CEO at Samaritan Counseling Center discusses his career and path to a leadership position
By Barbara Pierce
James (Jim) Davis is executive director of the Samaritan Counseling Center of the Mohawk Valley in Utica, with offices also in Rome and Herkimer. The Samaritan Counseling Center is a nonprofit interfaith organization committed to a unique concern for the spiritual dimension of human life, offering psychotherapy and pastoral counseling to individuals, couples and families.
Davis leads an interdisciplinary staff trained to assist people who seek relief from suffering and to help them bring healing and hope to their lives.
He talks about his career and how he became the leader of Samaritan Counseling Center.
Q: What led you to this challenging career?
A: While I reflect on why I chose counseling as a career, I must travel back to memories of high school. I remember not being sure what direction I wanted to go in terms of a career. I had friends who had a solid idea of what they wanted and at times I felt like I was behind the eight ball as I didn’t know what I wanted to do or be. That changed my senior year of high school when I took psychology as an elective and became very interested in the subject. For whatever reason, it clicked for me and made sense. Now I had a direction. I wanted to go to college to learn more about psychology.
In college, I was able to participate in several internships to learn about the mental health field. Several of those internships involved observing and shadowing therapists and psychologists. This helped solidify even more that this was the field I wanted to find a career in. What I didn’t realize is that I would need more than a bachelor’s degree to do the type of work I am doing now. After graduation, I worked as a case manager for two years and worked as a camp counselor with young children. I learned that the helping field is where I was called to be and that I enjoyed working with children. I also learned I needed a master’s degree to be a therapist.
Q: What is your educational background?
A: I started at Mohawk Valley Community College. I transferred to the State University at Albany and completed a bachelor’s degree in psychology. In 1996 I started the master’s program in counseling at SUNY Albany with a school counseling track. In 2013, I graduated from the Sage Graduate School, Esteves School of Education, with a doctorate in educational leadership. I am a certified school counselor and a licensed mental health counselor in the state of New York.
Q: What was your path to the Samaritan Counseling Center?
A: Upon graduation, I began working at Troy High School in a grant–funded program as a school counselor where I had the opportunity to work with kids of all ages, elementary, junior high and high school. I also started working as a part-time therapist at the Colonie Youth Center in Latham. This is when I realized I truly enjoyed working with people to overcome their struggles, mental health challenges and emotional issues. I worked with all ages providing individual and family counseling. In 2015, after working in schools throughout the majority of my career, I began working full time at Samaritan Counseling Center.
Q: What are the rewards of your position?
A: What I love about the work I do is when a person has that ‘ah-ha!’ moment and begins to make changes to work on their issues, manage their symptoms and live a better quality of life. The rewards include making a positive impact in someone’s life, supporting them through difficult times and seeing a person make healthy changes.
Q: What are the challenges?
A: The challenges include that people make changes on their timeline, not mine. As a therapist, it is key to always start where the client is, not where I am. Other challenges include dealing with the administrative end of being a therapist — billing, insurance, renewing licensure and technology issues.
Q: Anything else you’d like us to know?
A: In summary, my career path has been a journey of discovery. I’ve had the opportunity to work in different settings, with different people and organizations that have all had an impact on the career direction I have had over time.
For more information on the Samaritan Counseling Center, visit www.samaritancentermv.com or call 315-724-5173.