The 2006 Timothy J. Coakley Leadership Award
The 2004 Timothy J. Coakley Leadership Award
On March 17, 2006,
the Trustees of the Coakley Fund announced the recipient of
In 2005, articles were solicited for the second annual Award. Only two articles were received and upon review, the Trustees determined that we would not make an award that year and instead use this as an opportunity to redesign the award criteria to support and incubate emerging social programs in behavioral health that meet the ideals and values of innovation, consumer participation and leadership.
THE 2004 TIMOTHY J. COAKLEY LEADERSHIP AWARD
ACMHA and the Timothy J. Coakley Leadership Fund announced the winners of the first annual Timothy J. Coakley Behavioral Health Leadership Award at the annual Santa Fe Summit of the American College of Mental Health Administration that was held on March 10-13, 2004 at the Eldorado Hotel. The winning paper was circulated by the American College and published in Behavioral Healthcare Tomorrow and the author received travel support to the Summit, complimentary registration and a $500 prize. The winning paper and honorable mentioned are listed and linked below.
Winner - Exemplary Rural Mental Health Services Delivery
Edward L. Knight, Ph.D., CPRP
Vice President of Recovery, Rehabilitation & Mutual Support, Value Option
Adjunct Professor, Rehabilitation Sciences, Boston University
Honorable Mention - Framingham, Massachusetts - Jail Diversion Program
Christopher Gordon, M.D., Medical Director & V.P. Behavioral Health
Lisa Chabot, Development Office
Advocates, Inc.
Honorable Mention - How to Accomplish Practice Change in Behavioral Healthcare in Less than One Year
Natalie S. Berger, Ph.D., Director, Adult Network, Pikes Peak Mental Health
For twenty-five years Timothy J. Coakley was an outstanding leader, advocate, program innovator, and visionary in the behavioral health field. In the early days of his career in Massachusetts, he pioneered alternatives to psychiatric hospitalization for adolescents, initiated award-winning services for homeless families, and cultivated a broad range of psycho-social services for the seriously mentally ill. Later on, as the Principal for Coakley Consulting, he was at the forefront of design and implementation for many of this country's most successful and innovative public managed care programs, including Massachusetts, Chicago, Iowa, Nebraska, Arizona, and Washington, DC. His work was characterized by the highest degree of integrity and a passion for creative approaches for improving the lives of mentally disabled persons, especially in the public sector. He was also known for his persistent, engaging and sometimes irreverent style of working with colleagues. He passed away suddenly on February 18th, 2003.
To acknowledge and create a lasting memorial for Tim's many contributions to the field, Tim’s close friends, colleagues and family have established the Timothy J. Coakley Leadership Fund. The Fund is housed at the American College of Mental Health Administration (ACMHA). The Timothy J. Coakley Behavioral Health Leadership Award will be given annually for projects that demonstrate leadership on key issues that affect the field of behavioral health.
For the award, we seek projects in the following areas:
1)
Outstanding service innovation and design
This area will recognize services and programs that have made an outstanding
contribution in the behavioral health field. Especially worthy for consideration
will be programs or behavioral health systems that have been especially
challenged by difficult circumstances and have been successful in meeting those
challenges, those that have been able to demonstrate successful outcomes, and
those that can serve as models for replication in other locales.
2)
Consumer participation and choice
This
area will recognize significant achievement in the area of consumer protection,
consumer choice, and consumer governance. Included will be exemplary examples of
active consumer involvement and decision making in the areas of health system
oversight, program design, illness management, recovery and consumer directed
purchasing. An essential consideration for this category will be the degree to
which consumers and family members are truly active in the governance and
management of the program or system.
3) Leadership
This category will focus on two areas in behavioral health leadership and leadership theory. First, papers that highlight the behavioral health leader’s unique role in helping an organization achieve significant, outstanding results, particularly as a result of challenging circumstances or management restructuring. Second, we seek articles or essays that speak to Tim’s style of leadership: namely, the role of self-sacrificing leadership that empowers and serves, that is characterized by the values of openness and inclusion, and finally that offers the gifts of grace, respect, and meaning for employees and consumers in the behavioral health system.