mentor

program director

executive director

development director

engagement specialist

Friends of the Children

What is the best part of working at the company?
Excellent and caring leadership, clear vision, meaningful work that makes a visible difference, dynamic team, mileage compensation, plentiful PTO, and plentiful training opportunities. I have worked with the chapter for the past few years and love the work! It hasn’t always been the case, but I believe the current leadership is top notch with genuine support and care. They have clear expectations of the role, will hold you to those standards (primarily set by national) but are also quick to offer support, advice, and assist with tough problems. I have never heard “What can I do to support you? What do you need? How can I help?” as much as I have in this role. They are easily approachable with any concern and I never feel like I have to be perfect or change anything because they’re watching. The vision of role expansion, new enrollments, resources available, and changes are explained with good reasons and room for questions. With any changes to database system, time management, HR, etc., I’ve watched and heard leaders (especially the current executive director, program director, and OPs Manager) listen to mentors and try to understand their viewpoint; working with us to met national standards, but in ways that practically work for our day to day roles. Working with the kids can be emotionally difficult to watch their family’s struggles, but the reward of being a part of their progress is incredible and well worth the challenges! I’m strongly encouraged to work ONLY 40 hours and my supervisor and the team are very supportive of staff taking time off to recharge.

What is the most stressful part about working at the company?
Schedules shift regularly based on kids availability (sickness, life event, caregiver’s availability, etc) or needs of other kids on your roster. Occasionally a weekend day is needed (usually not more than 2-4 hrs) and typically for an event. Sometimes I’ve tried my best (while sticking within 40hr work week) and there were circumstances out of my control that led to a child being short on service hours they received and that’s reflected in data. In this case, I tell my current program director and she is understanding and supportive. She’s even offered to see kids when I’m unavailable. There’s an emotional toll it can take supporting families as they experience homelessness, domestic violence, DHS involvement, child and adult abuse, etc. Self awareness and self care are key! PTO is odd, it covers the hours you as the employee work, not the service hours kids receive. So you do need to plan accordingly to see kids extra before or after PTO. If you try your best and a kid’s still short on service hours, you can ask leadership if they have capacity to visit kids while you’re gone (typically, I don’t have to ask leadership, I can just front load or back load). With planning, it’s typically doable to take PTO and kids still receive their full service hours; win-win!

What is the work environment and culture like at the company?
We’re growing into a very dynamic and connected team! Under previous leadership, it hasn’t always been this way, but with very strong leaders now, I’ve seen a collaborative supportive environment grounded in a value of “how can we serve the kids and the families to the best of our reasonable ability?” 

What is a typical day like for you at the company?
There’s never a typical day because the population we serve has ever changing needs. Consistently, my days are full of visiting kids inside and outside school, admin, caregiver contact point, and planning outings.


Working for Friends of the Children was one of the most disappointing and professionally traumatic experiences I've had in my entire career. At the National level they preach a wonderful mission and values, but once you are involved you quickly realize there is a lack of integrity that is apparent at all levels, but especially within the National Team's leadership and the Twin Cities leadership.

Leadership at all levels have very little lived experience in common with the clients served, and it becomes very clear that they do not understand the needs of the families and children served when you look at their budgets.   They only allot $40 of spending per MONTH per child, which is unrealistic.  Leadership has inflated salaries while the direct service staff are paid barely above poverty level wages.

There is significant disconnect between leadership and staff, and policies and procedures are not followed at all levels.  It is quantity of children served that is valued over the quality of the program provided. 

On a local level, the Twin Cities leadership has no experience in leadership, working with children or families,  or non-profit experience serving under-resourced communities. Leadership treats people as if they are superior, and communication is very condescending and belittling.  

The Twin Cities chapter and the National Team engage in retaliatory behavior when questioned about the issues and problems. This is a problem on a National and Local level - many other chapters, besides just the Twin Cities, have had executive and program directors who have been fired for speaking the truth and calling out the organization for not fulfilling their promises to communities and treating their direct service staff poorly.


Leadership in this agency ruins the mission which is to support children in need of a long term mentor. The concept is awesome. A mentor for 8 children but the agency does not allow the time nor the system to make this happen.  The children are the best part of this role but the agency serves the board and the leadership. Anything that comes up as a challenge is blamed on the mentor not the leadership or management who create the system for the Professional mentors working with the children. Most of the work you do is spent on the leadership's request to get the story "out there".  As a mentor you felt interrupted by what "higher up" wants their agency to look like vs actually serving the children. Although it is an agency supposedly serving the underprivileged children, that isn't what my caseload looked like. Many of the hours are spent driving to locations to meet the children. The role should have more support for the Professional mentor.  It cannot be sustained as a long term role due to the daily taxing stress.  This is a highly stressful position   due to the chaotic nature of the management team. Also witnessed racial inequity from leadership, unaware of how to serve in a culturally competent or sensitive manner. 

The mission is genuinely meaningful, and the youth and families are the best part of the work. Unfortunately, the structure of the role does not reflect the realities of what mentors face day to day. Caseloads are spread across many schools and wide areas of the city, leading to excessive daily driving and stressful schedules. Working with this population also means navigating frequent caregiver cancellations, limited responsiveness, and youth no-shows, however expectations and data targets do not reflect these realities, and missed hours still must be made up, even when PTO is used. Policies and expectations appear to be set without enough input from those doing the day-to-day mentoring. Communication from leadership is inconsistent and expectations change frequently, which adds stress to an already demanding role. Flexibility and workload adjustments are not applied consistently across mentors which contributes to frustration, low morale, and high turnover.


Expect to be out in the community every single day. You’ll pick up kids and drive them to libraries, parks, museums, etc to do enrichment activities and provide interventions. You don’t get much training and are expected to know what to do. The caregivers don’t often get explanations on what your role is, so they feel entitled to your time and money. This role could be perfect if it was more structured and if management actually had their employees’ back when they gave feedback rather than weaponizing it against them. 

Management is very unprofessional and cliquey. They do not take accountability for their actions and mishaps and throw it back on mentors. Sufficient training is not given to mentors and they are expected to know what to do. Work/life balance does not exist as every mentor is expected to see their roster of 8 children for 16 hours EACH a month which is not doable as the pairing system for mentors and children is super unorganized and unthoughtful. Mentors are often paired with children 15+ mile distances from them and are at times paired with children with language barriers which makes it hard for the mentor to provide the best services for the children. On top of all this, mentors are required to attend sporadic events throughout the year that aren’t included in our contracts and attendance is made mandatory which is highly unfair. There is truly no structure in this workplace and mentors are very much overworked and underpaid. 

They constantly focus on putting employees first. They actually take your suggestions and implement them to ensure that you're satisfied. 

There were some issues with certain schools not allowing us inside to support the kids but that was outside of FOTC's control.

I'd highly recommend working here if you have a passion for serving kids. There's some data entry and admin work here and there but for the most part it's a very easy and enjoyable job. 

The veteran mentors are also very supportive and you get a chance to shadow them. Every now and then, you may have a situation where a parent cancels an outing which will leave you with some time to either see another kid or do some admin work.

Most enjoyable part of the job is working with the kids and watching them develop socially and academically. There wasn't much that was hard about the job - the admin work was manageable. 

I'm extremely grateful to be a part of Friends of the Children. My community of coworkers are some of the most amazing people I know and management shows a great deal of appreciation for the investment we make in the children we work with. The employees are treated with great respect, and benefits that you can't beat in the non-profit world. Each mentor is empowered to have a genuine and honest connection with the youth we serve, and invited to be ourselves and do what we think is best for the relationships we have with our youth.

The youth and families were the best part of this role, and the mission itself is meaningful. Unfortunately, the workplace environment made the position very difficult to sustain long term.

Work-life balance was poor, expectations often felt unclear or constantly shifting, and the emotional demands of the role were extremely high. There was significant pressure placed on staff without enough support or structure in return. Communication and leadership consistency were ongoing concerns.

I am a Professional Mentor (Friend) in Detroit and I love my job!  It is so awarding just talking and getting to know the children.  I feel really proud and accomplished at the end of the day to know that I am making a difference. It is a wonderful organization and those in charge have huge hearts and are easy to work for.  There is room for advancement in the organization, but so far I am loving being Mentor/Friend!

Top Job Titles	Average Salary
Mentor 41 salaries reported	$50,606 per year
Program director 6 salaries reported	$83,750 per year
Executive director 6 salaries reported	$147,125 per year
Development director 11 salaries reported	$129,455 per year
Engagement specialist 1 salary reported	$52,500 per year

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