About this guide
This guide draws from nominations submitted for the 2026 Unite Awards, isolating the stories that speak to staff retention, tenure, and how providers actively support their BCBAs and RBTs. These are practitioners and teams the field itself has recognized for holding onto good people. Nominee and organization names are included as submitted, since award stories are meant to be shared and celebrated.
The Common Thread
Across the highest-scoring nominations, one pattern shows up again and again: providers with strong retention don't treat it as an HR initiative bolted onto clinical work. They build it into supervision, scheduling, onboarding, and how leaders spend their own time. Six practices came up repeatedly enough to call out.
1. Build a Real Career Ladder from RBT to BCBA
The strongest retention stories weren't about perks - they were about a visible, funded path from technician to clinical leader. When RBTs can see a clear path from the therapy floor to the clinical director's office, they're far less likely to look for that growth somewhere else.
Arizona Autism United (AZA United) - Carey Beranek, VP, Children & Youth Services
Her team is described as having historically low turnover, with "dozens of staff" who have risen from Behavior Technician into senior BCBA, manager, or director roles.
Lacuna Autism Services - Ashley Moran & Amy Siebold, VPs of Clinical Operations
Rolled out 100% internal promotions to Clinical Director across 5 states and built a three-tier program that gives BCBA candidates a structured path toward case management as they accrue supervised hours.
2. Make Onboarding a Retention Lever, Not a Formality
Early-tenure turnover is where most ABA providers bleed staff. The nominations that scored highest treated the first weeks on the job as a designed experience, not a checklist.
StarBright Centers - Regina Glamore, Founder & Clinical Director
Built a comprehensive three-week RBT training program from scratch. Every RBT she's trained has passed the certification exam on the first attempt, reflecting a deliberate, high-quality onboarding model built for long-term success.
xyzABA - Caitlin Caceres, Clinical Operations Manager
Builds new-hire schedules deliberately "manageable, well-supported, and set up for fidelity - not just coverage," because in a field where early burnout is common, onboarding scheduling has a direct line to who stays.
3. Treat Supervision as Coaching, Not Compliance-Checking
The nominations that named specific retention or morale outcomes almost always described a supervisor who showed up in the work itself - not one who reviewed it after the fact.
Lilac Learning Center - Kaleigh Ridlon, BCBA
Replaced a top-down supervision model with a Clinical Mentorship Pipeline, including "in-the-trenches" co-regulation sessions where she works directly alongside frontline staff during difficult moments to model support in real time.
Swann Clinic for Behavioral Health - Jessica Burkle, Clinical Director
Leads training in person, on the floor, modeling technique in real time rather than overseeing compliance from a desk - an approach the nomination credits with building a team that feels supported enough to counter high field-wide turnover.
4. Protect the Team Through Staffing Crunches, Don't Push Through Them
Staffing gaps are a fact of life in ABA. In the strongest stories, leaders stepped in and carried the weight so their RBTs and frontline teams didn't have to.
Matrix Behavior Solutions - Erik Hansen, Chief of Operations; Zane Khan, CTO; Brittany Meckler; & CCO, Cheryl Rodrigo, Executive Director of Care Management
Built staffing and matching processes that pair each learner with the right staff member, helping the organization address waitlists across multiple counties.
Westside Children's Therapy – Cody Cooper, Carrissa White, Sara Witherspoon & Nicole Murawski, Regional Clinic Operations Managers
Cross-cover each other's clinics when staffing gaps hit, keeping morale intact and making sure "staff feel supported rather than overwhelmed" across all 29 sites they manage.
5. Recruit and Staff for Fit, Not Just for the Open Seat
A few nominations pointed specifically at recruiting and scheduling functions as retention drivers in their own right, not just downstream beneficiaries of good culture.
All About ABA! LLC - Emily Hopkins, Human Resources Generalist & the Operations Team
Rather than simply filling schedules, pairing clients, they look at the bigger picture, anticipating staffing needs, reducing unnecessary disruptions, and lead with data driven, informed decisions that benefit both our employees and the families we serve.
LINKS ABA Therapy – Rebecca Karelitz, Director of BCBA Recruiting
Matches BCBAs to roles based on their actual strengths, preferences, and schedules rather than a one-size-fits-all placement, directly strengthening retention within the organization.
6. Build a Culture People Choose to Stay In
The highest-scoring leadership nominations described specific, repeatable behaviors like open-door access, visible investment in people's growth, and business models built around stability, rather than vague "great culture" language.
Learning Institute for Functional Education (L.I.F.E.) - Terra Oehler, BCBA/CEO
A former Behavior Technician herself, she built a workplace described as one where "people feel valued and appreciated," backed by ongoing CPI training and staff development investment.
Verbal Beginnings – Christina James, Program/Center Director
Her center's operations team runs an "open-door philosophy" alongside structured coaching and mentorship for new and experienced staff alike, and is cited as having directly strengthened morale, teamwork, and retention.
Verbal Beginnings – Diana Wolf, co-CEO
Championed a center-based, stability-focused clinical model built as a direct answer to "the burnout and unpredictable pay driving clinicians out of ABA," and convened the company's first Leadership Team Summit to invest in developing leaders, not just managing them.
Questions to Bring Back to Your Own Team
- Can a new RBT see, concretely, what the next three roles ahead of them look like — and who at your organization has actually made that climb?
- Is onboarding designed to prevent early burnout, or is it just the fastest way to get someone billing hours?
- When a supervisor gives feedback, does it feel like problem-solving with the clinician or evaluation of the clinician?
- During your next staffing crunch, who absorbs the strain — leadership, or the front line?
Source: CentralReach 2026 Unite Award Nominee Submissions.
Posted in Review
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