A Workforce Rebuild For Retention & Training In I/DD Services: The Beverly Farm Foundation Case Study

A Workforce Rebuild For Retention & Training In I/DD Services: The Beverly Farm Foundation Case Study

Health and human service organizations, particularly providers serving individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities (I/DD), continue to face persistent workforce challenges. High turnover, chronic vacancies, rising labor costs, and onboarding models that fail to prepare employees for the realities of direct support work all threaten organizational stability and service quality. 

In this one-hour live presentation, Crystal Officer, Chief Executive Officer of Beverly Farm Foundation, will share how her organization transformed its workforce strategy over five years by integrating onboarding, training, compensation, leadership development, employee engagement, career pathways, and supervisor development into a single, coordinated approach. 

Founded 129 years ago, Beverly Farm Foundation serves nearly 250 adults with I/DD in Godfrey, Illinois. Drawing on an industrial-organizational psychology framework informed by her doctoral research, Ms. Officer will examine how the organization connected workforce initiatives to realistic job expectations, early role mastery, supervisor relationships, organizational commitment, and long-term retention. 

The session will provide a practical look at the executive leadership, strategic planning, and organizational commitment required to move from workforce crisis to workforce stability, while offering an evidence-informed framework for prioritizing investments, sequencing change initiatives, and building the conditions for long-term success. 

What This Case Study Explores 

• How Beverly Farm used strategic planning to evaluate priorities, sequence initiatives across fiscal years, allocate resources, navigate resistance, and make the course corrections needed for strategic momentum 
• Which workforce interventions worked and which required organizational adjustment 
• How organizational values were embedded in training, supervision, leadership expectations, and standards of care 
• The future of Beverly Farm Foundation’s workforce strategy, including more flexible workforce scheduling designed in collaboration with the union 

What Executive Attendees Will Learn 

• Analyzing the primary drivers of direct support professional turnover, including supervisor relationships, employee voice, and early job experiences 
• Building and sequencing an integrated workforce retention strategy using Beverly Farm’s five-year transformation as a practical model 
• Applying strategic planning and change management principles to lead workforce stabilization initiatives at the executive level 

Featured Speakers

Crystal Officer, MPA

Chief Executive Officer, Beverly Farm Foundation

Crystal Officer serves as the Chief Executive Officer of Beverly Farm Foundation in Godfrey, Illinois, bringing over two decades of dedicated service to individuals with developmental disabilities. Her career began as a direct support professional, where she gained invaluable front-line experience in caregiving and advocacy, a perspective that now informs her executive approach to workforce retention, training, and organizational change.
Crystal is currently pursuing a Ph.D. in General Psychology with a focus on Industrial and Organizational Psychology. Her dissertation research examines how supervisors describe characteristics of their relationships with employees with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) that may influence employee retention. Her research interests in workplace relationships and retention complement her practical experience leading workforce transformation in the I/DD field.