Pros
The diverse population of all ages, demographics and psychiatric illness will provide good experience, especially for a new clinician. However, outside of the New Employee Orientation training held by HR, you will receive little to no training from Team Lead or Program Manager. Benefits are good in terms of PTO and agency contribution towards Health Savings Account. Schedule preferences were routinely granted, making it easier to save PTO (team works on a rotating schedule with different days off each week). If you can establish yourself with the passive-aggressive, catty management, you're likely to promote quickly. Front line staff was a joy to work with!
Cons
United Healthcare Insurance is sub-par, however a high deductible policy is available with no monthly employee contribution. No compensation for licensed clinicians working over 40 hours, although flex time is possible. Team Lead and Program Manager often provided misinformation regarding agency policies and showed questionable clinical judgment at times. The disrespect from management towards employees' boundaries regarding staying past end of shift was remarkable. This agency is not that different from others in terms of shortage in staffing and high workload. However, staff is treated as insignificant and when concerns are raised about the need for work/life balance, the Program Manager referred staff to EAP. What did stand out in comparison to other agencies was the hostility and condescension from management, blatant inconsistencies in expectations (discipline given to one, but not another for the same error), and lack of trust in staff. Management was routinely lacking in their ability to set example of the work ethic they demanded from staff. The punitive measures and utter lack of training by Team Lead and Program Manager is a poor example of leadership and will never be conducive to retaining qualified clinicians. To expect fairly new, unlicensed clinicians to provide training in the field is irresponsible. In my 15 years working for government agencies (10 years of which has been in mental health field), I have experienced a fair share of politics and difficult personalities, but MCOT management lowers the bar. Think twice before working for MCOT or EMCOT.