When a client is stuck in a problem narrative, the trained instinct is to fix it. Dr. Deborah Teplow on the three small moves that work instead: acknowledge, ask coping questions, and look forward.
When a client names a strategy, that is not the destination. It is the door. Here is how the Solution-Focused approach uses strategy talk as a starting point for building a real preferred future.
When a client knows what to do but isn’t doing it, the instinct is to fight for them. Here’s why that backfires, and the Solution-Focused move that puts ownership back where it belongs.
When you paraphrase a client’s words, you’re making a choice — not just a communication decision. Research into the microanalysis of therapeutic conversations shows that how practitioners handle client contributions directly predicts follow-through. Here’s what the evidence says.
The check-in is scheduled for 15 minutes. Your client is struggling with a habit they’ve committed to multiple times. You can feel the clock ticking as you try to help them find the drive to stay on track. In health coaching, many practitioners rely on...
When a patient has already decided to change, Motivational Interviewing’s evocative structure can slow their momentum. Here is what the evidence shows about a different approach.
You explain the plan clearly. The person leaves seemingly committed — and yet the follow-through never happens. When this pattern repeats, the evidence suggests the problem may not be their motivation, but the structural starting point of the conversation itself.
Most specialty practices lose patients not from lack of leads, but from what happens in the conversation after the lead arrives. Here’s what the research shows.