If you want to enjoy a career in therapy, you’re going to need to make sure of a few things before you open up your practice. The better you’re assured about these factors, the easier it’s going to be to acquire and retain clients.
Plus you’ll feel more satisfied in your career path.
After all, if you’re going to help people, you need to have a solid foundation for the two of you to start on!
So, let’s go through a list of seven things you need to tick off before you start advertising your services. A good therapist is aware of the power of what they do, but a great therapist takes every step to ensure their form of healthcare is positively impactful while keeping an eye on the negatives.
I’m sharing about what to do if you’re considering a career In therapy, because I am a leading executive coach – with about 2 million personal development books sold globally.
I love sharing insights and strategies to help people to become more successful.
The first thing to do when you want to be a therapist, period! Anyone who practices a recognized form of ‘medicine’ needs a license to do so. And that means applying to sit a licensing exam after you’ve put in the right amount of hours to prove you’re capable of sitting it.
Of course, these requirements are going to vary based on…
So make sure you check on your local and/or state government’s website to see what you need to do.
Becoming a therapist is a lot of hard work, and rightly so! Make sure you’ve got the qualification and the necessary experience to try and make other people’s lives easier.
So, once you’ve passed your licensing exam and you’re able to become a practicing therapist, where are you going to provide your therapy? Setting the scene just right is essential in the psychology world. People need to feel like they’re in the right place in order to open up. And that place needs to be as comfortable as possible as well.
Thankfully, it’s perfectly legal to run a therapy practice from home, so if you’ve got a spare room, this could be your ‘office’. You can also find a dedicated therapy space within your community. For example, look into if a local doctor’s office is looking to hire a counsellor. Always check out opportunities like these. You could end up getting quite a few employment benefits coming your way.
You won’t be able to help everyone – that’s a simple fact of life, let alone a fact of therapy. After all, you can’t specialize in or get experience in dealing with every kind of problem. That’s why you need to make it clear what you can handle. And what someone is better off looking for elsewhere.
Most therapists will list what they offer services for on their website or through their portal on an accredited counsellor directory. Use sites like these to be more accessible and discoverable. But also to keep any pertinent information about contacting you in one place.
If you have experience in providing care for OCD, for example, make sure this is at the top of your treatment list. On the other hand, if you have no experience in assessing and treating ADHD, make sure this is stated plainly in bold as well.
Don’t let getting paid be an afterthought. In 2024, collecting cash at the end of a session or awkwardly asking for a bank transfer just won’t do! You need to make it clear from the beginning what the client needs to pay and how they can do so. Within this, make it clear whether or not you accept insurance, or if you’re open to programs like NDIS and can take that in payment.
You may even wish to ask for deposits to secure an upcoming session, or to secure a course of six upcoming sessions – this can then be taken off the final total once their therapy is over. Either way, let a client know what to expect regarding your costs and how they’re processed. This will also make your own bookkeeping a lot easier to manage as well, which is something a lot of business owners find to be a struggle!
All therapists need to have boundaries when dealing with their patients. These keep everyone safe, and make therapy a productive place that stays helpful. Otherwise both clients, and even you as the therapist, can become intrusive in each others’ lives.
So set some boundaries. The times at which you can be contacted, for example, and how much notice you need if someone needs to rearrange or cancel their appointment. If you have a client who regularly cancels at the last minute but then makes regular attempts to call you in the middle of the night, you’ll have to reinforce these boundaries.
You may even have to take them off your client list, but doing so is for the better. Keep this in mind going forward; therapists have to be harsh and firm sometimes. Even when you want to help people, and you find it otherwise difficult to connect with this troublesome client, you may just need to move them on to someone who is better equipped to handle the issue they’re presenting.
All therapists need a therapist of their own! It might sound ironic, but it does mean you have someone to turn to when your own mental load becomes too much. Taking on other people’s problems can do a number on your own wellness, and if there’s someone there who’s qualified to listen to you vent about that, you’re going to be able to do your job as a therapist for a lot longer.
Don’t think that being a therapist means you have an iron mindset that cannot be torn down or made worse in any way. Reach out to someone who specializes in providing care for other therapists and get on their client list. It will help.
This is something you can start right now and continue to work on for years to come. After all, you’ve got your qualifications, you’re accredited and licensed, and you know you play a constructive role in the lives of your clients.
However, a therapist who thinks they know everything isn’t going to be able to help their clients in a meaningful and productive way. Sure, you’ve had a lot of experience in addressing complex mental issues and using various forms of therapy to allow someone to dig into the roots of a problem they’re dealing with, but new medical information is revealed to us all the time.
Don’t ever discount new studies, theories, and practices. Investigate them, measure them against your own knowledge, and form an opinion about their efficacy in the face of someone’s mental health.
Always dig into what the information is telling you, and if it really matches up to the hypothesis. The more you take a critical lens to the science, the more informed you’re going to be when it comes to dealing with your therapy clients.
If you’re considering a career in therapy, go for it! But make sure you feel secure and stable in the seven things above first. You can be the person your client base relies on, but you need to have your own boundaries in place, your own therapist to talk to, and a working practice that feels good for both you and the person coming in to see you.
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