You will burn out - Behavioral Health Care Advocate Optum Employee Review

1.0
Dec 13, 2021
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

You will be enticed by a large yearly salary.

Cons

It's the insurance world. A billion dollar company. They are about making the company money. They want to limit the therapy and other mental health treatments. The cognitive dissonance of this job is that you are helping funds be used appropriately but in reality, they are watching their bottom line grow. There are people who need treatment but will have it denied. For example, if a clinician does not respond to outreaches to complete a clinical review, treatment will most times just be denied, based on new real reason except they didn't hear back from already overworked therapists. Many of the clinicians who work on the team that review outpatient therapy have not worked as actual therapists for many years. They are asked to evaluate the 'medical necessity' of treatment in a 10 minute conversation. You will also be asked to take on more and more responsibility. You will be evaluated by numbers each month--how long was your call, how long between your next call, all calls are recorded. If you enjoy micromanagement and being evaluated by metrics each month, this is a great job for you.

Explore other reviews about Optum

5.0
Jun 15, 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

great management, work life balance, atmosphere

Cons

no cons, very satisfied with my employment.

3.0
Jun 4, 2026
Anonymous employee
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Some very talented people give so much of themselves to the company, the clients and their co-workers. I work with (and have worked with) some excellent, smart, supportive people.

Cons

Too many layoffs. Upper management is clueless about how the day to day work gets done, what it takes to make certain changes to processes, and how to treat employees. Some are great. Mostly, they just look at numbers. So many of us have been doing our jobs long enough to know what is needed for certain requests. But we don't get a voice. We just have to do it and suck it up. They are firing ('reduction in force') all of the seasoned staff and let the rest deal with the fall-out. So many teams are losing good people but those people are training their off-shore replacements before they are told about being cut. So how is that a reduction in force? It's just a reduction in payroll numbers. Everyone is on edge just waiting for the next axe to fall. And we have to try and learn or teach another role with less experienced people and more work. It's crazy. On milestone anniversaries, they send an email recognition but once the milestone gets to over 15 years, you are a target. Pay and benefits are fine by me. Raises are practically non-existent, even after layoffs and asking employees to take on more responsibility. that's messed up. They talk about work/life balance but that doesn't trickle down to the actual workers who are so stressed they fear for their jobs if they don't do the extra mile. Many of us are just hanging on instead of quitting so we can at least get some severance. Others are actively looking.

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