Her Story
About Jessica
Jessica Preuss is an Engagement Specialist and Case Manager in the mental health field. She began her current role in August 2024 after a diverse career path that included math tutoring, earning an accounting degree in 2013 and working in the field for about 10 years, completing a front-end developer bootcamp, and teaching for one year following a move from Michigan to Illinois. Preuss was named Rookie of the Year in April 2025 at her agency. She is a member of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority Incorporated. Preuss attributes her success to values instilled by her family and skills developed through prior work experience, such as prioritization, time management, asking questions, and teamwork. She emphasizes the importance of maintaining boundaries and asking questions in her advice to others entering the field.
Her Interview
Ten minutes with Jessica
01What do you attribute your success to?
I attribute my success to the things I learned growing up from my parents, my family, so some of those values that were instilled in me. As well as my previous work experience, that helped me to learn how to prioritize, how to manage my time, how to ask questions, how to word emails, what it means to work in a team.
02What’s the best career advice you’ve ever received?
Identify and maintain your boundaries. With any human service position, you're in relationship with people. You need to make sure that the people that you're working with understand what's acceptable and what's not acceptable.
03What advice would you give to young women entering your industry?
Identify and keep the boundaries that you set with clients, with coworkers, with whomever that you are in relationship with as it relates to your career and your job. That is gonna save you a lot of stress, and heartache, and long hours. And then, I think the other thing is ask questions. Don't be shy. Cause the more questions you ask, the more you know. The more you know, the better service provider you will be.
04What are the biggest challenges or opportunities in your field right now?
For specifically nonprofits, one of the biggest challenges is funding that comes from the federal government, through state governments. With less funding, then it can be more challenging to provide services to a wide variety of people no matter what insurance they may have, or no pay source.
05What values are most important to you in your work and personal life?
Honesty, transparency, vulnerability, accountability, trustworthiness, compassion.
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