboratively with employees in Staff Development and with staff at the Help Desk to share her benefits program knowledge and her experience with program functionality in CalWIN and the California Healthcare Eligibility, Enrollment and Retention System. As a result of this collaboration, staff is able to work in these programs with greater levels of accuracy and efficiency. She has also assisted staff in understanding the requirements associated with the new expanded Medi-cal program, known as MAGI, by developing an extremely successful "MAGI Clinic" to provide training to all staff responsible for determining eligibility, including supervisors and members of Staff Development. Maria's dedication to personally ensuring the proper handling of difficult cases has contributed to hundreds of Medi-Cal applicants receiving the health care benefits for which they are eligible. She consistently demonstrates excellent leadership skills and always strives to make sure that staff have the resources, tools, and support they need to provide outstanding customer support. Her efforts on behalf of both clients and staff are to be commended.
SILVER - Sherra Clinton
In 2013, the Human Services Department established a Centralized Contracting Unit, known as CCU, to help strengthen and streamline contracting throughout the department. The new CCU has successfully undertaken administrative ownership of approximately 150 contracts and 350 purchase orders, totaling $22 million in departmental expenditures on an annual basis, as well as a host of non-fiscal agreements across agencies within the county. Since taking the helm of this new unit in 2014, Sherra has done a phenomenal job managing the work of the unit, demonstrating excellent analytic ability and clear coordination between various divisions while providing superb customer service to both internal and external customers. She has exceeded in every aspect of managing the unit's overall workload, helping keep the extremely fast-paced nature of the unit's administrative work on track and making sure that the insights, experience, and talents of staff are taken into consideration during problem resolution. Her strong leadership, knowledge, and communication skills have enabled her to be extremely effective in this new assignment, and her efforts are sincerely appreciated.
BRONZE - Mary Greenham
The Family and Children's Services Division recently redistributed social work tasks in order to make each family's experience with Child Welfare less confusing and more streamlined, while continuing to ensure that each child's need for a safe, permanent home remains the Division's driving focus. This redistribution of tasks created the need for additional training in a number of areas in a very short period of time. As the Senior Staff Development Trainer appointed to work with Family and Children's Services, Mary immediately began working with the management team to identify training needs. Based on that information, Mary created a comprehensive training plan that took into account the subject matter expertise of existing staff, the number of staff which could be pulled away from case work at a given time to participate in training, and the best ways to ensure that existing Child Welfare experts could share their knowledge. In addition to these services, Mary utilized her own base of knowledge as a former Adoptions Supervisor and volunteered to provide one-on-one coaching for social workers struggling with the intricacies of adoption work. As a result of Mary's intelligent, creative, and flexible work style, a successful training implementation program was developed to support staff in the division. Mary's outstanding work will benefit families and children in the community both now and in years to come.