Professional Development Needs of VCE Mid-Career Extension Professionals

We see Extension professionals leave for industry and other similar organizations between their third and seventh work anniversary. This is also the time when they go through their initial promotion within the organization and are first eligible to become members of Epsilon Sigma Phi. There is significant cost in getting an agent to this point in his or her career. It has often been expressed that Extension trains these agents, and then they move on to greener pastures; however, we have not thoroughly explored why they leave. We conducted this study with support from Epsilon Sigma Phi to identify challenges and develop recommendations for professional development and organizational change to increase retention of Extension professionals beyond this stage of their career. Our team identified pertinent literature and developed focus group protocol focused on competencies, sources of stress, the role of needs assessment in work, mentoring, organizational support, and professional development organizations. We conducted six focus groups with agents and specialists with differing status regarding promotion. Online focus groups were recorded and transcripts were provided to participants for member-checking. Two members of the research team facilitated each focus group session and then the research team held a discussion regarding their observations and reactions which also was recorded, transcribed, and member-checked. All transcripts were coded using the selected literature and emerging themes. Findings documents were developed and shared with the Extension organization. Focus group participants were invited to attend a virtual session to focus on findings and to prioritize issues and develop recommendations for solutions to the issues including actionable items. This session will provide findings and recommendations, while also providing opportunity for attendees to consider how they apply similarly or differently in their organizations.