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Running Head: HUMAN SERVICE PROFESSIONALS RELATED TO HOMELESSNESS

Human Service Professionals Related to Homelessness

Amber Mousel

May 8, 2017

Instructor: Nilajah Nyasuma Sims

Ashford University

Human Service Professionals Related to Homelessness

A lot of people community suffer from hardships of life, and they need help. Therefore, day in day out, those people require the services of the human service professionals to help in solving their issue. The support is often provided by a network of organizations and agencies, both private and public. Staffed by the human service personnel, the system, as well as the kind of help it offers varies widely as the clients it serves. The Human health services are as broad as the problems and needs of the customer base. The main aim of the human service professionals is to help their clients to become self-sufficient. They achieve this by helping the clients to achieve the skills they need or recommending the resources that can allow them to be in a position to take care of themselves. Also, the professionals aim at making them depend on themselves by directing them to work hard to overcome their setbacks. Moreover, the workers help the clients who are not in a position to help themselves. They include the children and the elderly. They direct the donation of their basic needs. In this essay, the main aim is to evaluate the role of different health professionals (counselor, policy makers, and case manager) in combating the global issue of homelessness.

Caseworkers work a lot every day depending on where they are working and the level of their expertise. They provide work that varies widely. They work with the homeless people to provide them with the resources that they need. They are responsible for identifying the individuals who are in need of help. Also, they are responsible for assessing the needs of the homeless people, their situation, and the networks with the aim of determining their goals. Moreover, they develop plans that help in improving the well-being of the homeless people by helping them change to the changes and challenges in their daily lives. Last, they aid and advocate for the homeless people to get resources that can improve their well-being.

The homeless people often face a lot of difficult issues to deal with in their daily lives. The counselor plays the role of combating the problem of homelessness by providing them with emotional support. One of the factors that cause homelessness is substance abuse and alcoholism. It results in a lack of personal control, social support and increased debts especially rental arrears and mortgage. Moreover, most of the homeless people become drug addicts and hence, it is difficult to solve the issue of homelessness without the social problem of substance abuse. In this case, the counselor has the duty to see to it that he has helped those who are drug addicts to recover. It can be achieved by providing them with guidance and counseling as well as giving them emotional support. Third, mental health problems as well as getting involved in criminal activities can result in homelessness. Therefore, there is a dreadful need for a human service professional who in this case happens to the counselor to come in between and give them moral support and guidance for them to be willing to change.

Another contributing factor of homelessness is sexual assault and domestic violence. Both sexual assault and domestic violence can cause women to go through extreme levels of trauma hence sending them to the streets. Moreover, unresolved family disputes can result in family breakdown causing homelessness because of divorce and separation. In this case, a significant number of women are affected. It is important for a counselor to ensure that he/she offers them with the emotional support that can help them to recover from the trauma or solve the family conflict, to combat such sources of homelessness. Recovery from trauma or finding a solution to the family conflict that resulted to homelessness can make a homeless person to go back home without many efforts.

The policymaker is one of the most influential people in human services profession. He/she comes with the programs that can solve the issue. To best manage the problem of homelessness the policy maker is responsible for coming up with various strategies. First, the policymaker works together with the governments to ensure that they come up with affordable housing supports with the aim of averting homelessness and restoring residential stability. Second, the policymaker designs policies that provide support and facilities to the homeless people. Some of the additional transitional services which are developed by the policymaker are; case management, child care, health care, treatment programs, and parenting support to help in combating this issue. Therefore, their primary aim is to assist in improving the life of homeless people as well as their families.sss

One of the most vital components of the human services is communication skills. Every day, the professionals must communicate with the clients to gain the information they need, give critical information, and come up with important decisions. Failure to have sufficient communication skills, the professionals may fail to convey the information. As a result, the professional can cause detrimental effects to the clients. For instance, the human service professionals must have effective communication skills. A good portion of the job done by the professionals involves interviewing the clients as well as other parties who participate in caring for the customer. Therefore, to provide clients with the most efficient services, the professionals should be able to listen carefully and be attentive to details. By doing this, he/she is not likely to lose any information. Also, the social workers should build client’s trust to impact effective communication. For instance, if the client feels that the human service worker is not into his/her best interest in mind, communicating with the client cannot be successful.

Human health professionals often face challenges in their attempt to combat the issue of homelessness. Most of the problems arise with the governmental institutions as well as the perceptions of the administrators and other finance personnel. First, human service professionals have to overcome the prejudices like biases against people who engage in substance abuse or sexual assault in their lives which affect how they interact with other people. Another challenge arises from the perception that other people carry about the clients and social work. The many people, in this case, include those in authority and the people who control financial resources assuming that the problem of homelessness can be fixed in a way that it consumes less time and finance. There is a lot of pressure on the human service professionals which involve resolving and closing of cases and finances. As a result of these pressure, the experts in this field have a high rate of burnout (Cherniss, 2008). Moreover, self-care is an issue that the professionals must face daily.

Reference:

Cherniss, C. (2008). Professional burnout in human service organizations. Praeger Publishers.