Being a therapist does not make me perfect. In fact, the thought that I should be immune to the difficulties of every day life makes me laugh frequently.
And yes, I’ve actually had to have that conversation before.
One of the benefits of being a therapist, however, is that through my work, I’ve learned to be very aware of myself in addition to my clients. I am attentive to my feelings, my processing, and my mistakes. If not, I’d never be able to differentiate if a behavior was my client, or my client responding to me!
One of my biggest downfalls as a therapist and business person?
I have to take a lot of time to process my verbal output, especially when dealing with detailed matters. Many of my clients can tell you of their initial phone call to me. It likely went something like this;
“Hello, Mrs. Mullis? This is _____________ and I’m interested in _______ receiving music therapy/music lessons. “
“Oh wonderful and nice to meet you! Can you tell me a bit about _______?”
(list of details about child and reasons for pursuing therapy/lessons)
So at this point, I’m doing pretty well. I can quickly organize details about people, as well as appropriately respond and ask questions. We’re about to get to the nitty gritty though.
Client: “Wonderful! So, our schedule has us available on x,y,z, day at x,y,z times. When could we see you? We also live in ______ how much would it cost for you to travel to us?”
Me: “Uhh.. buhh. uhm.. calendar.. yeah.. err.. rates.. gas.. google maps.. mileage… EXPLODE”
Yep. That was my head exploding just there. What actually happens, is that I politely tell my potential client that I do a much better job organizing the details and delivering them through e-mail and would they kindly provide me with their e-mail address, or send me a message through the contact form on my webpage.
Delivering details over the phone is where I can mess up badly. I can get confused, give bad information, and am a giant helpless mess. What are the areas you struggle with? How do you deal?
I have similar issues. I’ve come to the conclusion I need to take a little more time to process before answering. With the question you posed in your post I might respond with “Let me put together some options and call you back. Would you be available to talk at ___?”
That is a good response as well JoAnn! Thanks for your thoughts!
I can totally relate Natalie. Phone interview with potential client family = information explosion and brain malfunction! I love your email idea though…if the family is good at checking it and responding. JoAnn brings up a great point too. Collecting and organizing how you respond and setting up a time to follow-up via phone is a great “plan B” option. PS. If we (therapists) were perfect we wouldn’t spend our time helping others with their imperfections. It’s more like humans helping humans. =)
Yes, I think it’s important to be flexible. If I can organize before a phone conversation, I can be somewhat successful, it all depends on the client! I do what is best for them.
And you and I know this, but so many people’s perception (of course, inexperienced) has been that we should be perfect.