Pivoting to support new mental health needs

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Brian Begin

You. Welcome to the Job Matchmakers podcast, where we share stories from employment consultants about supporting people with intellectual and developmental disabilities to find employment in their communities. One person, one job at a time.

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Sherry Healey

This podcast is produced by the Minnesota Transformation Initiative, a technical assistance center focused on expanding capacity for competitive, integrated employment across Minnesota. We are your hosts, Sherry Healey and Brian Begin, and we work at the Institute on Community Integration at the University of Minnesota. Thanks for joining us.

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Brian Begin

Welcome, everyone, to another episode of the Job Matchmakers podcast.

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Sherry Healey

In this episode, we're talking with Brenda Albright, a job coach with Life Works, a provider of day employment and in-home supports in the Twin Cities. Brenda is a seasoned veteran in this field. She's been doing this work for about thirty years. We're grateful to have her join us on the podcast today to share her experience and expertise, as she tells us one of many stories from her career in employment services.

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Brian Begin

Welcome, Brenda. Thank you for joining us today.

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Brenda Albright

Thanks for having me. I'm happy to be here.

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Brian Begin

Let's start off by having you tell us how did you get into this work?

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Brenda Albright

Well, I worked in the the residential setting for quite some time. And then as I moved forward, I got into the day program sector. And I was a program manager, overseeing many staff and about seventy clients. And we just kind of, helped support them at the different crew sites that we had at that time.

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Brenda Albright

The company I was with did some restructuring after I was there about fifteen years. And so I moved on to Life Works, where I've been for about eighteen years, almost eighteen. And, I just loved the The Day program sector and that shifted more towards employment. And so now we're looking at, you know, helping people find jobs and supporting them in the jobs that they have.

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Sherry Healey

So the story you're sharing today is about a person who had a mental health event that forced to shift in her career. Can you start at the beginning and tell us about supporting that person to first get a job at the Minneapolis Saint Paul Airport?

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Brenda Albright

Sure. This individual, was very independent. She started out part time and worked her way to full time as well as working her way off Social Security. That's how independent she was. And continued getting increases in her pay over the time. And like I said, she was really independent. She took the city bus everywhere. She and her boyfriend would travel independently.

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Brenda Albright

And she hardly ever missed a day. Just right on, you know? And then she had her mental health doesn't. Which really spiraled and changed her abilities in many ways. She could no longer navigate the MSP airport. There were just too many people, and that caused too much anxiety. So she couldn't return to the MSP airport?

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Brenda Albright

And she also, could no longer navigate the public transportation system. And that took away so much of her independence from living in an apartment by herself to having to move to a group home, for support. And so, you know, in that process, I would meet with her and help her find a new job. And we applied for jobs.

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Brenda Albright

And did, you know, resumes and and whatnot. And even, you know, we tried doing some bus training. Which was unsuccessful. So, you know, it was just kind of a struggle in, in helping her to, to find something from going from being so independent to needing almost total support.

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Sherry Healey

Wow. That it it it's so interesting. When, when things like that happen, you know, when there's a change in your health status and you've got this resume that on the surface looks like, you know, amazing experience, but it's no longer relevant because it's not what she's able to do anymore. So you really have to start over and you know, and really you have to start over with discovery and and understanding where she is now and what her abilities are now.

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Sherry Healey

Independent of whatever she had done in the past.

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Brenda Albright

Absolutely. Yes. Because, on the surface, the resume looked beautiful. You know, six years, five or six years at this this independent placement job at an airline club. Two. Well, where are we at now? Yeah.

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Brian Begin

So as you're working with this individual, supporting them through their changes in their health, how did that change how you interacted with the rest of their team? Did their, interdisciplinary support team increase? You know, what was that like working with the case manager to perhaps change, you know, the the amount of support that that was being funded to, to further employment supports, etc..

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Brenda Albright

Good question. Of course she needed much more support. So, you know, we had to ask for more support from the case manager. Her interdisciplinary team did increase. Because now she had group home staff and a group home manager, as well as the support staff. And so the team grew, and it was hard because, from being so independent to needing so much support, it was hard to see some of the team, accept that because they were so used to her being so independent.

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Brenda Albright

So it was really a wake up call for, say, the Guardian, who wasn't super involved, who now had to be. And so it was hard to get the Guardian to realize that this person does actually need this extra support because she's not who she used to be. And the case manager was pretty supportive. So that was that was helpful.

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Brian Begin

I think this I really appreciate, this experience that you're sharing, Brenda, because for me, it highlights the crucial role, that the job coach plays. Because sometimes, particularly for folks who perhaps are not getting any like residential support, perhaps for, for folks who have their, that are their own guardian or have a guardian that maybe is like legally appointed and checks and, you know, once or twice a year the job coach is actually just the support person that's seeing them the most and kind of seeing these day to day changes.

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Brian Begin

And so you're in a very unique position. The job coach is in a very unique position to sort of flag these changes and be like, okay, we're I think, you know, in my professional opinion, we're going to need to make some adjustments here and working with the person. I'm sure you know. Was there any apprehension on behalf of this person?

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Brian Begin

Like were they resistive at all to you getting increased support? Did you have to kind of convince some, you know, hey, I.

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Brenda Albright

Think maybe.

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Brian Begin

You might benefit from looking at a little bit different living situation or were they were they pretty on board and the like? Yeah, I kind of feel some changes in myself and, you know, need that.

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Brenda Albright

It took a while to convince this person that she did need the support, because she didn't accept that she had a disability and was like others that had a disability. So going from her independent apartment to a group home, with folks that do need support. It did take some convincing and, kind of talking into just think of the friends you could make.

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Brenda Albright

You'll live with people. You'll have people help you do this. And it did take some time, but she was very accepting after a while, realizing that she did need the help, and support. The difficult part was, the group home staff was new to her, and being her job coach for so many years, having to let them know and tell them what she used to be capable of and what the declines are, because of course, they didn't understand or know that.

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Brenda Albright

So that that was hard. But we did get her on board and and now she knows that she has that support and does well with them. Nice.

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Sherry Healey

So I'd like to dig a little deeper into discovery and, vocational themes. And you know how did you identify where her skill set is now compared to, you know, obviously where it had been before you really starting all over again? So I'm kind of curious about the strategies you use to, you know, to figure that out.

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Brenda Albright

Well, being that I did work with her for quite a few years, it was, you know, just conversations. What are your interests? What do you think? She tried to be a home cleaner with a company. For the elderly in their homes. And, she did all right. However, it wasn't quite the right fit. She couldn't navigate the transportation system.

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Brenda Albright

You know, the cleaning, tasks weren't quite up to par. So basically, it was trial and error. So, it took, you know, some help from coworkers. It's important to discuss with coworkers. And see, you know, who they're working with and what they have and working together as a team to be able to, you know, say, so you have this person working at this place.

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Brenda Albright

What do you think about this individual? Giving it a try? Yeah. You know, and just kind of utilizing our resources and working together as a team.

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Brian Begin

Because.

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Brenda Albright

We can't do it alone. We need each other. So it's teamwork. Definitely. But, basically trial and error. So we ended up, giving her a try at a marshall store. Just kind of straightening shelves, organizing shoes, taking clothing from sitting rooms, and re racking them, stuff like that. And that turned out to be a really good fit for her.

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Sherry Healey

Great. I, I imagine you need to pivot pretty quickly because it could get discouraging trying, you know, all these different things and not having success. And you know, because because you're just, you're you're starting from scratch. So how how did that go? I think, you know, from, from that standpoint of, you know, trying to navigate her, you know, her mental health and keep her, you know, keep it positive.

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Brenda Albright

Well, always trying to keep her upbeat was important. And and lots and lots of verbal praise. While it was frustrating, it was at the same time kind of exciting because she was trying something new and she was trying something and and she was very willing to try. She was very motivated to work. And so it was exciting to at least try something, even though that piece didn't turn out successful.

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Brenda Albright

It was just a matter of pumping her up and saying, it's okay. That's not for you. It's okay. We'll find something else. And just helping her to be positive, because she did have those moments where she was really down or skeptical or nervous or anxious to the point where she kind of had to be talked down a little bit to say, know.

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Brenda Albright

Okay, let's just take a deep breath. You got this. You know, as I would follow the bus in my car.

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Brian Begin

When a person is going through some changes. There's all sorts of factors that that come into play, as we had discussed already. You know, and usually an expansion of the support team, there's usually some more folks involved. Did you help this person? Get connected to, resources for their mental health or or how did that work?

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Brenda Albright

Well, as a team, as her interdisciplinary team, we talked about it and worked on it together. However, her guardian and her case manager played a large role in In Finding Somebody in her mental health area.

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Brian Begin

Yeah, because I just, you know, in my experience, I know sometimes there again that, you know, falls falls to the job coach and I don't I don't necessarily I'm not it's not like a good or bad thing. It just it is what it is. Right. There's a reason why there's a team. We all have to work together. I think about in certain circumstances was, for example, substance use disorder.

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Brian Begin

There again, that might be something that a job coach picks up on maybe before anybody else on the team does is because that along with changes in one's mental health depending on the situation, can pretty quickly start to impact the job. And so then just by default, the job coach is like, okay, well I'm aware of this. What you know, what can we do?

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Brian Begin

And obviously you bring in the team, work and benefits. Something that we hear so much about as a barrier as a concerned individual was, was there changes to, when when this individual really drastically decreased the hours that they worked? How did that impact their benefits, if any, that they were receiving? And and what role did you have to play and, and, and helping them navigate that?

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Brenda Albright

Yeah. It was a big change in her benefits because she was doing such a great job independently and working her way off of Social Security. And so it was a it was a do over. It was a total start over. She had to apply for Social Security. And, you know, her main benefits then needed a bump. And so, you know, doing the paperwork for, Social Security and the team, how many hours did she work?

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Brenda Albright

How many hours does she work now? What did she make per hour? What does she make now? Just helping her to get all of that in place. You know, which, of course, involved with the team as well. But just making sure that things were aligned to prove that, Yeah, she really does need these benefits. And so that that played a large factor, and kind of proving that she can't she can no longer work full time at eighteen dollars an hour kind of thing.

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Brenda Albright

That hours will be cut significantly just due to mental health factors.

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Sherry Healey

It occurs to me, how important it is to have sort of a broad base of understanding across, across multiple service streams. You know, you you as a job coach, need to understand the, the, the system, you know, the developmental disability system. You need to understand the mental health system. And you know how those things work together.

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Sherry Healey

Because, you know, in in the abstract today, okay, there's this path and then there's this path. But in reality, there's a lot of, of crossover between, those two service streams. Can you talk a little bit about what that look like and, and how you were able to, work through that?

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Brenda Albright

Well, it was a matter of, you know, what services, what streams of services. There, there was, you know, whether it was the Didi or caddy Weaver, you know, the different things like that and just, helping to figure out what the needs will be now, to just make sure that all streams can be in place so this person can get the supports that she needed to be successful in all areas of her life.

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Brenda Albright

So it was just a matter of working together and and getting the right funding stream. And.

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Brian Begin

You know, in terms of, of work and benefits, what kind of training or resource do you leverage to, be able to support the folks you're working with to understand how work and benefits go together? You know, you talked about, a Social Security subsidy, heck, even finding out what benefits a person is on because I know, in my experience, sometimes the folks that, we work with, it's like, well, I know I'm getting something, but I'm not entirely sure what it is.

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Brian Begin

You know, SSI, SSDI, etc. so what my question, our question is, you know, what resources do you use and what.

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Brenda Albright

Formal training.

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Brian Begin

Or informal training have you gotten over the years, that you think is helpful to your colleagues that you would recommend to someone, doing the work?

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Brenda Albright

Yeah. Social security? Yeah, that is always a thing. Yeah. Finding out and knowing what the person receives, whether it's straight SSI or, as you mentioned, Brian, SSDI, which is Social Security disability versus straight SSI. If someone is on SSDI, there are, resources that, you know, we can utilize, such as a subsidy, as you mentioned, Brian.

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Brenda Albright

And I think, you know, a lot of people aren't aware of that. But what a subsidy form does and Social Security oftentimes sends these out to employers, which is difficult because to our employers, they say, oh, yeah, they're just one of our workers at one hundred percent, you know. However, the the subsidy form allows for the supports that the person gets, whether it's job coaching, do they take metro mobility, do they have attendance issues because of their disability?

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Brenda Albright

All of that kind of, for lack of a better word, cuts them some slack in their accountable earned income. And there's this handy dandy tool that I've used. It used to actually be the form that we would send to Social Security, but it it calculates all of that staff. Do they need extra help? Do they need extra supervision?

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Brenda Albright

How many hours a week of job coaching? As I mentioned, you know, transportation and it takes it all and it calculates this time and it gives a percentage of what that person would compare to you and I or one hundred percent worker. Some days I think even we aren't one hundred percent workers, right? Right. But I think that, using this tool and helping the employer understand what that means, because they see this and they say, oh, no, they're fine.

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Brenda Albright

They don't take into account the job coaching. They don't take into account transportation. They don't take into account if this person has disciplinary action because of attendance, that kind of thing. So it helps to do this subsidy and send it off to Social Security. And maybe someone is a seventy percent worker comes out at seventy percent and it puts them under the substantial gainful allowance for that year.

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Brenda Albright

And so I think, you know, just knowing that and helping them to navigate that so that they can work because it's kind of a double edged sword. They can't live on the part time work that they're doing. Yeah. Because they can only work part time because of their disability. But they can't just live on their Social Security as well.

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Brenda Albright

So that makes a huge difference.

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Brian Begin

Yeah. So I like to one of the things that we like to do with the podcast and put in is put in plugs for training resources, etc.. So disability hub and then a lot of great resources on there. One of the things that I appreciate about that tool that, that we created here in Minnesota is that it's got different tabs for professionals.

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Brian Begin

So you're like a job coach, etc., and it's also got, resources tailored towards the individual receiving, benefits and also family members. So I think that's pretty cool. I find the videos to be, I appreciate that they're short, so they're a little more digestible for folks that maybe don't have huge pockets of time to spend studying, this information.

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Brian Begin

And you mentioned this, this tool, the subsidy. Where could a person, where could a professional or whomever find this tool?

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Brenda Albright

You can actually find it on a legal and it may be called a work questionnaire.

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Sherry Healey

I believe it is. Yeah. And like you said, it is a it is a really useful tool for employers, to, to provide for the opportunity for individuals with disabilities to work additional hours because they have those extra supports in place. And I think, you know, I said it at one of the many roles that an employment specialist or job coach plays is to help an employer understand the purpose of of these forms and tools that are out there and available that can can make it more of a win win for everyone.

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Sherry Healey

If if they understand the purpose of it and how it can be helpful.

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Brenda Albright

Definitely. And explaining it to the employer is really important. Because they see it as just a form they have to fill out for an employee. No big deal. But it is a big deal and it is really important. So I do try to really explain to the employer what it means and what it does.

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Brian Begin

Yeah. And so just, you know, pop it into a search engine and immediately came up. So s s a work activity questionnaire. The first thing that that comes up is the Social Security Administration. It takes you right to the fillable PDFs. And as a reminder to our listeners, helping folks that you're supporting on the job navigator benefits, that is part of employment services.

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Brian Begin

In Minnesota and in so it is billable. The expectation is not that, you know, you the job coach is just doing this for free in addition to all the other stuff. This is this is, you know, billable your time spent figuring out the information on behalf of the individual. And then, of course, you know, working with the individual to say, hey, this is the tool that we're going to use.

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Brian Begin

I'm going to fill it out for you. But, you know, obviously you need to be aware that the this is something that we're doing. So our final question is what we ask all of our guests. And that is what do you want people in your community to know about employment for people with disabilities?

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Brenda Albright

That is a great question. I want employers to know that someone having a disability, you may not see it, and that's really important, but to get to know and understand what that person needs for supports and asking questions and allowing the people to learn as they go and just making sure that they accept that this person has a job coach and that we will work together and as a team, because that's how we can make this person successful.

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Brenda Albright

And just sharing when that person is having a bad day or why they're having a bad day, if it's okay to share that, and just helping them to be successful and, and boosting them up and just knowing that they're people to and they're trying to live their best life to. And so they just need some extra support to do that.

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Brenda Albright

Well said.

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Sherry Healey

Thank you, Brenda, for joining us today and for sharing some of your experiences doing the work. Thank you, listeners for tuning in to this episode. We hope you join us next time to hear another compelling story of one person finding one job in the community.

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Sherry Healey

Thank you for joining us for the Job Matchmakers podcast, funded by the Minnesota Department of Human Services. This podcast is a partnership between the University of Minnesota's Institute on Community Integration and UMass Boston's Institute for Community Inclusion.

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Brian Begin

For more information on the Minnesota Transformation Initiative, visit our website. Linked in the show notes. We're glad you joined us, and we'll see you next time.

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Brenda Albright