Well-Being Coach

The Well-being Coach serves as Upstate Veterinary Specialties subject matter expert in emotional wellness, crisis intervention, grief support, compassion fatigue, and psychological wellbeing. The primary purpose of this role is to provide specialized emotional and behavioral support to clients and team members experiencing significant distress, while promoting resilience, wellbeing, and psychological safety throughout the organization. 

Unlike the Client Advocate role, which serves as the primary point of contact for the routine client experience, communication, visitation coordination, and euthanasia logistics, the Well-being Coach focuses on high-acuity emotional situations, complicated grief support, anticipatory grief counseling, decision-making support, family conflict mediations, crisis intervention, staff wellbeing, grief counseling, education, consultation, and organizational wellness initiatives. 

The Well-being Coach serves as a consultant and escalation resource to the Client Relations Specialists and clinical teams, Client Advocates, leadership, Human Resources, and hospital staff to ensure individuals experiencing significant emotional distress receive appropriate support, intervention, and access to community resources. 

Experience Requirements: 

• Two years of Well-being coaching experience is required, preferably in a medical, hospice, or mental health setting 

• Experience with grief, loss and bereavement is required 

• Experience working successfully with multi-disciplinary teams is preferred  

Education: 

• Bachelor or Masters degree in a related field is preferred 

Skills: 

• Demonstrated excellent communication skills both written and verbal.  Ability to present information and tools in a clear and concise manner. 

• Excellent organizational skills with the ability to multi-task and prioritize. 

• Ability to work independently and be self-directed. 

• Ability to provide supportive services needed by clients and staff in an emotionally intense, fast-paced setting. 

• Ability to remain calm in high stress situations.   

• Demonstrated experience in effectively de-escalating situations. 

• Ability to handle highly confidential information in a trustworthy manner. 

• Ability to present oneself in a genuine and compassionate manner. 

• Flexible attitude and work habits 

• Flexible with working schedule, pending UVS business needs 

• Demonstrate leadership capabilities, professionalism and the ability to encourage a positive work environment 

Essential Functions: 

To perform this job successfully, an individual must be able to perform each essential duty satisfactorily. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable qualified individuals with disabilities to perform essential functions:  

Client Crisis Intervention & Advanced Emotional Support 

• Respond to escalations from Client Relations Specialists, Client Advocates, medical teams, leadership, and hospital staff involving significant emotional distress. 

• Provide in-the-moment interventions for clients experiencing acute grief, emotional crisis, severe anxiety, panic, family conflict, psychological distress, or traumatic circumstances. 

• Assist clients experiencing complex decision-making challenges involving quality of life, euthanasia, financial hardship, ethical concerns, or family conflict. 

• Provide specialized support during situations involving: 

• Client surrender considerations 

• Animal cruelty investigations 

• Rabies suspect cases 

• Severe trauma cases 

• Threats of harm to self or others 

• Suicidal ideation or comments 

• Significant behavioral or mental health concerns 

• Facilitate referrals to community-based mental health, grief, crisis, or social service resources when appropriate. 

• Provide follow-up support for clients experiencing prolonged or complex grief reactions. 

Staff Wellbeing & Resilience 

• Serve as the primary resource for employee wellbeing initiatives throughout the hospital. 

• Provide confidential support, consultation, and coaching to team members experiencing compassion fatigue, burnout, moral distress, secondary traumatic stress, grief, workplace stress, or emotional exhaustion. 

• Facilitate individual and group debriefings following emotionally challenging, traumatic, or high-impact cases. 

• Support leaders and managers in navigating emotionally complex employee situations. 

• Assist employees in accessing Employee Assistance Program resources and external support services when appropriate. 

• Participate in employee retention, engagement, and wellness initiatives designed to strengthen organizational culture. 

Education & Organizational Development 

• Develop and deliver educational programming related to: 

• Compassion fatigue 

• Burnout prevention 

• Stress management 

• Emotional resilience 

• Grief and bereavement 

• Mental wellness 

• Psychological safety 

• Difficult conversations 

• Provide training and consultation to Client Relations Specialists, Client Advocates, clinical teams, supervisors, and managers regarding escalation criteria and emotional support strategies. 

• Develop written, digital, and community resource materials related to grief support, wellness, resilience, and emotional health. 

Consultation & Interdisciplinary Collaboration 

• Serve as an internal consultant to medical teams, leadership, Human Resources, and Client Relations regarding emotional, behavioral, and psychosocial concerns affecting clients or staff. 

• Collaborate with Client Advocates to provide coordinated grief support, end-of-life support, family support, and bereavement resources. 

• Participate in interdisciplinary rounds and meetings to proactively identify clients, families, or team members who may benefit from Well-being services. 

• Collaborate closely with Client Advocates to ensure smooth transitions of care and clearly defined escalation pathways. 

• Maintain appropriate documentation of interventions in accordance with hospital policies and confidentiality requirements. 

Operational Expectations 

• Maintain a visible presence throughout the hospital and actively round in clinical areas to identify emerging client and staff support needs. 

• Maintain timely response standards for vocera communications, phone calls, electronic communications, and urgent support requests. 

• Ensure schedules and availability are visible and accessible to hospital departments. 

• Utilize established escalation pathways and documentation standards to support continuity of care. 

ROLE BOUNDARIES 

The Well-being Coach is not responsible for: 

• Routine client rounding 

• Standard wait-time updates 

• Routine client hospitality services 

• Patient visitation scheduling or facilitation 

• Euthanasia room preparation 

• Euthanasia and Cremation paperwork/documentation 

• Cremation arrangements 

• Financial checkout processes 

• Routine client communications 

Client Advocate and Client Relations Specialist roles are the point of contact for these responsibilities and escalated only when emotional, behavioral, or psychosocial complexity exceeds the Client Advocate scope of practice 

Further Development and Education: 

• Attend webinars and conferences on related topics such as grief, bereavement, compassion fatigue, etc. 

• Utilize external resources to gather ideas and develop new resources and initiatives for UVS. 

Schedule:

• Monday–Friday, 9:00 AM–5:30 PM, Onsite