Human service practitioners can also perform the role of a teacher/educator. This role models new behaviors for clients and conveys new skills (Sue & Sue, 2006). In fact, human service practitioners can help their clients to develop new, positive models of behavior and develop new skills. The development of new skills and behaviors can help clients to cope with their problems, to distract and to elaborate new goals in their life that will change their lifestyle.
Human service practitioners can also work as behavior specialists since they carry out a range of activities planned primarily to change the behavior of clients, including coaching, problem solving, counseling and behavioral management (Sue & Sue, 2006). In fact, the change of behavioral patterns is one of the crucial elements of the work of human service practitioners because clients often suffer from negative behavioral patterns that can make their life unbearable, while the change of behavioral patterns often changes the life of clients for better.
Furthermore, the role of mobilizers implies that human service practitioners organize clients and community to obtain new community services and resources (Sue & Sue, 2006). Hence, human service practitioners help to develop new services and to use all resources available in communities to help their clients. In this regard, clients cannot use these services without the support of human service practitioners.
At the same time, human service practitioners can perform the role of consultants that involves the use of specialized knowledge of human service practitioners to work with other professionals, health and human service agencies regarding their handling problems, needs and programs. Therefore, human service practitioners collaborate closely with different health and human service agencies to deliver human services to their clients. The support of these agencies is essential because human service practitioners alone cannot tackle all the problems of their clients, especially if their clients have health problems or held a low social standing.
Another role that may be performed by human service practitioners is the role of community planners, which also involves the close cooperation between human service practitioners and communities, where their clients live. This role implies that human service practitioners design, plan and organize new programs to serve clients’ needs (Sue & Sue, 2006). The development of new programs is essential for the provision of human services because needs of clients change and so should do programs offered by human service practitioners and different agencies.
Furthermore, human service practitioners perform the role of care managers/case managers that implies the assessment of individual clients, assisting in the development of care and treatment plan, arrangement for service delivery, monitoring service delivery and other functions performed by care givers (Sue & Sue, 2006). Similarly, human service practitioners can perform the role of administrators that implies management and supervision of activities that are involved in the provision of human services (Sue & Sue, 2006).
Conclusion
Thus, the work of human service practitioners involves a complex work of professionals, who should have multiple skills and extensive experience in different fields. Human service practitioners should choose the human service model that matches the best needs of their clients and resources available to them. In addition, human service practitioners should be able to perform different roles that are important for their clients and delivery of human services to them.