Workplace reviews and discussion: 財團法人勵馨社會福利事業基金會

You can quickly and deeply accumulate work experience. The internal systems are clear, and the accounting is transparent. Many supervisors are quite easy to get along with in private, and there generally isn't much infighting among small cliques.

There are many internal meetings and efficiency is low. Strong Christian beliefs are integrated into the work. Overtime is always compensated with compensatory leave, with no overtime pay. Social worker salaries and the amounts approved under subsidy programs are not necessarily the same (new hires' salaries are almost always lower than the personnel expenses approved in the program). Supervisors will say that this is not a kickback; at most, the program's personnel expenses are simply not fully claimed for reimbursement to cover it. Although there are labor-management meetings, labor representatives usually do not first ask frontline employees what rights and benefits they want to fight for, so the meetings often produce no meaningful results. It is recommended to gain other work experience before joining The Garden of Hope; your salary will be much higher than that of a fresh graduate. There is a performance evaluation system, but even if you work very hard, you may not receive a raise. There is an unwritten rule that new hires will definitely not receive a salary adjustment in their first year, and one-third of employees will not receive a raise each year. Some unit supervisors are more considerate and rotate who does not receive a raise; in other units, it depends on how close you are to the supervisor or the supervisor's personal preferences when rating performance. I once had a colleague who had worked for more than five years, yet their salary was still only NT$30,000.