Essential private practice startup tips infographic from Tamara G. Suttle, M.Ed., LPC – mental health counselor with 20+ years experience and private practice coach. This visual summary distills the most critical strategies for successfully launching your private practice: start networking NOW even if practice is years away, create your self-care plan before scheduling your first client, join or create a consultation group to combat isolation, be strategic in networking by declaring both strengths and weaknesses, build reciprocal referring relationships, get paperwork in order before seeing clients, establish systems for everything early, invest in a quality WordPress website, blog to get known online efficiently, and remember private practice is a marathon not a sprint. Includes bonus Q&A on establishing a practice in foreign countries. Based on comprehensive interview featured in “Complete Guide to Starting Your Private Practice” where Tamara shares decades of wisdom alongside social worker Michael Langlois.
Complete Guide to Starting Your Private Practice
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 Essential Social Work Skills Every Practitioner Must Have
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.
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 […]
