Pros
I like the people I work with. They also have a very robust training department. I am very impressed by the trainings they offer.
Cons
Unfortunately, HomeFirst falls victim to the structure of capitalism. Homeless services is a booming industry. HomeFirst may be a “nonprofit“ however, they fall victim to the same capitalistic structure that caused the homeless crisis in the first place. HomeFirst has around 475 employees. Around 70% are direct service staff making $64,575 per year or less. This means 70% of their staff is classified by HUD as “very low income.” This is a HUGE problem! It's unacceptable for any business to pay less than a living wage. It should be even more unacceptable for a homeless services provider to under pay 70% of their staff! There are no raises. Only annual cost of living increase. This means a brand new employee is paid the same as somebody with five years experience. (meanwhile the CEO lives out of state and makes over $250k/year). They say if you want to make more money you can get into management. This is true, however, there isn't "tons of growth opportunity" as staff makes you believe. I calculate 20% or less of available positions are manager roles. Potentially more than 300 internal candidates are fighting for a management role when it becomes available. This wouldn't be a problem if we were making living wages until we land a management job. When asked if the company was going to try and raise wages for direct service staff, the CEO said no. As a direct service worker in homeless services, I'm getting VERY tired of business structures existing where they underpay workers as if it's morally ok.