Howard:  Feeling stuck in your private practice? Not sure of your direction? Worried about making changes in your mental health practice? Just getting started and need help? You’ve come to the right podcast. Welcome to PsychBiz.

Hi, I’m Howard Baumgarten, licensed professional counselor, practice owner, author, and business consultant, and I’m delighted to be here to help you learn more about navigating the road to your private practice. Along with my sidekick, the Robin to my Batman, the one and only web designer for therapists, Sarah Gershone, we’re here to help you understand how to be successful and make the most of your psychotherapy business.

Sarah:  And I’m Sarah Gershone, professional web designer and digital marketing strategist. Each week, we’re going to delve into topics that are pertinent to the building and running your therapy practice, online and in your office. Whether you’re just getting started or are a seasoned veteran, there’s going to be something in each episode for you. It’s time to get psyched about PsychBiz.

Howard: Hey, hey, Sarah. How you doing?

Sarah: I’m good. How are you?

Howard: I am great. It is so nice to be here with you, and I’m so excited about this podcast. I can’t tell you.

Sarah: Yeah, me too. This is going to be super fun.

Howard: Totally. What should we do?

Sarah: Well, I feel like it’s a good idea to start off by letting the listeners get to know us a little bit so they can have a feeling for where we’re coming from and the different stuff we’re going to talk about.

Howard: Come on, they don’t need to know us. They don’t need to know anything about us.

Sarah: No, we’re super boring, but I feel like if we try, we can spice it up enough to keep them listening, you know?

Howard: Okay, I guess it’s fine. No, I’m excited. Do you want to go first?

Sarah: No, let me ask you some questions and get you to talk about yourself a little bit and we’ll go from there.

Howard: Okay. That sounds good. I love it. Let’s do it.

Sarah: Cool. So you’re a therapist. Do you want to tell us a little bit about what made you want to become a therapist in the first place?

Howard: Yes. That could take the whole podcast.

Sarah: Okay, so a brief … We can delve into it more in a future episode, but just kind of …

Howard: Of course.

Sarah: … in general, what made you want to be a therapist?

Howard: I can remember back the earliest time that I wanted to do this for work when I was about 12 at my-

Sarah: Wow.

Howard: Yeah. Up at my summer camp. I went to a summer camp in the mountains in Colorado here, and I really fell in love with helping other kids that were in my peer group, that were younger than me. And, of course, I started going to the camp when I was eight years old.

Sarah: Oh wow.

Howard: I lived every off season … When I was home in the wintertime, I would say to my mom, “I can’t wait for camp. Only 169 days left until camp is here.” And part of what I loved about it was there was this sense of acceptance and spirituality and connection.

Sarah:  Wow.

Howard And so I became really interested in how people connect and why it’s so valuable to have friends and mentors and people to help you along the way. So many people in that experience over the years helped me in my developmental process that my initial interest in becoming a therapist really came from wanting to engender that kind of helping to others. It really felt like a calling to me in many ways. And then, I think some other really deeply personal things happened in my life. And I’m sure that listeners would agree who are therapists or studying to become therapists themselves that we all have a personal journey attached to our professional interests, and I had a deeply, deeply personal experience happen early in my life, well before I even went to camp, in which we lost a family member to mental illness, and-

Sarah: Oh my God.

Howard: Yeah. And it was due to a lack of accountability and responsibility with the hospital staff.

Sarah: Wow. Oh, I’m so sorry.

Howard: Yeah, no, I appreciate that. And it’s really been a journey in terms of understanding that deeply held personal experience and to make sure that I’m not … This was one of my things going into this field, is, Howard, you can’t go into this field to put off, allay, or get rid of this painful suffering experience. This is not why you go in. And so the differentiation between going in for that reason versus really, really understanding and working on that familial experience …

Sarah: Wow.

Howard: … and knowing that I’m going in to try to create change and more accountability and some sense of justice in our world through psychotherapy was part of my decision. And then, of course, as I became older and more mature, my intellectual interests really followed suit. I became fascinated by what makes people tick, why are certain behaviors accepted and others not, what is emotion and reason in psychology, and all of that was so valuable for me. And so those are some of the deeply personal reasons, some of the intellectual reasons. So that’s what led me to become a therapist. It really felt like a calling for me.

Sarah: Oh, that’s amazing. And then within the world of therapy, you chose to pursue being in private practice. Were there particular reasons that led you to that rather than to other types of practices?

Howard: Yeah. I think by the time I turned 16, 17, 18, I kind of was feeling like I wanted to do my own business at some point. I knew I would need training before that. Not just educational training, such as I have an undergraduate in psychology, I have a graduate degree in counseling psychology, but I knew I was going to need some post-grad training not in private practice in order to really, really immerse myself in the clinical areas that I wanted to focus on and really get some good training beyond grad school. So for a few years, I worked at an adolescent residential treatment center working with abused and neglected children. Most of them were through the Department of Social Services or the Department of Youth Corrections, and I really became interested in adolescent development and child and adolescent development became one of my early specialties, along with a really interesting … I became highly interested in systems theory during graduate school.

Howard: And so I sort of built this practice after working at the residential treatment center, and I worked in some other agencies as well along the way. But I built this practice with this expertise in this specialty, and we’ll probably talk about niche work and specialties and whatnot in another podcast. But I built this expertise in working with teenagers and adolescents, along with my, at the time, newly designated interest of systems theory and working with couples and families. And so I have these sort of three areas that I work on, along with individuals and whatnot. Hopefully we can talk at some point about having specialties and also being a generalist. I wrote about this in my book, the transposition among specialties and wider general interest in the field in terms of populations we work with.

Howard: But yeah, that’s kind of … And private practice for me was mainly a goal I had because I come from a family of small business owners. My grandfather was a-

Sarah: Really?

Howard: Yeah, he was a restaurant owner in Chicago.

Sarah: Oh wow.

Howard: Yeah, he was a restaurant owner in Chicago. My father went into business. He went into sales and management. My brother owned a small company for a short time …

Sarah: Wow.

Howard: … and now he’s the head of … really a vice president, the second in command of a large, large company. My other brother is in the medical field. My mother spent the better part of most of her adult life working in the field of business management.

Sarah:

Interesting.

Howard: Yeah, with no formal education beyond high school, and she founded her own business in Denver and worked in that business for many, many years before she died 10 years ago. And so I’ve been very inspired by the values that my entire immediate family have espoused revolving around good business ethics and how to monetize to grow your business and be responsible and really be of service to others in your business, which is what I imagine most of our listeners want to do.

Sarah: Yeah. And I find that really fascinating because I think you are an example of someone who’s done a really good job of embracing both halves of being in private practice, meaning that you love and are passionate, obviously, about the therapy you do, but then you also really embrace the business parts of it and are comfortable growing your private practice and investing the time in making your private practice really successful. So it makes sense that you have this background in some of the entrepreneurship stuff from your family.

Howard: Yeah. People would come to me and say, “Howard, what are you doing about this and what are you doing about that?” When I first got into private practice, I entered through a group, and the group that I entered through was very mismanaged. They were billing insurance companies and not following up and they had a lot of financial loss …

Sarah: Wow.

Howard: … and promising therapists that they would be paying them and not sending them the paychecks.

Sarah: Oy.

Howard: This was a large group at the time, and I could see the writing on the wall within two months of being there.

Sarah: Wow.

Howard: And within eight months, they went out of business and I got out before they went out of business.

Sarah: Wow.

Howard: And I had people from this group who lost a ton of money and I felt terrible for them. So I found another group practice that was very reputable. I vetted them much better than I did the first time because we all make mistakes in processes and building and I want-

Sarah: Oh, for sure.

Howard: I want our listeners to understand that, that hey, you’re going to make a ton of mistakes along the way. That’s really important. And I got with the second group and what I noticed is, is that they weren’t diversified enough in many ways. I went to the owners and I said to them very boldly, “Hey, have you two thought about doing some things a little bit differently? I think if we got on some more managed care panels …” We were very heavily managed care driven back then, and to some degree, that group still is. We can talk about where my practice is if we want later on, but … And I said, “And I think having five or six practitioners along with a couple of prescribers is great, but we could certainly serve the needs of the community by adding really good, strong clinicians all over the city and have these satellite offices.”

Howard: And so I had this conversation with the owners and they were about 10, 15 years older than me and they said, “Well, we don’t really have the energy to do this. Would you do this for us?”

Sarah: Wow.

Howard: And so I said-

Sarah: That’s great.

Howard: Right, and I didn’t expect it to happen, and so I said, “Well, yeah, I guess. Sure, yeah, for the right amount of money, of course.” I mean, and that’s the other thing. I think therapists are really … It’s hard to ask for money because what we do is we help people, and we hear this all the time in our circles. But I had to at least be compensated for my time …

Sarah: Of course.

Howard: … in a structural way that would work, and so we worked all that out and I went out and I took their practice and built it within a year. And, of course, I stayed with them from about 2003 or 4 until 2010, and over that six-year period, we built that practice. I think in the first year, we increased to about 25 practitioners, from five to 25.

Sarah: Wow.

Howard: And then from two managed care panels to roughly 12 and-

Sarah: That’s amazing.

Howard: I’m proud to say, by the way, that even though I’m no longer affiliated with them, they’re still … They’re not the largest. They were at the time. By the time I left, I had built them into the largest practice in Colorado.

Sarah: Wow.

Howard: And some other practices have come on and franchised, which is great. I don’t see competition as unhealthy. I see it as allowing for more people to get health, right?

Sarah: Absolutely. Yeah, 100%.

Howard: And so this practice, I think now has over 75 clinicians.

Sarah:

Wow.

Howard: I think when I left, it had 40. And the same owner is running it. I think one owner bought the other owner out. And it’s one of the oldest and largest practices in Colorado, serving the mental health needs of Colorado and I’m proud to say that I got to be a part of that. After that, it was time for me to be more independent. By the way, I built this practice, all the while building my own clinical practice and servicing my clients.

Sarah: Wow. That’s amazing. That’s amazing. And then, did that success that you had, both with this group practice and also with building your own practice so much, did that kind of then lead you to want to teach other therapists? Because I know you taught a course at the University of Colorado, right?

Howard: I did, yes. I did. And I feel so blessed and fortunate to have had the opportunity to spend 12 years sitting as an adjunct faculty working with students training to be practitioners. I designed and developed the first ever, at the time … now there are other courses around the country … a course on the intermix of business in psychotherapy within a graduate program.

Howard: So it was really a course on building a successful, ethically responsible, meaningful private practice for graduate students.

Sarah: There’s such a need for that. I wish there were more courses like that out there, because I feel like you’re meeting such a real need that is so often not something that people are given as a tool for when they’re actually out there trying to both help people and also support themselves and make a living.

Howard: Well, I think you’re right, and that’s what led to the birth of this course. I had been asked to come give lectures and talks to the honors society over time, and one day I’m having lunch with a professor from the program and we’re sitting at lunch and I said, “Marsha, this would be a really wonderful thing if you thought about making it into a course. I think there’s enough material if you could get somebody to teach it.” And she said, “Would you do it?”

Sarah: Right. That seems like a natural question, yeah.

Howard: And of course, what do you think I said?

Sarah: You said yes. Oh my God, it’s such a perfect fit for you.

Howard: That’s right. That’s right, yeah. And so there at this restaurant, we sat and, on a napkin, we brainstormed some of the elements that …

Howard: [crosstalk 00:16:54] became the … I have the napkin still at home and it-

Sarah: You could frame it.

Howard: Yeah, right? And it really became this wonderful curriculum in which I invited outside folks to come in. We had a lawyer come in every semester …

Howard: … to talk about legal entity, and we had …

Sarah: So important.

Howard: … an accountant come in and a financial expert come in.

Howard: Yeah, so we would have these guest speakers, and then, of course, I would lecture. And of course, that’s how I met Chris Stout and Lynn Grodzki, two pioneers in the field of business and psychotherapy who I have such respect for. Of course, Chris wrote the foreword in my book and Lynn gave me such a wonderful, nice, beautiful testimonial about the book. And so I’m grateful to be a part of those early experiences just at the turn of the century of really ushering in a period of business experts within the field of mental health, and now it’s exploded. I mean, here it is, 2020, and it’s just exploded. Of course, it’ll be 2021 when this podcast airs, but-

Sarah: Right. Thank God. 2020 can go any time. I’m ready.

Howard: Oh, I’m with you on that. So again, this was a happy accident, I think, because my intellectual interest in business and my natural tendency to want to merge these business principles in an ethically responsible way … This is what our podcast really is going to be all about.

Sarah: 100%.

Howard: It’s about teaching people who feel insecure, uncomfortable, or worried about their practice and not sure how to balance and … This is what I’ve been doing for a great deal of time as what I might call an accidental project and it’s turned into something really wonderful and I’m so, so grateful to have fallen into this. And I’m really grateful it’s what led to this, right?

Sarah: Yeah.

Howard: Grateful to be here.

Sarah: Yeah, absolutely. And at what point did your book come along? Did you kind of take what you had been using in your courses and use that as a basis when you were writing the book, or did the book come after that?

Howard: It came toward the tail end of the curriculum that I taught for 12 years. So this is interesting. I condensed the curriculum into a day-long professional training and went out on the road around the country and gave day-long trainings on …

Sarah: Wow.

Howard: … how to start and/or revamp your practice using the tools of what I was teaching in the course. So I really kind of took the 16-week course and I condensed it into a professional training for professionals who may have been working at an agency and they were thinking about being in private practice, or other professionals that were just getting started, maybe getting started late or they had just graduated from grad school and didn’t have the opportunity to take a course like mine because there weren’t many at the time.

Sarah: Oh, absolutely.

Howard: And so from that, the organization that I did this through has a publishing division, and they said, “We’d really like you to put this in the format of a book that we see happening as a toolkit.” And so that’s really what the book became. It became the one-day training course housed as the … and a blend into the curriculum that I taught at University of Colorado … into this toolkit or book that I have called Private Practice Essentials, which I’m very proud of.

Sarah: Oh yeah. It’s an amazing resource and so needed, and since you can’t make sure that these classes are offered to every practitioner, it’s great that you have a way of sharing it with people all over.

Howard: Yeah. Yeah. So that’s kind of how those things sort of happened. Like I said, I’m super grateful that we’re now doing a fun podcast. You and I met when? When did we meet? Like eight, nine, ten months ago? Right when the pandemic hit.

Sarah: Yeah. Oh my gosh, that’s right. Our first conversation, we were talking about going into lockdown. I don’t remember if it happened at the same time for both of us, but yeah, that was right back before the world went crazy.

Howard: Yeah. I was looking at something really terrifying for me about revamping my website and making some important changes, which we’ll hope to get into in another podcast where we’ll talk about websites and even the experience of what I was going through and how incredible you were in terms of helping me over the anxiety I had about making some important changes in that platform.

Sarah: Yeah. I-

Howard: And that really leads to how wonderful and grateful I am about having met you, because-

Sarah: Aw, well, thank you.

Howard: Yeah. Because from within all that, you and I have just developed this wonderful professional relationship where we’ve bounced these great ideas off of each other and here we are sitting here today making our first podcast episode.

Sarah: Yeah. It’s really exciting, and I think that we both bring a very different perspective, but both are really, really useful. And you put those two perspectives together and I think there’s a lot that we can talk about that people will find super helpful.

Howard: Absolutely. And speaking of bringing different perspectives, I’d love for our listeners to hear about the perspective you bring, because you’ve done some really amazing things as a web designer and I’m curious about how you got into doing this.

Sarah: How I got into doing web design?

Howard: Yeah, of course. Yeah.

Sarah: I mean, web design is actually a second career for me. And-

Howard: Really?

Sarah: Yes. My first career was as a sign language interpreter, which I did for many years. Being a sign language interpreter was something that was a really good fit for me for one season of my life, because when I had very young kids and I was wanting to really, in a lot of ways, focus on being available for my kids and having a super flexible schedule and those kinds of things, it was a really natural, really fun thing for me since sign language was a skill that I had. I was able to use that as a way to do meaningful work, help support my family, and then also be available for my kids when I needed to be.

Sarah: So that was kind of what I did for many years, and I enjoyed it, but it wasn’t a career that I felt super called to, I guess you can say, because there’s not a lot of room for personal expression. When you’re a sign language interpreter, your job is to take things that other people are saying and communicate them effectively from one party to the other. And if you’re really, really good at your job, people kind of forget that you’re there and you’re just enabling their communication to take place the same way that it would if both people were speaking the same language and there were no communication barrier.

Sarah: But I’m a super creative person, and I do writing and I do a lot of kind of artistic type stuff, and after a while, being in that role felt very confining to me and it wasn’t super satisfying. The way that I first got involved in web design is by helping people who were friends of mine who were starting either a business or who were needing a website to promote something that they were doing, and I’ve always been kind of good at the tech side of things and people would ask me for help and I would help them.

Sarah: I really discovered that when I was helping other people figure out how to build their websites that I really loved it and that it was a crazy combination of different things that really I’m passionate about. Because you had the design aspect, you had the artistic aspect, the creative aspect, and then also you had … A lot of times, writing is a huge component of creating a successful website, and writing is something that I really love and that is very important to me. It kind of brought all of those different aspects together, and so for a long time, I was doing and learning web design while still working as an interpreter.

Howard: Wow.

Sarah: So it was kind of … I was taking courses and learning and getting better and experimenting with things while still having my day job of being a sign language interpreter. Then eventually it just got to the point where it made sense to transition to doing web design full time, and it’s so amazing how much happier I am and how wonderful it is because I love my job. Thank God my business is successful and I have clients that I love working with and I do stuff and create things that I’m really proud of.

Howard: A couple things come to mind as I’m listening to your narrative. It’s beautiful to hear your story, and even after we’ve known each other for so long, there are a few things I just didn’t know and it’s sort of exciting. What comes to mind is you really created a blend … a very good balanced blend, it seems … of your skills … those skills being to the technical skills, which I’m sure are improving … sort of coupled with your passion and then joined in with your creativity, which drives that passion, right?

Sarah: Yeah.

Howard: And so this is probably why you’re happier, because you really were able to blend those three. I often talk about these kinds of elements in delivering services as a therapist, and I’m just excited to hear that you have discovered those elements and really exercised those in this.

Howard: Then the second thought I had was just how you sort of transitioned from doing something that was good enough, it afforded you time with your kids when they were young and whatnot, and I’m sure there was some meaning, otherwise you wouldn’t have done it. But it was your bread and butter, and I always talk about bread and butter as being something that sustains you until the next thing that you really want to do, even if you don’t have that defined entirely yet.

Sarah: Yes, 100%.

Howard: That’s what it sounds like your process was.

Sarah: Yeah, absolutely. And I think that it’s really good to allow ourselves to have different seasons of life and to say, “This is what worked for me for a specific period of time and there was benefit to it and there were positive things about it, but that doesn’t mean that that has to be what I do or what I care about for my entire life.” We can make transitions in life to do things that we find more fulfilling and that we find more meaningful and more exciting or that allow us to use more of our talents. Yeah.

Howard: So why Strong Roots? I’m curious about that title. It’s such a beautiful title.

Sarah: Thank you.

Howard: I’m curious how you came up with it.

Sarah: Well, I mean, it’s kind of a combination of things. One is just that, personally, I find a lot of beauty and comfort in nature and I kind of very naturally gravitate towards nature imagery and things that are connected to nature. And then also, my understanding and belief that having a good website can really be a foundational part of growing your private practice. And that by having a really good website, you’re kind of establishing the roots that you need to then grow in lots of different ways and that it kind of provides this basis for my clients to then do lots of different things and to expand in ways that are meaningful to them and connect with more patients, more people who they can help. And so to me, that image of having those really strong roots that are based on this website that belongs to you, that expresses who you are, that helps you connect with people, and then allows you to grow in all of these ways that you find meaningful … to me, that really resonated for me.

Howard: I love it. It’s really kind of also an analogy … Or the imagery of strong roots, the website itself is the root underneath what drives clients to private practices all over. And so that’s something for listeners to think about, that your website … and we’ll talk more about websites in depth in a future cast. But I do think this concept of … Because I think about my website … and by the way, it is an amazing website. I’m so grateful to you for having collaborated with me on this site.

Sarah: It was a great project.

Howard: Oh, it was so fun. But I think about my website … It’s so funny how my image and my thoughts now think about what my website is and what websites are to practitioners. It really is what drives clients to you, and maybe sometimes not even directly, but people want to go to websites to really get information about you and they learn … I can’t tell you how many people over the last eight months since we … Well, I’m sorry, we launched three months ago. But since the launch, people have been saying, “I love your website. I read all about you.” I say, “How did you hear about me?” They hear from some outside source, many of them. They go to the website because they’re interested in learning more.

Sarah: Yeah, absolutely. They hear about-

Howard: You think that’s true?

Sarah: Oh, I think it’s true for so many people, and I think sometimes people don’t realize the degree to which that is a vital step in the process of connecting with a person who might be a potential client of yours, that people hear about you and then the first thing they do is they want to learn about you and they Google you. And so having a website that is a really good expression of who you are as a practitioner is really vital to then getting to the next step, which is having them contact you.

Howard: Right, right. Exactly. And we’re going to talk a lot more about that [crosstalk 00:31:58]

Sarah: We’ll talk more about it another time, yeah.

Howard: Yeah, so let me ask you … I also am curious … You could have been a web designer and really opened yourself up to other industries and other companies, and I’m curious about why … It seems like most of your clients are mental health, but you do other healthcare agencies or companies, but why healthcare? Why mental health especially?

Sarah: Well, I think that as I was starting out in having this business, what I really was looking for was a feeling of meaning and satisfaction in the work that I did. I wanted to work with people who I could do projects for that I would then feel really proud of and feel really good about. I get a sense of real meaning and satisfaction from helping mental health professionals create a website that helps people feel comfortable reaching out for help. I think that there are so many barriers to people getting the support that they need, and I think websites can be such a huge part in breaking those barriers down that I just really get a lot of satisfaction from that work specifically.

Sarah: And then it also means that not only am I really proud of the work that I’m producing, but that I also am working with clients who I really like. Working with therapists has been such a positive experience for me, and they’re people who are focusing on helping others who have really a desire to do good in the world, and being a part of supporting that effort is just a really positive and satisfying thing for me. So that kind of led me to that main focus.

Howard: Wow. I love that. I’m sitting here thinking about the fact that I think you’re the only individually-run web design organization that … And I know you have other people assisting you and helping you, but that hasn’t gotten so big that there’s 35 people working for you. I know many of those companies and they’re great, and it’s wonderful, but the more people you add, the harder it is to keep it so deeply personal in terms of the connection. I wonder if that might end up being something down the road that may be a difficult decision to make. Do I want to keep it as individualistic as I have it now?

Sarah: Oh, I do.

Howard: Or do I want to grow it? Do you want to keep it individualistic?

Sarah: I believe that small is the new big. I’m all about being small.

Howard: Oh, I like that. I love that phrase.

Sarah: Yeah. I mean, I would much rather work with a smaller number of clients and have the opportunity to get to know them and have them have a relationship with me. I mean, so many of my clients are now friends and I think that that is really special. I think it also creates a better outcome for everybody. I think that I have better communication with my clients because they feel comfortable shooting me an email and saying, “Hey, what about this? I’m not sure.” It’s a very different experience when you’re working with one individual who is helping you to achieve your goals, who takes the time to get to know you, who learns about specifically who you are and what you’re trying to accomplish and then tries to figure out how best to support that through the website.

Howard: I love it.

Sarah: Yeah. I mean, I definitely intend to stay in a situation where I can continue to have those kinds of one-on-one relationships with my clients. That’s how I envision things.

Howard: Small is the new big. I want that in the show notes.

Sarah: I’m pretty sure I’m quoting somebody. I’m not sure who, but I’m pretty sure that someone else said that.

Howard: And here’s the thing. What’s so great about you putting yourself in the market of web design for therapists as a single member LLC business is that you’re creating a market where therapists like our listeners have choice, right?

Sarah: Absolutely.

Howard: There’s absolutely nothing wrong with going with a large firm, even that specializes in working with professional counselors or psychologists. But you’re another option, and for some people, it’s going to be better for some to go with you than it is to be, say, with a larger company that designs websites.

Sarah: Right. And it’s much like what you were talking about before with your own practice and not seeing other practitioners as competition and seeing it as a good thing because it gives people more opportunities to get help. I feel the same way. I think that there are lots of different people and lots of different situations who need different kinds of support to help them succeed.

Howard: I am so excited that we’re doing this, and I love the fact that we got our listeners to get to know us a little bit. I mean, they’re obviously going to get to know us even more as we continue to move through this amazing journey of just recording our conversations. I want us to maybe talk about what we’re going to talk about in these episodes, because you and I created this big long list.

Sarah: We have so many ideas.

Howard: I know.

Sarah: It’s too many.

Howard: And really too long to go over it all for today. But what are some things that you hope that we’re going to be able to talk about in this podcast?

Sarah: Well, I think we’re going to talk about things like picking a niche, deciding what your focus is, growing your practice, getting clients, fee setting, making videos to promote your practice either that go on your website or that go somewhere else. I mean, there’s a ton of stuff. What are some of the ones that you’re looking forward to?

Howard: I mean, I’m looking forward to all of that. I know that listeners are going to want to … A lot of listeners are very uncomfortable with the financial side of things, and so I love talking about that because I think financial resources are really important in term of sustainability. You want to grow your practice. You want to take care of your family. These are some important aspects, and so I want to talk not just about budgeting and banking, I also want to talk about growing your finances. I’m not a financial expert, per se, and one of the things I’ll recommend is to do that, to go see a financial expert, but the reality is is that many clinicians are a little bit afraid to dive into money matters. And so I really want to dive into money matters, and maybe that could be more than one episode.

Sarah: Oh, for sure. That’s a huge issue.

Howard: Yeah. And then also, I think that practitioners are wildly independent people, and so it’s hard for them to ask for help from others. And so I want to have an episode where we look at other people that can be really helpful to private practices like bookkeepers and accountants and lawyers, the kind of people that sustain and help the practice, and when is it time to do that. I’d love to talk about some of the key strategies that I outline in my book that make for success, like diversification and how to properly diversify. I get people that come to me and they say, “How are you able to write a book and be a consultant and be a public speaker and go train people on wellness topics, all while doing your private practice?” I’m one of these people that wear many hats, and I say, “Let’s talk about how to get you from a successful clientele to doing other things if you want to do that,” right?

Sarah: Yeah.

Howard:That’d be another thing that we could talk about. I want to talk about one of the topics that I’ve become really interested in in my research and in delivering to medical and healthcare communities, which includes therapists, is that I have, over the last five, six years, been very, very in-depth researching compassion fatigue [crosstalk 00:40:27] burnout prevention. So I’ve-

Sarah: Right. That’s so important.

Howard: Yeah. I’ve created a compassion management scale and survey for practitioners, and I’ve also outlined a compassion coaching program …

Sarah: Wow.

Howard: … that allows healthcare professionals, including therapists, basically monitor their sense of burnout that they’re having, because that’s such an important part of building a successful business.

Sarah: Right, absolutely. Absolutely.

Howard: We want to maybe do that. I’m really excited about the possibility of having some special guests.

Sarah: Absolutely.

Howard: You and I are both very well connected in our respective fields, and we don’t even know how it’s going to unfold or who it’s going to be yet, but I’m sure we’ll have some interesting people.

Sarah: Yes. Yeah.

Howard: I do think it would be important to also discuss telehealth and the impact of the pandemic. As this drags on, it’s really been uniquely different for every business [crosstalk 00:41:30], so I think we should talk about that, too.

Sarah: Yeah, absolutely. That all sounds really super exciting.

Howard: Well, Sarah, this has been such a wonderful opening episode. I feel like not only are you, the listener, getting an opportunity to get to know us, Sarah and I have gotten to know each other even more in this 45 minutes. I mean, it’s just been really wonderful and I’m excited to share that with you, Sarah, and with our listeners.

Sarah: Yeah, I can’t wait. This is going to be amazing.

Howard: Our podcast is new and now you know who. Let’s get ready for episode two where we’ll talk about marketing your practice.

Sarah: This podcast is made possible by Strong Roots Web Design and HB Enterprises. For more information, please take a look at our show notes.