clinician

child development specialist

family support specialist

registered nurse

therapist

THE VILLAGE FOR FAMILIES & CHILDREN

Where is the zero stars option to choose from? This organization is dominated by sheer incompetence and ineptitude. The people running this place do not know what they are doing. None of them know the first thing about safely and effectively operating a non-profit. The leadership here freely allows their staff to get punched and kicked and bruised and basically beaten up by their clients. Yet they categorically refuse to allow their staff any recourse when this happens. For example staff are prohibited from calling 911 or pressing charges whenever we have been seriously assaulted by the clients. (Management tells you that it’s “part of your job description” which you signed up for.) Wait? What? Coming to work every single day to get punched and kicked and slapped and having fecal matter thrown at me or saliva and spit spewed on me by clients with unknown disease histories was “written right into my job description”? Give me a break! Several staff here (including me) have gotten seriously injured here as a result of severe client assaults. Some staff have even ended up in the emergency room as a result of these assaultive client behaviors. Yet do you think that the leadership of this organization cares one bit? Nope! Think again! Those clients who seriously assault and injure staff (and even other clients) in the programs never receive any consequences of any kind because this organization doesn’t believe in utilizing a “model of behavior management which punishes because it isn’t therapeutic.” What this organization has in place instead is something referred to as CARES model of treatment intervention. But what it really is instead is a system in which clients can basically do whatever they want without ever being held accountable for their disruptive or unsafe or physically assaultive behaviors. Honestly it’s just so nauseating thinking about how terribly operated these programs are here in this organization and how incompetent the leadership here is! I’ve literally witnessed clients cause thousands and thousands of dollars’ worth of property damage (in just one day alone mind you)…. and then still be eligible to go on off-grounds fun activities and field trips simply because the organization doesn’t believe in “punishing” a child or issuing consequences. Even worse yet is how I’ve also witnessed managers and senior administrators here at The Village for Families and Children laughing about many of these unsafe and disruptive behaviors! Really? Are we honestly serious right now? Laughing and joking around about extremely serious criminal client behaviors such as: arson or vandalism or violently injuring other human beings to the point of them needing to be hospitalized or even attempted s-e-x-u-a-l assault? Yes you heard me right: senior administrators here in this organization engaging in jocular and lighthearted type conversations about their own staff almost being s-e-x-u-a-l-l-y assaulted by clients with severe psychiatric problems and sociopathic tendencies. Yet the organization still refuses to intervene appropriately and allow for staff to have recourse of any kind when their physical or emotional safety is at risk?? This organization doesn’t care one bit about its staff and/or their safety. They basically expect their staff to just stand there and tolerate the physical (and emotional/verbal) abuse from dangerous clients who are COMPLETELY inappropriate for some of the programs that they’ve been referred to. So in summary: all this organization truly cares about is money. One less client (no matter how dangerous that same client might be around others or how much of a risk their behaviors pose to clients and staff) in this organization’s programs equals one less source of revenue used to finance what I honestly feel are bloated salaries which the executive management here receives. Because honestly the executives and senior managers of this organization aren't the ones being directly affected by any of this dangerous behavior. And they aren't the ones doing the hard work day in and day out like we are. They aren't the ones being spit on or kicked and punched or having human bodily waste thrown at them. None of that behavior directly affects them at all. So obviously it's much easier for them to just categorically refuse to put their foot down and demand the removal of some of these same clients from their own programs. But like I'd said earlier that would affect the revenue stream of their programs which is the only thing that I honestly feel this organization genuinely cares about. Here's my biggest message to anyone considering applying for a job at this organization: Run (don’t walk) away from employment here! Because honestly in my opinion they are one of (if not the) absolute worst in the entire behavioral health industry.

At first, this seemed like an okay agency to work for. Then, people's true colors started emerging. The management who I reported to was atrocious! They were extremely unprofessional, constantly gossiped about people behind their backs, practiced blatant and obvious favoritism, and even engaged in highly illegal behavior. Worse than this however, was the intervention by the agency's human resources department: nothing at all. Honestly, it really makes me wonder how some people to choose the profession they do, if they are not going to uphold certain 'core values' which their employer binds them to. For example, here at The Village (Hartford, CT location specifically), the agency allegedly promoted certain 'core values' of respect, honesty, integrity, blah.. blah... blah, you get the point. None of that was even remotely true, not even for one split second! Promotion and advancement here at The Village is unfortunately decided solely on your ability to 'brown nose' and suck up to insecure managers, while constantly fulfilling their self-serving needs of having their egos stroked. I witnessed and experienced this time and time again, the outcome was always the same: completely direct, assertive, and honest people (like me) were shunned, gossiped, alienated, blacklisted, given bad performance ratings, targeted, harassed, deliberately set up for failure without adequate resources to get the job done, accused of "not being team players".... you get the point..... Meanwhile, those who preferred to transform into teachers' pets while constantly stroking some of those insecure/narcissistic managers' massive egos were the ones given the promotions, fancy new titles, salary raises, etc. This pattern of unfairness, favoritism (and yes, even illegal discrimination against certain individuals...) had occurred just way too many times, that it couldn't be ignored or simply chalked up to 'coincidence'. This was something so much bigger than that, actually illustrative and representative of the agency's overall work culture. The biggest shock for me though, was just how disconnected, isolated, and just completely clueless the agency's human resources representatives were. None of them appeared to really know what was going on in the departments, and the leadership of human resources in particular certainly left quite a bit to be desired. My list of negatives could probably go on for pages and pages...... hours and hours....., but I think you get the point. So, my advice for a prospective candidate of employment at The Village in Hartford, CT would be to just conduct a very thorough and comprehensive analysis of the following key points: a) What do you really expect to get out of a job here at this agency? b) Which manager will you ultimately be reporting to in which department? c) Most importantly, whether or not you'll be able to have thick enough skin to deal with all of the incessant backstabbing, "ladder climbing", personal agenda filling, gossiping, sneaky, unethical, and just downright ruthless and cutthroat behavior that seem to dominate this agency's workplace 'culture'. Quite honestly though, my best advice to a prospective candidate employment here at this agency would be to just take my word for it (and evidently, others' who've also expressed equally horrible experiences here on Indeed) that this is one future employer that you'd probably be better off skipping over and avoiding altogether.

My experience here was actually pretty awful. The Village worked their people very hard and did not compensate them for their efforts. Very few improvements were made despite them sending out frequent surveys about job satisfaction. Filling out some of those surveys kind of put a mark on you if you mentioned specifics in your department so it kind of defeated the purpose. If you filled out your survey, I felt like both the executives and Personnel would screen through them and identify those people who complained. Then it seemed like a lot of people who complained about some of the very serious ethical and operational issues in The Village got targeted. I saw it happen hundreds of times here and I felt really bad for some of these people. It happened to me on several occasions too. Executive level management and Personnel were rarely supportive in the departments. You saw executives and Personnel for only one of two reasons usually: written notices about performance issues or during terminations. My entire experience here was basically sink or swim. Their was very little training support and The Village had exceedingly unrealistic job expectations of its people. Instead of adequately training their people, The Village just kind of threw you to the wolves and let you figure it out on your own. The Village also expected you to perform several different job titles while giving you the salary of just one. For 10,000 different job titles, you basically got the salary of only one. Policies and procedures were another really negative aspect. They were way too rigid and unrealistic, especially for what The Village was paying for salaries. Unrealistic policies and procedures led to a lot of unnecessary terminations here because of how unattainable they were to follow. Accreditation and referrals was all The Village really focused on or cared about, instead of ensuring that all of their people felt actually supported and valued.

They treat staff like they are students being scolded in grade school. Lots of unnecessary micro management, and thousands of petty little rules which are absurd and ridiculous and truly. I cannot figure out why half these rules are in place. For example you cannot have your phone on you for any reason or you get written up. It doesn’t matter if it’s a family emergency. You will still get written up for having your phone on you or using it in the milieu. Totally ridiculous for the 21st century where everybody has cell phones. It’s a part of daily life but you still get in trouble here. They spy on staff with the cameras system to see if you they can catch you doing something wrong, then run right to HR with their so called “evidence” to use to get you into trouble. And then they claim the cameras are to protect staff from allegations from clients which is a total lie. The cameras are there to basically intimidate staff into following pointless rules just because they want you to conform to their rigid corporate hierarchy. Many of the rules have no purpose and exist just for the sake of existing but without any rationale or logic behind them. No room for individuality or to express your individual beliefs, opinions and identity. “Yes Ma’am and yes, Sir” corporate culture mentality or you can basically kiss your job goodbye. Higher ups are easily threatened and intimidated by their subordinates, HR is even worse and will automatically take the higher ups sides even if they know they are wrong in the first place. HR are basically paid lackeys and servants who serve exclusively management and do whatever they say even if it’s unethical or unfair. This job was so bad I would not ever refer anyone, even my worst mortal enemy here for employment… even if they were desperate for a pay check!

I would not recommend this non-profit. They have it’s favorites of who receives special treatment. A lot of the policies are applied inconsistent. Some must follow these while others do not. It depends on your relationship with your manager. There is also poor refverral screening. I got seriously hurt while working here. Yet nothing was done. They still kept those dangerous kids in the program who continued assaulting others. I felt this decision was because discharging them would have meant lost revenue. Safety of personnel is clearly secondary to revenue from referrals.. at least for this non-profit. There were no legal ramifications for these assaults. We were forbidden from calling 911 if even if our safety was in jeopardy. I felt like the administrators at the top level didn’t truly care. I never saw any of them around when all this crazy stuff was happening. The pay isn’t that good either. I was earning only a couple dollars more per hour at this job then when I was working retail. But this job exposed me to greater physical harm and risk of my personal safety for a salary not worth the risk. I did not feel likes the program was every effective either. I saw the same kids repeating the program two, three, sometimes a 4th time and still no progress or improvement. It felk more like a shelter environment – just housing and feeding these kids rather then they actually learn something useful. Sometimes there were fun staff events. But the work was still very draining. I would not recommend this employer.

Challenging work but sometimes makes a difference. Some kids are okay, others very disrespectful and obnoxious. Hard to be around. Don’t truly understand the purpose of everything for example not requesting disruptive kids removed sooner. Keeping disruptive unsafe kids for many months allowing a good program to become quickly toxic. Just one or two rotten apples spoiling the whole bunch must be removed sooner. Put the foot down, demand they go. Department for children and families gives us most who we get. All ages ranges from 5 to sometimes over 18 if no other suitable programs around. Desperate selection criteria used. Some training is legit but not all. Don’t know what the deal is with this cares thing they are using? Never had that before where kids cam tantrum use profanity, hit and aggressive to staff and nothing done? Whatever… Use consequences the old fashioned way to teach lessons – the same you had growing up. Refuse to go to school = grounded for a week no special activities. Attack and hit people = 911 arrest. None of this softy approach being used.. doesn’t make sense. That's why lots of these problem behaviors persist. No accountability enforced from the top hierarchy downward.High turn over in some programs. Detached admin at the top. Just a temporary stepping stone.

Over my time at the village, I witnessed many staff leave and lots of changes in upper management. My team was incredible to work with and always very positive and helpful, however, there was a lot of internal politics at play throughout others in my position and upper management. Of the others in my position, there were many discrepancies between how we were all treated and it seemed like management was playing favorites with some of the staff. My boss and directors were very sneaky and fake and most seemed to have their own agenda. Most of the time, I felt very unsupported and like they were all watching what I was doing at all times. Along with that, the work with the clients was very stressful and at times very dangerous for staff. I was hurt on multiple occasions and needed to be hospitalized once. There was little support from upper management in those moments and the compensation was not nearly enough for the situations I send my staff were being put in. Overall, it was a very stressful environment and work culture, management is uninvolved and unsupportive, and the compensation is low for the work we did. Unless you're only planning on working here for 6 months to a year, I would not recommend employment at the Village.

The patients which the company freely welcomes all of them into their programs are too high risk. Almost all of them are way too acute to benefit from the treatment here. The environment you'll work in here is quite hazardous. It has became almost the same level of risk working in a locked psychiatric facility only for half the hourly compensation those workers make. The turnover is very high I feel because the workers have no leverage any longer. These patients here have more rights and allowances for their bad behaviors then I feel would ever be tolerated out in real-world society. The largest issue central to this company's failure of its programs is how they use a molly-coddling treatment philosophy which doesn't enforce accountability for hazardous behaviors. I honestly feel like it's only a matter of time before something really serious happen or somebody gets seriously hurt because of the free-for-all circus system used now which management use to justify patients bad behavior. I would strongly dissuade applicants from applying or working here. The job is too high risk for somebody get hurt badly. Or even worse is the fact if you get logged in DCF abuse/neglect reporting database by this company for working around their high risk patients it could probably spell the end of your career. Don't take the risks.

stressful work environment for little pay and mediocre benefits, typical day at the village: clock in, babysit and supervise disrespectful and disobedient children for 8 hours, do restraints, chase kids around campus when they go AWOL, deal with tons of behavior problems; upper management isn't very helpful, as long as it isn't them getting physically assaulted or verbally abused or having their own property destroyed by aggressive and violent clients in their programs, they really don't seem to care too much when this stuff happens to their staff; the organization has become way too corporate and too much like big business; there isn't a lot of appreciation or gratitude for hard work doing a thankless job; sometimes there are different training opportunities but other than that staff don't have too many resources for dealing with problematic and aggressive behaviors; unfortunately most of the upper management here at The Village tends to stay shut away in their offices or in purposeless meetings and don't spend enough time out in the milieu to understand what is really going on in their own programs

Wanting to help individuals recover from trauma is a noble task that should be left to the COMPETENT. 

The directors and leaders of this agency should really reevaluate their mission and purpose. On the outside The Village looks like a well managed place but in reality the opposite it true. “This organization is very unorganized” -HR Member. When a representative from the Human Resources department can say such a thing about their company it’s quite freighting.

A normal day at The Village is very chaotic especially for their Eagle House program. Staff are not equipped with the necessary support, direction, and leadership needed to effectively help kids in trauma. On a normal basis staff encounter an immense amount of assault from the clients while seasoned supervisor staff by and watch without intervening.  

Methods, such as TCI and the Care model leave staff feeling inadequately prepared to respond in moments of crisis, not only on grounds (Village compound) but while clients are taken into the community (YMCA, BGC, etc). Many of the clients have been banned from community settings yet the leaders refuse to change or adjust protocol. 

Burnout is inevitable! So if you feel like working for the Village is for you...USE MUCH PRECAUTION! 

Sincerely, 

A Concerned Individual

Top Job Titles	Average Salary
Clinician 36 salaries reported	$61,069 per year
Child development specialist 7 salaries reported	$20.64 per hour
Family support specialist 12 salaries reported	$45,574 per year
Registered nurse 13 salaries reported	$37.58 per hour
Therapist 8 salaries reported	$68,500 per year

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