Rare is the employee who hasn’t been solicited by his boss to contribute money to a favorite charity or volunteer for the company’s pet cause. But now, in an unusual partnership that takes the notion of corporate-driven altruism to a new level, a number of Chicago-area hospitals are asking their employees to consider taking a step that would transform their lives: to adopt a child.
Children’s Memorial Hospital in Chicago on Wednesday will become the latest medical institution to join the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services in recruiting employees to adopt children from the state foster-care system–mainly hard-to-place children.
Although many officials stress the laudable goal of finding homes for these children, other observers caution that employers in such initiatives may be invading their employees’ lives.
Although there’s no suggestion that any employer would try to force someone to take such a step, there are concerns that a high-profile campaign could exert subtle pressure. Would a person seeking a promotion, for example, wonder whether agreeing to adopt might give him an advantage with the boss?
Issues also may arise about companies’ long-term commitment to helping their employees deal with the complexities of caring for such children. Many of the children have medical or psychological needs that might require time off or other interruptions in a worker’s job schedule.
“This is a very big undertaking for the employers,” said Ellen Galinsky, president of the New York-based Families and Work Institute. “My concern would be to what extent the employers will support the parents in their efforts to meet the children’s needs. It’s not just a matter of giving them encouragement and support during the adoption process, but all along the way. It’s important that there be real counseling to parents about what this decision entails.”
More than a quarter of all U.S. employers and 65 percent of Fortune 1,000 firms offer benefits to workers who adopt children. But Illinois’ organized pairing of the public and private sectors to promote adoption appears to be unique, experts say.
“Other states have undertaken campaigns to promote adoptions, but not in partnership with corporations,” Galinsky said.
Jann Heffner, director of the Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption, called the program “novel and creative.”
“They’ve begun with the perfect industry,” said Heffner, who monitors workplace-adoption programs. “People who work in health care are attuned to caring and perhaps will go the extra mile. They have a good support system for both children and parents, especially those children who are medically fragile or may need a little more of a helping hand.
“I think it’s wonderful,” she added. “We’re interested in seeing how it works, so we can help duplicate it. After all, there are hospitals everywhere.”
The program, announced earlier this year by Gov. Jim Edgar, is a joint effort of DCFS, the Illinois Hospital Association and private child welfare agencies.
Participating hospitals will mount a major information campaign, including letters from the respective chief executive officers extolling the joyful rewards of adoption and appealing to employees to “consider making a difference . . . in the life of a child so deserving.”
The hospitals also will offer incentives. They may allow workers to attend meetings and training sessions on company time and company premises, provide paid leave for those who go through with adoptions, and reimburse up to several thousand dollars for legal and medical expenses.
There are some 1,400 Illinois children now in foster care who have been freed for adoption, and more are in the pipeline. Most are older African-American boys, children with special health-care needs and siblings who must be kept together.
Children’s Memorial will kick off its program Wednesday with a presentation by Jane Elmore, deputy director of the division of foster care and permanency services at DCFS and the adoptive parent of a 4-year-old former foster child. Volunteers of America of Illinois, the private child-welfare agency paired with Children’s Memorial, will explain the adoption process, which recently has been streamlined.
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Chicago’s Bethany Hospital held a similar event Friday at which Crystal Mobley, the hospital’s director of ambulatory services, spoke of her own experience as a single adoptive parent of two teenage boys. Other Chicago hospitals taking part include Trinity, Mt. Sinai, La Rabida, St. Joseph and St. Anthony.
Diane DeLeonardo, project coordinator for DCFS, said that nine area hospitals and two in Peoria are participating and that more than 30 hospital employees have signed up so far to go through orientation and training.
Some observers, however, question how far companies should get involved in their employees’ lives.
There is frequently strong pressure from the boss to contribute to whatever social cause he supports, said John Challenger, a Chicago outplacement executive who tracks workplace issues. “Sometimes that kind of zeal makes employers intrude too far,” he said.
One of the first principles of fundraising is that the pitch will be more successful if it comes from someone the potential giver knows well and would have trouble turning down. Cancer groups recruit people to solicit their neighbors; churches and synagogues get members to invite friends to a coffee before asking for a donation to the building fund; large charities recruit corporate sponsors to solicit their employees.
But at what point does persuasion cross the line and become coercion?
Richard Barrett, an Alexandria, Va.-based corporate values consultant, said companies must be very careful how they present such a program.
“It can’t be run like the United Way, where some managers are rated on how successful they were in recruiting people to give from their business unit,” Barrett said. “Employees cannot be left asking themselves, `Will my performance be judged against participating or not participating?’ “
Another concern is that the program could raise unrealistic expectations that such private initiatives can solve major social ills.
Burton Weisbrod, a professor of economics and a fellow of the Institute for Policy Research at Northwestern University, said the biggest potential pitfall is creating the belief “that this kind of program can substitute for an effective state agency in dealing with the larger problems of family breakup and child abuse.”
Weisbrod and Challenger noted such public-private initiatives are part of a broader pattern of decreasing government support for social welfare that has left holes in the safety net.
“These things can do some good and should be encouraged,” said Weisbrod, “but they’re unlikely to make a dent in the need for state action.”
Barry Stein, president of Goodmeasure Inc., an international management consultant firm based in Cambridge, Mass., raised another possible worry.
“Hospitals are heavily regulated and tightly integrated with a lot of political and other administrative issues,” Stein said. “It changes the nature of the relationship between the government and the hospitals. The governor’s relationship with the business sector becomes different. It raises the potential for misuse.”
Such concerns try the patience of those in the child-welfare system who struggle daily to mend the injuries inflicted on innocent children.
Nobody is applying any pressure, said Susan Gordon, a spokeswoman at Children’s Memorial, and everyone acknowledges that adoption is an intensely personal choice.
“But the plight of these children is so serious,” she said, “that everyone should be doing whatever they can to help make their lives more secure.
“Whether you’re in government or business, it only makes sense to come together on their behalf. To perceive it any other way is a little cynical.”