Product Description

Understand all the aspects of beginning and sustaining a therapeutic practice with The Therapist's Starter Guide: Setting Up and Building Your Practice, Working with Clients, and Managing Professional Growth, a practical, hands-on guide to professional fulfillment and business success. If you’re a new practitioner or seek to grow your practice, this book will provide you with the skills you need to succeed, thrive and grow professionally and personally. Equip yourself with the knowledge you need to transition to a new job or to begin your own practice.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #108345 in Books
• Published on: 2008-07-15
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 384 pages

Features

• ISBN13: 9780470228920
• Condition: NEW
• Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.
• Click here to view our Condition Guide and Shipping Prices

Review
"...is one of the most comprehensive books out there that I’ve seen on this subject. The guide offers a collection of tools and information for those new to private practice issues and is a valuable reference and reminder for veteran practitioners. I find it refreshing for a handbook to exist that combines coverage of professional growth, working with clients, and setting up a private practice in a single volume. All in all, this is a helpful resource for social workers in private practice, as well as educators and students interested in this area." (The New Social Worker, Winter 2009)

From the Back Cover
A hands-on and practical guide to professional fulfillment and business success

The first guide to cover all aspects of therapeutic practice, The Therapist's Starter Guide: Setting Up and Building Your Practice, Working with Clients, and Managing Professional Growth provides new practitioners, and those in the first few years of establishing a practice, with the skills needed to succeed, thrive, and grow professionally as well as personally. This vital guide recognizes the practice of psychotherapy as a unique blend of science, art, and business. It equips new mental health professionals with the knowledge they need to transition to their first job out of school or the start of their own therapy practice.

Written by two seasoned mental health professionals with both clinical and managerial experience operating a network of behavioral health providers, this hands-on book is designed for those seeking realistic advice on how to manage a successful career as a therapist—be it working on one's own or as part of a larger organization or practice. Filled with relevant case studies and self-test questions, it presents solid, practical answers to questions including:

• How should you recognize ethical dilemmas and handle them when they occur?

• How can you position your practice for success in a very competitive marketplace?

• How do you recognize when your clients are ready for change?

• How will you handle working with insurance companies?

• What issues are important in the beginning and during treatment?

• How do you end treatment gracefully?

The Therapist's Starter Guide: Setting Up and Building Your Practice, Working with Clients, and Managing Professional Growth provides practitioners in counseling, social work, and psychology with the tools they'll need to become outstanding, effective, ethical, and satisfied professionals.

About the Author
Mark Lanci, MSW, is a Licensed Independent Clinical Social Worker who has worked in a variety of settings including an inpatient psychiatric center, the community mental health system and private practice as well as being the District Manager for a large, nonprofit healthcare organization, where he oversaw the behavioral healthcare provided by a network of independent contracted practitioners.

Anne Spreng, MEd, has been a counselor in a number of organizations, including a runaway shelter, a home for pregnant teens, a tenant support program, an adolescent day treatment program, an inpatient residential treatment program with children and adolescents as well as a behavioral health case manager for a large, nonprofit healthcare care organization. She is currently in private practice.

Customer Reviews

Very helpful guide for old and new therapists
The Therapist's Starter Guide is an easy to use guide for both beginning therapists and those who have been in practice for years. It is well organized and can serve as a resource tool for any practice. I particularly enjoyed the case studies and the way in which the text is organized. As someone who is quite visual and working in a busy practice group, I appreciate the book's layout and visual appeal. It is easy to skim through quickly and find useful bits of information. The tips and exercises are also helpful ways to "tune up" and refresh skills. I highly recommend this text for all professional therapists.

A Must Have
As a Mental Health Counseling graduate student just finishing up, this book was essential. This is NOT just a textbook for a graduate student. For me, it is easy to get caught up in the many techniques, strategies, and theories. This book broke it down and got me back to the basics of goals, theory, techniques, and the counseling relationship, and then built up to more detailed topics. It also included many suggested activities and questions that inspired me to consider my identity as a counselor, what I value in practice, and different approaches I could take. It inspires you to take a step back from the daily workload to remember some of the things that you are basing your counseling on, and why you became a counselor in the first place. The authors are very experienced and are able to present the information in a readable and understandable format. Although this was a required text for an internship graduate class, this book was enjoyable to read and very helpful. This is a book that any mental health counselor should have on their shelf--whether you are one year out of school or twenty!

Informative and easy to read
I highly recommend The Therapist's Starter Guide for counselors and other therapists. Because it is so clear and concise (easy to read), I read the whole book in a short amount of time. It was assigned reading in graduate school and provided a GREAT introduction. Even now, after graduating and having more experience, I often refer back to this guide when I'm feeling "stuck" or looking for inspiration. For example, I found their suggestions on working with resistant clients very helpful. One of the book's strengths is that it takes the theoretical and brings it to life with case examples, sample questions to ask clients, and questions to ask yourself as the practitioner. The layout and organization made the book enjoyable and really facilitated my understanding. The Therapist's Starter Guide included excellent information on case conceptualization, documentation, and working with insurance companies (including billing and utilization review.) I got something out of every single chapter of this book, even the chapters on ethics and legal issues, which were a review for me. This is because the book had a knack for getting me to think about old information in new ways. I think The Therapist's Starter Guide would be useful for all new mental health professionals, regardless of theoretical orientation or work setting.