Pros
Supportive co-workers, better pay than most, good health benefits for a single person, helpful learning experience for assessment, differential diagnosis, and counseling skills.
Cons
Lack of clarification about job duties! INSANE productivity and paperwork expectations. Mixed messages constantly. Somehow asking us to do more work for clients yet spend less time billing for them. Caseloads that average 70 clients per counselor. Expected to only spend 60-90 minutes per month on each client, even though people deserve so much more help. OH and billing/ productivity is the only thing managers discuss with you. Minimal time spent on clinical supervision. These factors may be true for many community mental health agencies, and if so, it demonstrates that this is a truly broken system. I do think that support from a supervisor can minimize or maximize these inherent problems, though.
