clinical research coordinator

mental health therapist

counselor

therapist

clinic coordinator

Cerebral

I started with this company when it was building. Though it took me a while, as a contractor (which we all were at the beginning), to build a panel of patients, I eventually did fill my 20 hours plus more every week. They asked me to take on additional licenses (at my expense) for other states. I have stuck with them through thick and thin. It was rewarding work, and with some health issues, I could work a reasonable schedule from home. 

There was a lot of growth and changes that many of us worried were not well thought out and risky. Well, that proved true last year when it kind of fell apart amid allegations of wrongdoing (which have subsequently been proven false but, image is everything in this society). The founder was ousted and a new CEO appointed with the promise that things would be made better. Since then, layoffs and downsizing have pushed much into chaos. A process called "capacity management" is shrouded in secrecy and seems to be a punitive process that limits clients' access to qualified providers. 

What was an open and relatively transparent supportive administration has devolved into a tight-lipped punitive environment. They don't like it when tough questions are asked. Admin works hard to shut down any conversation that exposes them to having to answer reasonable (but challenging) questions. No group discussions that seek to support each other is allowed if it discusses the hard issues/challenges. They remove conversations from the posts and now set up 1:1 sessions challenging the 'offender' as being 'negative.' 

I was 100% sold on and even initially referred the company to others. Now I would caution others to look at other companies. This one has become toxic and financially non-viable as a place to work.  Standard operating procedures are changed frequently without warning or explanation, even when they don't make sense. There is no discussion allowed.

I do not recommend this company. 

I was really excited about this position at first.  It took almost a month to get any clients.  It is a pain to log in to the portal and a client could schedule 3 hours in advance, so I was constantly checking my google calendar and then being disappointed when no clients had scheduled.  I started to really struggle financially.  When clients did finally schedule, it was a nightmare.  There are a million different platforms to use depending on what problem you are struggling with, and you will struggle plenty.  Trying to get a timely answer when you have a client blowing up your EMR chat is so stressful.  There are pages and pages on SOPs that you are expected to pour through for hours to try to find an answer, just to find that the answer isn't there.  You do not get paid for any of your work spent messaging, filing IT tickets, going on a wild goose chase to figure out who or what platform fixes what problems.  There is no explanation or follow-up.  I had a client just disappear off my EMR and then I couldn't finish my note for our visit.  They were reassigned with no explanation or notice.  When you don't finish that note within 48 hours it looks bad on you, but you'll also be waiting more than 48 hours for anyone to fix the issue.  Clients seem to be confused with what's going on too and there are so many different people doing so many different things within the client's record, but there is no explanation of who does what role or who you are supposed to turn to for what client needs/requests.  There are just way too many forms and applications and ways you are "supposed" to do things that you can't keep it straight.  You communicate through email, maybe, sometimes SLACK which is like a social media type platform for communicating with a million different people in a million different channels.   With all the rules and policies in place, they make it difficult to even provide clients with services.   I spent all my time trying to find answers, help clients and figure out how to be successful at my job with no financial reimbursement.

All in all, working at Cerebral has largely been what I expected when I accepted the position.  

Pros: 
- The ability to set my schedule and work from home has significantly decreased the amount of daily stress when compared to working at a clinic. 
- I get to make a difference in the lives of patients on a platform that is easy for them to utilize and expands access to care for many who otherwise could or would not receive treatment.
- SOPs are easily searchable and expectations are reasonable and easily understood.
- There are numerous, helpful resources, such as the ability to collaborate with peers/physicians, access to UpToDate for CEUs and current research, and a dedicated crisis team which is particularly beneficial in a telehealth environment.
- I can honestly say I have not felt micromanaged, I experience the level of autonomy I would anywhere else, and that my clinical decisions have been respected.

Cons:
- 1099 means no benefits, no taxes taken out.  This is quite the downside if you must purchase private insurance and are unaccustomed to the tax ramifications.
- Loads of unpaid work.  The compensation for patient visits is decent; but that's it.  No admin time.  Countless Slack messages, medication refills, FMLA forms, etc. take up a significant amount of time and are not compensated at all.
- Wildly inconsistent income.  When I initially started, all of my available patient time was booked, typically for 2-3 weeks ahead of time. Over the past few months, the overall number of patients has dramatically decreased.  Being paid per client visit, this has lead to extremely inconsistent income from check to check.

Overall, the experience of working with Cerebral has been mixed.  The flexibility is great.  It really does appear that other team members care about the patients.  I feel that my clinical judgements are respected.  However, the inconsistent income, lack of benefits, and high amounts of unpaid work make it difficult to consider a career working here long-term.  A word to any Cerebral management that may see this review: Consider providing admin time and benefits to the providers you value if you wish to keep them.

Cerebral uses Slack to communicate to its many teams. It would be nice but the message you get if you have significant issues like not getting the right amount of pay, or questions about your benefits, you send a "ticket" in to "HR" or "payroll" and the message you get back right away is "We will respond within 3-5 business days". ...So hopefully you don't have any pressing pay issues.

Additionally, HR is absolutly impossible to talk to. They don't use email or phones in this company. It is ALL through slack. It's hard to know who to reach out to directly because there are so many slack channels that only handle one thing. If you want to experience what it's like to work at Cerebral, just picture that time at the DMV where you waited in line for a long time, only to be told by a rude and apathetic employee that you should of been in that line over there and that this worker can only do one function. Imagine waiting days to hear back about pay issues only for the message to read, "reach out to the other channel." That is the essence of communication in Cerebral.

Also, Cerebral does not guarantee benefits after your first 90 days of employment. You must get up and over at least 30 hours AVERAGE of work a week for a 90 day period. If you're like me and they didn't have a full load of work within that first 90 days, you'll be waiting a much longer time than you want to be. 

Their responses to any and everything is "Well we've grown faster than we thought but good changes are coming." This problem began 2 months ago for me and I'm still waiting. 

I was recently hired at cerebral as a salaried employee. Everything was AMAZING. Great support, connection and communication. I was actually shocked at how great it was for a fully remote company. That said, out of the blue, they set a mandatory meeting on everyone's calander and let everyone know that, effective immediately (like at the end of that meeting),  they were doing away with the salaried employees and making everyone hourly because they didn't budget correctly and could no longer afford to pay people. They then referred everyone to their reporting manager for them to tell that that if you had not met a certain threshold of clients per month over the course of 3 months, you would be losing your insurance benefits at the end of the month and would have to be tracked an additional 3 months going forward to see if you would be eligible at that time.
No warning.
No grace period.

Nothing.
They just basically pulled everyone together, crapped on them and then said, oh, and "if you do not agree with the terms and sign the new contracts coming to your emails in a couple days, you will be terminated."

I say that to say, the company wants to help people but are REALLY BAD at budgeting and actually taking care of their employees. If you're going to do this, I would be VERY careful. They'll turn on you in the drop of a hat and not care about how you as an employee will be effected. 

I was recently laid off from Cerebral in a surprise mass layoff where they let go of 20% of staff. I held a full-time, salaried role doing part-time therapy and part-time other tasks. The quick layoff was highly unethical, and fairly antithetical to their mission of long-term, high quality, mental health care, as the sudden therapy termination can cause client harm. 

The compensation was once competitive however is no longer competitive any longer. There is a lot of fear within the company as people do not feel secure in their roles. From my experience, I would say that overall company morale of those doing the client care (therapists, counselors, etc.) is fairly low. 

The flexibility of schedule and the WFH approach was really enticing. I would recommend a therapist role here if you are not looking for full-time work but are maybe looking to take a handful of clients in a high-need state, and are comfortable with occasional high acuity using a telehealth setting, as their desired client population continues to expand towards diagnostic complexity. 

In summary, lots of changes with overall low morale. A therapist role is fine if you are okay with a piecework model with no promise of benefits and potentially high acuity clients. 

I have been with Cerebral for over two years. There is no guarantee of work but you are required to committ at least 20 hours. Many employees schedule 20 hours for just a few hours of work. They have overhired to the point that there is no longer enough work for everybody. We are being audited constantly thanks to the increased scrutiny Cerebral is under. My biggest complaint is that they do very little to retain employees. Those of us who have worked hard for them and have been loyal are being told that there isn't enough work so leave if you want yet they are still hiring new employees rather than licensing those of us who have been loyal in states with higher demand.  They are no longer adverstising as much to keep their employees busy. There is much unpaid work. You must do refills and answer patient questions M-F whether you work that day or not and sometimes lately there is more of this type of unpaid work that there are patient visits. The EMR while easy -is very redundant and not yet well integrated. The medication system is a nightmare. There is a ticket system you use if you need any help for a patient and it can take days for those to be answered. I do not recommend working for Cerebral right now. 

What is the best part of working at the company?
Slack social channels for remote work connections 

What is the most stressful part about working at the company?
Lack of insight on the business of the provision of quality mental health services on the part of decision makers. Moving very far into automation in services which leads to very poor customer service. Makes it embarrassing to be an employee 

What is the work environment and culture like at the company?
The culture amongst teams is supportive and encourages connection. The work environment is stressful due to  upper management’s’ gaslighting its employees and their focus on the bigger picture while not looking at the impact on the individual patients. Makes it difficult to effectively provide quality services 

What is a typical day like for you at the company?
Clocking in, checking the calendar and Slack channel for any new updates and/or meetings. Working tickets which can involve messaging or phone calls while monitoring Slack for any updates. Lunch and then more of the same. Routinely scheduled through the week are 1:1 with supervisors and team meetings.

I was originally attracted to this company because their mission and vision statements for providing high quality and affordable mental health care to underserved populations is outstanding. But the practices of the company make it exceedingly difficult and stressful for practitioners to meet expectations. Every week changes to an already complex digital platform are made usually with workarounds because of bugs in the software. This creates a confusing and toxic work environment with policies that aren’t clearly defined or are not up to date since the leadership frequently changes goals and services. Compensation isn’t fair or realistic since providers are only paid per patient visit. The administrative burden places excessive complexities on providers making it nearly impossible to achieve metrics. Leadership appears to be too young and inexperienced to achieve the ambitious goals they have published.

I first started working at Cerebral when it was gaining popularity and my schedule of clients immediately took off. As a contractor employee, I was required to have at least 20 hours a week open, and being licensed in 2 states, helped me quickly build a
large client base. After the company was investigated for it's controlled substances prescribing, things quickly took a turn for the worse. Many established clients decided to end their subscription with Cerebral resulting in a much lower client base. They then began to prioritize giving clients to their full-time/W2 staff which I understand but still expected contractors to maintain 20 hours/week of availability despite having little to no patients. That was what prompted my decision to leave the company. It was unreasonable to expect me to leave my schedule open with no one scheduling appointments with me due to their severe limiting of clients. You are only paid by completed visits or a late cancellation/missed visit so keeping your schedule open 20 hours to not be paid when no one schedules sucked. It was fun while it lasted. 

Top Job Titles	Average Salary
Clinical research coordinator 13 salaries reported	$60,769 per year
Mental health therapist 1 salary reported	$70.00 per hour
Counselor 11 salaries reported	$34.55 per hour
Therapist 1 salary reported	$85.00 per hour
Clinic coordinator 10 salaries reported	$19.12 per hour

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