Clinical Counsellor

**POSITION TITLE**:Clinical Counsellor

**DEPARTMENT**:Mental Health & Wellness Services

**COMPANY**:Skills for Change

**LOCATION**:791 St. Clair Ave West, Toronto ON

**REPORTS TO**:Manager, Mental Health & Wellness Services

**CONTRACT TYPE**:Permanent (Union)

**HOURS**:35 hours per week (Monday - Friday, occasional evenings and/or weekend hours)

**RATE**:$28.00 per hour

**START DATE**:Immediately

**APPLICATION DEADLINE**:Open until filled

**COMPANY**:
Located on the traditional territories of the Mississaugas of the Credit, the Anishnabeg, the Chippewa, Haudenosaunee, and the Wendat peoples, Skills for Change (SfC) is working towards advancing the Sustainable Development Goals for the Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area. Named Charity Village's Best Non-Profit Employer - Diversity, Equity and Inclusion and winner of the 2021 Canada Volunteer Awards for Innovation, our organization is committed to reducing poverty, improve mental health, eliminating gender-based violence, building community, eradicating systemic racism, and settling and creating sustainable communities for all immigrants, refugees, and underserved communities. Start your career with SfC and join our 40-year history of creating innovative programming to build welcoming and equitable communities.

**GENERAL ACCOUNTABILITY**:
With 40 years of operations, Skills for Change is a highly respected non-profit charity with a province wide reputation for pioneering programs that respond to shifting immigration and workplace trends and lead to employment. We offer a range of accelerated programs including mentoring, employment, settlement, language training together with specialized programs for skilled trades, women, and youth. We have 5 locations across the GTA and serve 16,000 clients annually. We believe we are in the best position to provide thought leadership through evidence-based programming, impact stories and proactive policy advocacy using knowledge mobilization products.

**PROGRAM NATURE AND SCOPE**:
Reporting to the Mental Health and Wellness Services Manager, this Mental Health Counsellor will provide high quality and responsive mental health counselling support to support newcomers, refugees and underserved populations across Ontario with their mental health and wellness. In addition, the role will assist the program participants with disorders of thought, cognition, emotional regulation, perception, or memory that may seriously disrupt their judgment, insight, behavior, communication, interpersonal relationships, and social/professional functioning as well as individual and group counselling according to participants’ assessed needs and best practices in counseling and psychotherapy.

**IDEAL CANDIDATE** must have:

- Experience and sensitivity in dealing with members of diverse cultural and racial backgrounds including visible and invisible dimensions of diversity.
- Knowledge or understanding of the socioeconomic, cultural, political and other issues impacting the health and wellbeing of immigrants and refugee women, and seniors including those who recently migrated to Canada.
- Demonstrated commitment to high standards of culturally sensitive service delivery within an anti-racist and anti-oppressive framework.
- Knowledge of community mental health and other resources available to immigrants and refugees including women, seniors, LGBTQI2S+, and other populations across the GTA.
- Demonstrated ability in using discretion in dealing with highly sensitive and confidential issues relating to adults from equity seeking groups.
- Good organizational skills and ability to multitask in a quick paced work environment while maintaining a high level of accuracy, confidentiality and professionalism.
- Demonstrated a high degree of initiation, risk management, time management and problem-solving ability.
- Intermediate to master level skills in Microsoft and Google Suite (Word, Excel, and PowerPoint).

**DUTIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES**:

- Provide individual and group counselling based on evidence-based clinical assessment, interventions and treatment plans that promote assets, competencies, resilience and strengths in newcomers, refugees and underserved populations.
- Conduct case consultation, wellness checks, client intake, risk assessment, safety planning, crisis intervention, psychoeducation and other interventions with clients either by telephone, video conferencing or face-to-face interactions in the client’s preferred environment and within the standards of practice that meet the agency accreditation, regulatory body and funder requirements.
- Support wraparound service delivery by coordinating with caseworkers, instructors, program staff, and external community partners to offer holistic care plans.
- Provide counselling and intervention support for clients with or without non-disclosed trauma history through active listening, debriefing experiences, validating feelings, and respecting client choices and decisions.
- Assess cl