What are other benefits and incentives like at First Step House?

Pros

Ethical, caring leaders who listen to your concerns and provide mentorship. Good compensation and benefits. Including the 36 hour workweek. Heavy emphasis on training and professional development. Growing with an organization that is highly progressive/dynamic. Collegial, humanizing vibe between coworkers. It often makes working with an intense, complex population into an inspirational experience.

Cons

The population served is intensely symptomatic in a lot of cases. So it’s not light and easy. The collegiality between staff members can definitely make that better, but this is not cushy work. Also with the expectation of high quality work, and the need to navigate a fair amount of red tape from funding and third-party payer organizations, it takes a lot of diligence, and a fair amount of critical thinking. i’ve worked here several years in various roles. The programs are constantly evolving, and while that generally is exciting and useful, it can be a downside as well, because of the complexity, and all the bugs that have to be worked out with new programs. When you move up to a new position, you’re off and hitting something up that has not been done before. Being able to tolerate ambiguity during these times of change is a must for those who are going to have longevity and upward progression. You will face change, progress and ambiguity, and your leaders will expect you to speak up about changes that may be needed.

Advice to Management

The increased emphasis on staying sharp through self-care is helpful. The new anonymous tip form for those who have concerns that they want to share anonymously is helpful, so I would encourage leadership to continue with this. It is needed due to the level of complexity and change that the employees experience. Working here is a joy because of the kinds of people you hire - the ones who stay. We indeed need the help you provide in seeing performance lags, at least initially, as a need to be explored rather than a problem requiring criticism and discipline. So definitely, I would encourage keeping that up. It has helped me and many others to stay when other opportunities are out there.