Complete guide to starting a private practice from two successful practitioners. Michael Langlois, LICSW and Tamara G. Suttle, M.Ed., LPC share expert insights on building essential clinical skills, establishing your practice from scratch, getting your first clients, marketing strategies (websites, blogging, social media), managing the business side, creating systems and workflows, balancing multiple professional roles, finding your niche, and top 10 must-know startup tips. Whether you’re fresh out of graduate school or transitioning from agency work, learn everything you need to successfully launch and grow your private practice.
10 Clinical Social Work Skills Social Workers Must Develop
10 essential clinical social work skills infographic from Dean Nancy Smyth: substance abuse screening, mental health assessment, domestic violence safety planning, trauma understanding, dissociation assessment, behavioral interviewing, CBT interventions, motivational interviewing, record-keeping, and couples/family skills. The MSW is just the beginning; develop these competencies through specialized training.
Feeling, Writing, Empowering: Book Review and Author Interview
How Therapeutic Journaling Can Empower You/Your Client Have you wanted to use journaling as a therapeutic method with clients? Or have you wanted to try to engage in writing as a method of self-care or self-expression? If yes, you are likely to find Dima Dupéré’s book: Feeling, Writing, Empowering [Integrating Therapeutic Writing into Practice with Groups and Individuals], most helpful. Amy […]
How Every Social Worker Can Succeed in Private Practice
Private practice success strategies from Lynn Grodzki, LCSW, MCC, based on her talk “Navigating the New Psychotherapy Marketplace” at the 2014 Psychotherapy Networker Symposium. Learn how to succeed in today’s competitive mental health marketplace where therapists face lower insurance reimbursements (mental health outlays reduced from 15% to 1% since 2000), fewer sessions per client, preference for medication over talk therapy despite evidence showing talk therapy equals or supersedes medication long-term, and utilitarian perceptions of therapy. Grodzki recommends adapting business strategies that work with educated consumer shoppers. Key areas covered: Marketing is critical (unique selling proposition, benefits vs features, preparation for negotiation), communicate persuasively (prepare for first contact without disadvantaging yourself, structure 15-30 minute consultations to give prospective clients experience of boundaries and your therapeutic style), and adapt working style (review results every session tracking goals and progress, set expectations using metaphors, partner with clients session-by-session). Includes detailed infographic summarizing main takeaways and guidance on fee negotiation, handling objections like “I need someone who takes my insurance,” and creating successful first contacts.
Family/Couples Therapy – Improving Relationships
Family and/or Couples’ Therapy Have you wanted to know what a family/couples’ therapist does and/or what you could do to improve the communications in your family unit? These are some of the questions explored in an interview with Laurel Wiig, Ph.D., MFT., who is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist. Laurel has advanced clinical training […]
