Start Your Agency Adoption Here

If you’re feeling confused about what adoption agency you should pick, I get it. I’ve been there. In fact, when we were going through our adoption journey, my husband and I were really focused on finding someone that we felt confident could actually match us. We didn’t stop and really consider all of the criteria we should be thinking about when choosing an agency. When we came upon some really difficult things in our adoption journey, that was when it became really obvious to me that I should have spent some additional time getting to know our agency before we made the decision to write the big check and ultimately move forward.

That is when I realized that being successful with an adoption agency comes down to three things. 

Know how many adoption opportunities the agency has in an average year

The very first thing you need to do is understand how many adoption opportunities this agency has a year versus how many hopeful adoptive families they have on their list. I wish this was something that adoption agencies were required to report somewhere or publish on their website, but that’s just not the case. The only way you’re going to find this information out is to ask. Some agencies will share this information and some won’t. But it is a really important question that I coach my clients on asking their agencies because it’ll give you a sense of how big the agency is and how many families are waiting. All of those factors could play a role in whether or not you choose that agency. An agency with a really long list of hopeful adoptive families and very few opportunities to adopt in a year could mean that you might need to add on another type of adoption in order for you to move more quickly. You might want to work with this agency and self-match your adoption, and have the agency actually do all of the paperwork in the support systems for the expectant parent because otherwise, you might be sitting with that agency for a long time.

Understand their communication style

The next thing you need to do in order to be successful in adopting a baby with an adoption agency is to understand their communication style. Everybody has their own type of communication style. Some people like to be direct and blunt, some prefer to communicate via email, some text message, some via phone calls, etc. Understanding all of those types of things is really important because an adoption agency might have a long list of hopeful adoptive families on its roster. If you want someone who’s going to give you a call every week, that may not be a good fit for you. Or on the reverse, if this agency wants to tell you about every opportunity to come to the door, but you have a very specific list of criteria, you may not want to know about all of those types of agency opportunities that come about. So you might want to be more focused on one particular area. Also, it’s really important that you feel comfortable enough to ask difficult questions to your agency. I know this was something that I wish I had taken a little bit more time on when I was going through the interview process. This is what I coach my clients on when it comes to actually finding the right agency. 

I know the idea of finding the right agency can seem pretty overwhelming. Maybe it would just be helpful if somebody could give you the step-by-step process and the exact questions to ask so that you can determine whether or not they’re a good fit for you and for your adoption journey. You’re in luck because I have a resource for you that will be really helpful. It’s called the adoption interview partner guide, and it’s going to give you the exact questions that I suggest you ask yourself and then ultimately the agency so that you can determine if you’re a good fit together. Head over to myadoptioncoach.com/interviewguide and check it out!

Have an adoption profile that helps you create an emotional connection with an expectant family.  

The next thing you need to do in order to be successful in adopting a baby with an adoption agency is to have a profile that creates an emotional connection. Your adoption profile can dramatically impact the speed of your overall adoption. It can help you go from waiting in line for years to matching in just a matter of days. I know this because I’ve spent over 3,000 hours talking with expectant and birth families to really understand what they are looking for in adoption profiles. Not only have I applied this in my own journey, but I’ve also helped 1,000 other families be formed through adoption as well. If you’d like to learn more about how you can create an emotional connection in your adoption profile, check out this video where I’m sharing my own adoption journey.