Running head: MACRO LEVEL INTERVIEW

Macro Level Interview

Deric Batt
Ball State University

MACRO LEVEL INTERVIEW

2
Macro Level Interview

I interviewed Molly Flodder, Executive Director of TEAMwork for Quality Living

(TQL), for my macro level interview. As mentioned, Mrs. Flodder is the Executive Director of
TEAMwork for Quality Living, a poverty awareness and assistance foundation based in Muncie,
Indiana. Molly has been the Executive Director of TEAMwork since 1997. Prior to this, Molly
had worked in public relations and education positions. Molly was a founding member of TQL,
never having left the organization since its inception.
Molly has overseen TQL from inception to what it has become today. Under Molly, TQL
has grown to include two full time social workers, along with a variable number of interns,
practicum students, and Americorp Vistas, depending on the time of year. TEAMwork presently
offers a number of services, from the Circles program to poverty simulations and various other
community programs. The prime focus of TEAMwork on a day to day basis is in the Circles
program, which helps people in poverty create intentional friendships with people from the
middle and upper class, allowing them to access these people as resources that can help teach
skills and connect them with other services they might need. The overall goal with this program
is to give people in a poverty a hand up, not a handout, aiding them in leaving poverty and
creating a sustainable plan to stay out of poverty.
These diverse ends are achieved by the multi-professional coalition TQL utilizes.
Although all members of the organization have input in functions and services, not all are
qualified to do the same thing. Molly, for example, does not consider herself a social worker, as
she does not have the educational background nor does she case manage for this organization.
On the other hand, Molly very much assists an area of society that is underserved and in need in
a broader sense, perhaps qualifying her work as macro level social work. Nevertheless, her

MACRO LEVEL INTERVIEW

primary job tasks as executive director of the organization typically involves utilizing her public
relations experience and creating partnerships with organizations that can aid individuals and
families in need escape poverty. This has involved things ranging from creating partnerships with
local battered women facilities that refer women to TEAMwork upon their exit from that facility
and that relationship to things such as writing a grant proposal to start a program dedicated to
helping underprivileged children purchase the necessary equipment to participate in
extracurricular activities school.
The individuals who do work case management are, in both the professional and
educational sense, social workers. Molly mentioned that her social workers tend to come from a
generalist background and perspective, which is useful in aiding individuals in poverty with the
issues they might face. This turns out to be the case because, although poverty is a specific issue,
Molly reports that individuals in poverty also have many other basic issues that occur, such as
the need for resources, professional development, and personal and family issues. Although these
social workers use a lot of the generalist social worker skill set, they do also acquire and utilize a
lot of specialized skills they have gathered from working with individuals in poverty. This goes
towards things such as understanding the root causes of poverty and educating the public on the
reality of poverty.
These poverty education events, often in the form of poverty simulations, are one of the
many manners that TQL gets their clients involved in programming. Clients, for example, are
given time at the end of poverty simulations to help break the myths of poverty for audiences
who have gone through the simulation. These clients are allowed to tell their tales and help
inform the public on what it actually means to be in poverty, and what actually has happened to
lead some people into poverty. In a larger sense of client involvement, Molly pointed me towards

MACRO LEVEL INTERVIEW

TQLs Guiding Coalition, which is a board made up of members from the Board of Directors,
TeamWORK staff, clients in the Circles program and their allies. These individuals come
together and form committees, ranging from recruitment to event planning and to Big View,
which sets topics for conversation and exploration within the Circles system. This approach
allows people in poverty to, much like their participation as educators of a sort in the poverty
simulations, control the way they put out the image of poverty as well as the manner in which
they believe they are best served in select aspects of services. While this Guiding Coalition does
not set the personal policies or agendas that dictate the way clients are treated, it does have a
bearing on the events they coordinate both for the members of TQL and the Circles program, as
well as the manner in which they present themselves and the image of poverty to the public.
Some issues outside of poverty tend to provide TEAMwork with some ethical and
professional dilemmas. For example, Molly pointed out that TEAMwork does not allow
individuals who are currently involved with substance abuse or are currently in a situation of
domestic violence to work within the Circles program. This is the result of careful ethical and
professional considerations, as TEAMwork acknowledges that individuals might abuse
substances as a manner of coping with poverty or other situations, and that other individuals
become involved in domestic conflicts due to financial issues, yet TEAMwork also believes that
individuals who do not have their baseline needs met (in these cases, safety) are not likely to be
able to give the issue of poverty the attention it takes to escape it.. This has reportedly been a
difficult thing to bear sometimes, though TQLs partnerships and ability to connect individuals to
relevant resources makes this all a bit easier to handle in a helpful manner, solving part of the
dilemma over rather or not to offer these individuals services. Molly also noted that individuals
who have worked through these situations are welcome to join the program.

MACRO LEVEL INTERVIEW

Dealing with issues like these can lead to burnout, as there is a lot of stress related to
serving people who can have a wide variety of needs or turning away individuals with other
issues who could nonetheless use help escaping poverty. Molly attempts to deal with this by
taking vacations herself, and by hosting a respite day each year for her fulltime staff members.
This can be done in many ways, though it was most recently conducted in the form of a trip to
what seemed to effectively be a picnic. This is reportedly a whole day affair, where the group
will eat and do some kind of non-job related task, during a work day, and bonding with coworkers. Molly informs me that this increases communication in the office as well as allows each
individual to relax and clear their mind for a moment. Molly reports that these respites are vital
to the functioning of the organization.
In totality, I found my interview with Molly to be interesting. She highlighted things I
had never considered as a social work student, such as issues of professional qualification in
serving individuals who are battling issues outside of my own or my programs competencies. It
seems to be a rather discouraging and kind of depressing thing, but I believe Molly is right to
refer individuals facing issues such as domestic violence and substance abuse (which can take
individuals lives) to more appropriate services. It was also interesting to me that Molly, with a
background in education and public relations, runs what is ostensibly a social work organization.
To me, this highlights some of the flexibility in macro social work, as there is a clear need for
individuals who can bridge the gap between an organization addressing a public issue and the
public they hope to serve. As a social worker, I think I am qualified to do this, but I can very
easily see how Mollys past as a public relations person qualifies her to lead an organization like
TEAMwork for Quality Living. Ultimately, I believe effective organizations that practice macro

MACRO LEVEL INTERVIEW

level social work likely need individuals who come from a variety of backgrounds to effectively
operate. Molly is a great example of that.