The Relationship Between Job Coaching of People Experiencing Poverty and Employment

"Why don’t you get a job?" That may be easier to say than do, particularly for people who are experiencing ongoing mental health issues and resulting barriers to employment. These barriers can be intensified by co-occurring experiences of poverty and/or a history of incarceration. Recognizing that there can be barriers to obtaining and sustaining employment, various supported employment programs have been created. Many of these programs include an element of job coaching. The purpose of this dissertation was to explore the impressions of the people who received supported employment with job coaching. Specifically, participants interviewed were engaged in a program called Individual Placement and Support (IPS), a program designed to help those with a mental health diagnosis navigate employment. Based on my prior experiences, my research question guiding this work was: “What is the lived experience of participants receiving job coaching as part of a supported employment program?” I used phenomenological methods to conduct the research and Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA) to interpret the experiences of the participants. I interviewed 10 participants using semi-structured interviews. These participants were all adults receiving job coaching through IPS programs. The findings of this study highlight not only what is perceived by each of the 10 IPS participants, but common themes that emerged across those interviews. These themes have been consolidated into a model that can be investigated by job coaches and employers to learn more about how the recipients of job coaching interpret the experience of the services. Further, this information can be beneficial to coaches to help them form their practices and employers to better understand the benefits of supported employment with job coaching.