During the course of my case management class we were given the assignment to create a

mock case management scenario. The class was asked to pick a scenario in which one person
would play the case manager and the other would role play as the client. The exercise included
an intake interview, an assessment, a service planning interview as well as a termination
interview. Through the exercise I compiled case notes using the SOAP method. This meant that I
observed the clients strengths, made an objective account of the interactions with the client,
made an assessment of the clients situation, and created a plan for the next step. By doing this
assignment I was able to get a sense of the responsibilities that a case manager holds. I also
gained experience and awareness about clients that work with case managers. After engaging in
the role playing activity I was able to observe another groups case scenario. This allowed for me
to gain even more experience by objectively seeing another groups strengths as well as their
areas of improvement. For this paper I would like to discuss my experience role playing a case
manager, client, and observer, as well as the experience I gained from reviewing my peers
experience in the assignment.
Case management is a resource in the community that helps work alongside clients in
order to help them reach their goals. Case managers work with a variety of clients who have a
variety of needs. In week sevens power point slide, some of these needs include, mental health,
housing, daily living skills, socialization, employment, crisis intervention, and substance abuse
treatment. Many of the needs overlap, and a case manager will help a client address and make
goals for more than one need at a time. Depending on the clients needs a case managers role in
helping the client can be an ongoing process or only temporary. My experience as the case
manager reflected that of the latter. For my case scenario in which I played the case manager, I
was presented with a client whose needs involved mental health as well as daily living skills.

During the intake portion of the assignment I was able to define my interviewing skills. Since it
was the first time meeting with my client there was no initial planning being done. I enjoyed the
role playing during the intake interview because it let me practice building rapport with the
client. According to our book Woodside and McClam (2013) state that, the case managers
attitudes and characteristics as an interviewer are particularly important during the initial
interview because this meeting marks the beginning of a helping relationship (p. 175). Knowing
this, I attempted to give my client the best first impression I could. I asked my client how the
drive over was and made small talk about the weather. After the next few meetings I felt as
though the client was much more comfortable with me. My clients main concerns were that she
was planning to get off her medication for schizophrenia so she could get pregnant. This was
problematic because her husband had never seen her off her medication before and she was not
sure how he would handle it. During the role playing exercise I researched some of the outcomes
of discontinuing medication during pregnancy. This allowed me to speak to my client more
knowledgably about the issue. I knew that as a generalist I could not give medical advice to my
client so I made up resources to provide my client during the planning portion of our meetings.
My goals for the client were to refer her to a mental health doctor that specialized in family
planning. I also hoped to refer her to marriage counseling to help her and her husband cope with
her termination of medication. When I presented my client with these goals, she agreed that those
options would work best for her. Because our goals were congruent, I did not get the experience
of working with a client to change my process plan to better fit the clients needs. From this
exercise I realized I had difficulty taking notes while also interviewing. This made it hard when I
went to write my final SOAP notes. I felt as though I spent the majority of the time solely
focuses on the client, which is a good thing, but I lost important components of the interviews by

not writing down what was happening. My overall experience with my client was a rewarding
one. I had the opportunity to practice my active listening skills, note taking skills, as well as the
skills for assessment, goal planning and termination with a client.
During my experience role playing as a client in the case scenario, I gained insight into
some of the issues clients may face when working with a case manager. I role played as a 24 year
old African American male who was recently released from prison. Some of the issues I
presented to my case manager were that I needed to find housing that was not temporary,
employment, as well as possibly vocational training from a technical school. I enjoyed role
playing this client because I am passionate about the issues revolving around our prisons systems
as well as the rehabilitation needed afterward. During the planning and goal assessment portion
of the exercise I was able to work with the case manager to rearrange my goals to better fit my
situation. The case manager came to the meeting with an emphasis on focusing on my goals for
education. When I told the case manager that my most important goals were to first get a job and
then find housing, we reorganized our goals. I enjoyed that my case manager brought me real
resources from the community, which gave me a more real life experience when making
decisions. I believe this exercise was important because it allowed for me to see a clients side in
the case management process.
As an observer in the case management assignment, I was able to objectively reflect on
my peers as they role played their case management scenarios. From observing I took away
many techniques my peers had used that I had not. For instance, one group I observed made sure
to tell the client about confidentiality. In another scenario the client went through the action
planning paper and goals with the client before writing it in. When I had done my goals
assessment and action planning I had not done either of these things. Seeing my peers role play

allowed me to see things I had missed when doing my own interviews. I also saw what a more
difficult interview may look like between a case manager and a client.
When the case management exercise was wrapped up with the termination step, the class
was asked to find a peer we had not worked with a review their files. This exercise was very
helpful in broadening my understanding of the case management process. The case file I
reviewed showed me how important note taking was. The file had very thorough case notes
which allowed me to picture the case even though I had not been a part of it. This is a key
component in case management because often times case files will be presented to different care
managers who have no previous knowledge about the client.
After completing the case management assignment, I believe I walked away with much
more knowledge and experience of what a case managers roles are. I was also able to gain
perspective on how a client may view the case management experience. As a future human
service professional, I will use many of the skills I practiced during this assignment with future
clients.