ORGANIZATIONAL-BEHAVIOR MANAGEMENT IN LARGE RESIDENTIAL ORGANIZATIONS- MOVING FROM INSTITUTIONAL TO CLIENT-CENTERED CARE

This paper suggests larger residential organizations have a unique con tribution to offer people with developmental disabilities who require managed environments or research solutions to their living needs. It c laims no organization should be managed to be ''institutional'' regard less of its size, but that size alone is not the sole determinant of s elf-motivated service delivery. A move toward adoption of short-term g oals geared to the immediate benefit of people with developmental disa bilities and away from more traditional yearly developmental goals is cited as the key to keeping residential organizations focused on the c onsumers of their service. However, in order to utilize the unique adv antages of larger organizations, these organizations will need to solv e the problems created by having large groups of people living in clos e proximity and managed by multiple managers. A brief review of six ge neral steps to organizational management is offered as the outline for effective management. an emphasis is placed on a need for immediate s upervisors to have upper level administrator support to carry out thes e six managerial steps and to receive continuous feedback from consume rs and staff on the acceptability of this service. In addition, becaus e of their large size, history of abuses, and/or lack of consumer self -advocacy, larger residential organizations appear to have a special r esponsibility to show how they emphasize the concerns of their consume rs over the institutional concerns of organizational survival.