This is the 2nd part of a 3 -part series.
To see the previous post in this series, click here.
The Clinical Experience Will Be Invaluable
By working in a community mental health agency, nonprofit organization, or psychiatric hospital after graduation, new mental health professionals can learn to work with a wide variety of clients and issues. This strengthens your clinical and diagnostic skills. Oftentimes, the clients you see in these settings will have fewer resources and a greater number of social and clinical challenges. That’s an experience that is unique to these community settings and will help prepare you to competently work with a variety of presenting issues.
Professional Development is Usually FREE
Every mental health professional is ethically obligated to continue their professional development throughout their careers. Even Colorado has finally stepped up to this standard! One of the best things about working in community settings is that continuing education is typically provided for employees on the job at no additional expense. Consider that the typical workshop or conference that I attend may cost me at least $15-20 per hour without counting transportation and lodging. That’s a a great deal and a huge incentive for the new professional! Think about it – If your state requires that you attend 24 hours / 2 year cycle like Texas does, that equates to $480 / 2 year cycle plus transportation and lodging. If that training does not come as a perk from your employers, then it’s coming out of your paycheck!
Peer Consultation is Right Down the Hall
Most mental health professionals in private practice are sole proprietors who work in offices isolated from their peers. The number one complaint I hear from them is “It’s lonely in private practice!” By working in a community setting, you have an opportunity to work with and learn from your colleagues right down the hall from you. When you have a clinical or administrative question, you will have peers an arms’ length away to staff a case or help you find resources. Once you are out on your own, that immediate availability is likely to be much more difficult to find.
Shared Liability Reduces Your Risk
When you work as a therapist in a community mental health agency, it’s likely that you will make your share of mistakes just like the rest of us humans do while we are learning new skills. The benefit of making them there is that should you encounter a disgruntled client that decides to sue for malpractice, your entire agency can rally to your defense. Once you are in private practice, you are all on your own!
Administrative Supervision is Free and Abundant, Too
OK, so I’ll admit it . . . . I rarely appreciated administrative supervision when I had it. Mostly, it seemed like a lot of red tape i.e. a pain in the butt. Nevertheless, after 30 years of working in the field of mental health, now I get it. I get how critical it really is to learn early on how to write a strong progress note and treatment plan, how to deal with money matters and cancellations, and how to set an appointment, and how to be a team player in an organization. And, equally important, I get why someone needs to make sure that an agency continues to meet their own goals just to survive. Administrative supervision is critical – to the agency, yes, but also to you as a new professional. Administrative supervision teaches you to put foundational habits and practices in place that will support you in the field of mental health for decades to come.
Clinical Supervision at No Additional Cost
No one told me when I entered graduate school that I would need clinical supervision post-graduation in order to get licensed and practice ethically and competently. And, when the topic eventually came up . . . in my Practicum class, no one bothered to spell out that in all likelihood it would be ME paying for every minute of that supervision unless I had an employer or tooth fairy that was willing to provide it to me at their own expense!
If you were as clueless as me, let me clue you in now . . . . The customary fee for clinical supervision post graduation can easily cost you an additional $30,000. Here are some more thoughts about fees for clinical supervision. However, for now, let me just say that if that’s coming out of your wallet right out of graduate school, it’s going to hurt! Many employers will provide individual and / or group clinical supervision at no additional cost to you.
Community Resources Abound in Agency Settings
One of the challenges to any new mental health professional is a general lack of knowledge about the community resources. Yes, many communities have a “Blue Book” of community resources but that is not sufficient to support your clients and minimize your liability in private practice. By spending time in an agency, you will have time and experiences that allow you to develop a knowledge and understanding of specific agencies’ strengths and challenges. For example, if you were in private practice today, would you know
- How to support and keep safe a suicidal client who has phoned you? (Check out ASIST through LivingWorks.)
- Where to send a client who is struggling with staying sober? (Inpatient treatment if detox is needed; Alcoholics Anonymous for ongoing peer support.)
- Who provides group therapy to court-ordered domestic violence offenders? (Here in Colorado, providers must be approved through the Domestic Violence Offender Management Board.)
- Who to call first when you’ve been threatened with a lawsuit? (Yes, call a mental health attorney.)
- Where to turn when your client needs resources to help her adult son who is soon to be homeless? (For me, it’s the Douglas County Youth Initiative’s resource guide.)
Of course, those questions are just a fraction of the resources that you will need to know in private practice. And, working in an agency for a few years will build up your knowledge of community resources faster than anything else!
Opportunity Foster Community Relationships Will Pay Dividends Down the Road
And, while you are building up that knowledge of community resources, you will also be building up your address book as you continue to meet and problems solve with other agencies and professionals in your community. You may see this initially as simply “doing your job.” But, the truth is, you are planting seeds! Once you leave the agency and move into private practice, you will see that you have fostered many relationships with individuals and organizations. If you’ve done this right, you will know many who can and will be eager to send clients to you for counseling and support!
Here, in Colorado, many new therapists eschew agency work and opt to immediately hang out their shingles only to find that they struggle. I can’t say that I’m really surprised. If you haven’t planted the seeds to help clients find their way to you, it’s not likely that you will have great success in private practice. There are many paths to building a successful and vibrant practice, but working in an agency is definitely one that can pay off in dividends if you have the wisdom to pursue it!
Have you worked in a non-profit or agency of some type? What has been the benefits for you? Are you now in private practice and didn’t take this route? I hope regardless of your path, you’ll take a moment to drop in here to chat and let us learn from your journey, too! I look forward to chatting with you!
The last part of this 3-part series can be found here.
Hi Tamara,
I was not able to work for an agency as a music therapist when I was first starting out because there simply were no music therapy jobs where I was living. I did, however, work as a mental health tech for a psychiatric hospital for the time before my music therapy internship and PRN after I became board-certified as a music therapist and was working on building my practice. Some of the benefits you mentioned didn’t apply for me (for one, I have ALWAYS paid for my continuing education!), but it certainly was helpful to work from the inside of an agency to learn first-hand about how funding works (Medicare, Medicaid, private insurers, etc.), how non-profits are run, etc.
HI, Rachelle! It’s good to hear from you! Oh, thank you so much for highlighting the differences you experienced as a mental health tech. I know what you say is true . . . . When I worked in a psychiatric hospital, I had free training all the time. They brought in monthly speakers, invited the community and staff could attend for free. It was, for them, considered a marketing opportunity – allowing staff to mix and mingle with the area providers while at the same time increasing our skills and knowledge base. But, now that I think about it, you are right . . . I don’t think the psychiatric nurses or the techs were allowed to attend. That was a perk only for those involved in clinical (as opposed to medical or support) services.
It is interesting, though, to note that even though you were not working as a music therapist in the hospital, those perks i.e. learning about the finances, still paid off for you. Working in a psych hospital (especially a for-profit hospital) really is a terrific way to learn about the money and marketing end of the psych business!
Hey, thanks for dropping in today. I hope you’ll be back soon to join the ocnversations!
I wanted to point out that it can be really difficult these days to find a job as a mental health professional in an agency, so you can get all those fantastic benefits. Especially if you are limited in your ability to move around for your job (i.e., if you have family or other obligations requiring you to live in a specific area).
One possible solution is to get involved in agencies as a volunteer. There are a lot of agencies that use volunteers to provide paraprofessional counseling. I have personally accumulated years of experience in different agencies as a volunteer counselor and victim advocate. During that time I was exposed to some excellent supervision, training, and networking opportunities. One of my specialties is working with survivors of sexual assault, and through volunteering for a sex assault advocacy agency I had a chance to witness first hand what survivors can go through with police and medical care, not to mention their families, before they come to me. The agencies I’ve volunteered for have also become excellent referral resources now that I’m in private practice.
Peg! Thank you, thank you for dropping in and speaking up for volunteering! It’s a huge plus on any resume and you are absolutely right – you can get many of those same benefits – supervision, training, and networking! You sound as if you have a wealth of experience behind you, Peg, so I can only imagine that your practice is faring well! Good for you!!
Hope to chat with you here again, soon!
I think that the point on supervision hours is crucial. If you join some professional organizations they will help with a reduced fee for supervision but even that will cost you a significant amount over time. The quality of supervision as some MH centers is suspect, but free is better than homeless.
The connections that one makes in private practice are numerous and often very beneficial. I have found that the high turnover rate at some places is actually beneficial as it exposes you to numerous professionals. Perhaps ironically, this is similar to the actual work.
And that is the kicker in community mental health. You don’t have to be a specialist in anything to treat it. This is how you get your experience. You want to try your hand at co-occurring issues? Go for it. Sexual dysfunction? Go ahead, you have supervision. I feel this is how people get to taste numerous different things and then find what makes them tick. It has been extremely beneficial to me.
-Lem