MAILBAG: Saying no to clients who aren't a good fit & promoting yourself in a competitive market

[00:00:04] Bronwyn: Hey, mental workers. You're listening to the Mental Work podcast, the podcast about working in mental health for early career mental health workers. As always, I'm your host, bro Milkins, and today we're doing another mailbag episode. This is where we go through questions that have been sent in by listeners, and here to join me to do that is our wonderful collaborator, Marie Vakakis. Hey, Marie.

[00:00:25] Marie: Oh, I'm a collaborator now, not just a guest. I love this.

[00:00:28] Bronwyn: Yeah, you've, you've, well, I felt inappropriate to say yes because it's like we're having a conversation about these mailbag issues. So it is a, it is a true, true collaboration.

[00:00:38] Marie: Yeah, I like, I think it'll be another fun episode. So part two of a mailbag series.

[00:00:43] Bronwyn: Yes. I'm very excited. And I think to start us off with the questions, I think you've got one. Isn't that right, Marie?

[00:00:50] Marie: Yeah, so this one comes from an inside social work listener, and I'm guessing it's in a private practice context because you don't have much opportunity to do this otherwise, but it says how to say no to clients you don't think are a good fit for you in your practice.

[00:01:05] Bronwyn: Okay, so what immediately shows up for you when you read out that question?

[00:01:12] Marie: I don't have an issue with it, to be honest. I'm just like, you just say it's not a good fit. Um, but I, I think some people do- must be, find that really difficult to reject someone. Or maybe there's a money mindset, like a scarcity of if I say no to this person, will that, what will that do to my reputation? Will I be unavailable, will people think that I can't handle it?

So a few different things. I talk to my team a lot about finding your kind of your flow and thinking about the clients on your list. And you can do an exercise where you print out your entire caseload, get a few different colored highlighters, and just highlight green, all the ones you love seeing, highlight in red, the ones that you find maybe difficult or activating, and then sort of, yellow could be the ones in the middle... and then looking at the ones that are green and say, what do they have in common. That might help you define your niche. And I know we've talked about niche before, so it could be that, I mean, I don't work with eating disorders. I can screen for it, but if there's, and if there's a comorbidity, I might work with that. But it's, it's not that I judge it, I actually don't have the skills. So if we get a referral that has that as the main sort of presenting issue, I refer that on. For example, when I have, I'm, I'm, I don't feel bad about doing that because I know I won't do good work for that.

[00:02:37] Bronwyn: Yep.

[00:02:38] Marie: I almost feel bad if I said yes and couldn't deliver on a suitable therapeutic kind of process.

[00:02:46] Bronwyn: Yeah, I'm of the same mindset. I find it quite easy to say to a client, I don't think I'm the right fit to assist you at this time. Here's some alternatives that I can, I can suggest, and I think that they might have better expertise than myself. I feel quite confident saying that when it's very clear that, I'm not the best person for this client.

I was trying to think of some other examples in my mind where I'm trying to be empathetic to the person who wrote in, and I'm thinking of a situation where it was a scarcity mindset thing and I was like, oh, I don't wanna tell, um, this person that I can't see them because I'm building up my practice and I need that referral. Um, but in my heart I knew that it wasn't a good fit. Um, and I think the way that I overcame that was I did some personal reflection. I also did supervision and they said to me, Bronwyn, think of the future. Um, and I was like, no, I don't think this would be a good fit. And they were like, they could stay with you. How would you feel if they stayed with you for one year, two years? And I'm like, oh, no, I don't think that would be great. Um, so thinking of the future and how I already felt, um, in my gut at the outset really helped with that, um, situation.

And then I'm thinking of another situation where I found it difficult to tell a person that maybe I wasn't a good fit, and in that scenario it was actually, uh, fear of them getting angry at me. And I got supervision around that, came up with a clear and assertive statement, also gentle and empathetic to their situation and did that as well.

Um, so I think maybe what I'd say to this listener is work out what emotions that's evoking in you when you think of the difficulty with saying no to a client, 'cause I think different evocations... come up with different ways of approaching this.

[00:04:36] Marie: No, I think understanding the emotions is a good one, 'cause is it a skill gap? And it might be one that if it's a slight stretch, you might be comfortable doing. So let's say you work with adolescents and you get a referral for 11 or a 10 or 11-year-old, you might think I'm actually, I'm okay to stretch a little bit and, and learn a bit of play-based therapy, so that might be okay.

So is it, or is it that you just have too many of the same presentation on your caseload, and that feels mentally quite taxing? And so it could be seasonal, like dependent on, on what's sort of happening, uh, seasonally, a skill deficit. Or there's a presentation of a, a personality portray to a vibe you get through the email or through their voice, um, voicemail message or however they've contacted you, that gives you other feelings, and understanding that aversion what that's about. It can be a really helpful learning edge.

[00:05:32] Bronwyn: Yeah, I agree. Because usually like the approach will be the same. It's like, it's helpful for us to understand the emotions, but what we actually say to the client will be pretty similar. It will be like, I understand you've come to see me and we had say an assessment session and I've had some personal reflections and on reflection, I don't think that I'm the best practitioner for you in this circumstance. Can we talk about some alternatives? How does, how does that sit with you, discuss through that, that kind of thing.

[00:06:00] Marie: Yeah, and I would even be a little more direct because if you say, I don't think, and they're like, no, no, but I really want you.

[00:06:05] Bronwyn: Oh, that's true.

[00:06:06] Marie: You could put yourself in a position where you feel pressured and then maybe get resentful. So it could be saying after the, I'm not, I'm not the best person. I can't see you. Here's what I can do instead.

[00:06:17] Bronwyn: Yeah. Yeah.

[00:06:18] Marie: -Mean, soft, softer, and, and you, um, use your own language. But I think when you try to dance around it, like, oh, I'm not sure, maybe I'm the best fit. I mean, often when people, by the time they get to us, they've had to overcome extraordinary stigma that exists in the community to maybe admit, acknowledge, or come to terms with either relational concern, poor mental health, they might be languishing or they could just be stuck, maybe go through meeting their GP. It's not bulk billing. They've had to pay a gap. They've had to then search for a therapist on the internet, on psychology today, in different chat group. Then they finally get to us and we're just saying, yeah, nah. We have to also acknowledge that that's a really difficult journey and we wanna do as much as we can to at least provide a positive help seeking experience.

[00:07:11] Bronwyn: Yeah, totally. Um, it's also not the worst thing in the world if a client does get angry at you. I mean, just to pick up my thread beforehand, I've had another client who I worked out late later on, but before their first appointment that there was actually a conflict, um, let them know that I couldn't see them. There was some anger there. Um, and I'm very happy with the decision that was made. Um, it's not the worst thing in the world to have a client that's upset with you.

[00:07:36] Marie: No. But that's a, that's part of boundaries, right? And we've, um, we might have talked about this in the past, but I know I harp on about this a lot, is you cannot have a boundary without making someone else uncomfortable or disappointed. That comes with it. And, and I, mine often is around the challenges that I face with clients is not that they're not suitable. We've done a lot of work around marketing and branding in our network so that more and more of our referrals are suitable for the. Way we work, the way I work, the way my team works. But often it's um, they'll book in 'cause they'll be desperate. I had school holidays, I'll get my daughter in at 2:00 PM on a Wednesday, it doesn't matter. And then school starts, they're like, I can only do after five. And it's like, I only have one spot available a week that's after five. So, you know, a lot of it's, oh, but I can't do it. I'm like, but we, and so we've had to disappoint people from the start of, okay, so say you've got a 14-year-old and you've booked in at two o'clock on a Wednesday, 'cause it's school holidays. What's gonna happen come end of the month when we're no longer on school holidays? Like, and, and trying to, that's part of our onboarding, 'cause people will be disappointed. Like, oh, but I'll just see Marie after hours. She does not work after hours. There are no spots available If you've got dancing on a Tuesday and gymnastics on a Wednesday and sports, late sports and the late bus on a Thursday, and I finish a little bit earlier on a Friday 'cause I usually do my podcast recording and all that stuff, um, when, when do you propose We fit this in?

So sometimes it could be a scheduling conflict as well. And I've learnt the hard way and I'm sure I'm not. I'm probably gonna relearn it, that when I stretch my hours to accommodate people, it gets more, I get more burnt out and I get more resentful. 'cause I tend not to just start later and finish later, I do a longer day and then people expect that, and then I get an inquiry and I'm like, oh yeah, I guess I could fit them in. And so I've had times and seasons throughout my private practice journey where I've stretched. And then it means I get an entire caseload of people who just wanna do after hours because I allowed them to do after hours.

And so maybe coming back to how to, how to say no to clients, you're not, not a good fit, there could be not a good fit for a number of reasons, and it's okay, and we can overt as much of that upfront as possible through, you know, putting your prices on your website, advertising your work hours, being very clear about the presentations you do see. You don't have to say, I don't see people over 40 under age. You might say, special interest in working with adolescents has a strong interest in, I know women's mental health. Like you can talk about who you do see as a way to get more of that ideal client.

[00:10:24] Bronwyn: Mm, totally. Um, the only other situation I thought of with this question was that, um, sometimes I've had referrals from other people and they've been inappropriate referrals. And then I think I've felt bad declining the referral because then I'm like, they won't send me referrals in the future or damage that relationship. Um, but I have to say that that fear hasn't been borne out, and I've done it a few times and it hasn't been bad.

[00:10:50] Marie: I think, I think I, I've had that same fear. And, when I sit with it long enough, I actually think, and I recently did a podcast episode, a YouTube video on Brene Brown's braving inventory, the Trust Inventory. And I really think that that sits under integrity. Like it might disappoint the referrer, but if they, if you get a reputation for just saying yes to everything, they might never see you as a specialist.

[00:11:14] Bronwyn: Yes.

[00:11:15] Marie: And so, actually, maybe write to them saying, thank you so much for the referral. I'm not the best person to see that presentation. I've had an intake session, or I've had this conversation, these are the recommendations I've made, and maybe here's a, a flyer of, of what I'm currently, the services I'm currently offering. You might disappoint them, but it does build trust.

And think about how you would feel if you went to, uh, a physio or osteo. And what it would be like as a, if they just said, yeah, I, I can, I can do everything, and then you get there and they're like poking you in the wrong spots and they're like, I've never worked with a, I don't know, a swimmer before. And you're like, well, why did you take on the referral?

Like, but if they said, I'm sorry, we don't work with swimmers, our, our athletes that we work with here, I don't know, we're a pelvic health physiotherapy clinic. We don't work with elite swimmers, which I am not an elite swimmer, just an example, um, I think it can feel disappointed, but then you can get, I think I would trust that more.

[00:12:14] Bronwyn: I agree. I would trust that more too. I do think it speaks to integrity and thoughtfulness. Um, and considerateness in the referral as well. Um, I would trust someone more, even, because I'd be like, oh, they're thinking about how they're going to assist this patient, whether they can. Um, and I, and I respect that.

[00:12:32] Marie: Me too. So hopefully we've answered anonymous as question.

[00:12:35] Bronwyn: Hope so.

[00:12:36] Marie: Great.

[00:12:37] Bronwyn: Okay. Do we have another one?

[00:12:38] Marie: We do. Um, this would be interesting because it's, it's very much a social work question, but how does an accredited mental health social worker effectively market themselves to GPs in a competitive market with psychologists?

[00:12:50] Bronwyn: Oh, I'm interested, yeah, in your response to this.

[00:12:54] Marie: It's really hard. I think there's a lot of misconception that goes around psychologists. Like, even though I introduced myself to my clients as Marie, I'm a mental health social worker. It's in my, on, on the website. I host a podcast inside social work. It's on my email signature, it's on my bio, it's on my intake form.

[00:13:13] Bronwyn: You could not be more clear.

[00:13:14] Marie: Could not be more clear and I still had a client today saying, my mum, I was talking to my mom about the psych that I see talking. I'm like, and I'm just, I'm not gonna correct him now. It's, it's just, but there's such a, it's just the language is synonymous with therapy. Which is interesting because psychologists aren't all trained as therapists that people, psychologists work in marketing in statistic. I mean, my undergrad was all, was nothing about mental health or therapy. It's how we learn behavior, eyesight, hearing all the body sensations and statistics, and honors is more of that. So like you could get to your fifth or sixth year before you start really getting into therapy.

[00:13:57] Bronwyn: Totally.

[00:13:58] Marie: So in terms of the marketing, I think for an AMHSW, it's the nicheing. Um, it's being very clear of who you help and how you help them. And I don't know if it's the same in, um, for psychologists, I'd be keen to hear your, your thoughts, but because we have the accredited mental health social worker pathway, some people feel like that's of a higher status. So they're like, well, I've been a social worker 20 years. I should get AMHSW. And it's like, that's actually a different skill. You could be a brilliant case manager. You could be an intake clinician, a housing worker, you could have amazing skills. When it's an AMHSW that is under the Medicare model of providing a case conceptualization and treatment for a mental illness using a focus psychological strategy. So they're, they're very, it's a very different skillset.

[00:14:49] Bronwyn: Yes. Would you recommend meeting with gps? Because that's the first thing that comes to my mind, is that that's been the most effective referral strategy for me when I met directly with GPS and had a conversation with them. So I set up a little lunch and go meet with them, and now it's still my preferred way of, of connecting with other professionals. I do feel like we get a greater trust and a sense of who they are, what they're about, how they can help when we actually speak to somebody.

[00:15:16] Marie: In five years, I've only been successful once at meeting with a GP. It has not been something that's worked for me. What's worked most is other therapists who service the clients that I can't see and cross referring. So meeting with someone who does play therapy and then joining, uh, a practice group where, like a peer supervision group where there are people who do eating disorders.

And so, once I knew other people's niches and they knew mine, then we cross refer. So I had a referral today, a couple that I saw that was from someone I met in a networking group who does, um, autism and ADHD assessments. And I was working with this young person and then referred the couple, her parent-, that client's parents to me. And so I found other professionals as the, my, like other mental health therapists, psychotherapists, uh, the mo- and I literally went through Psychology today, looked at my, who was in my area and was genuine and met them for coffee. I have a, now I have an online, like a Google Calendar link. So if I'm meeting people, like for an e-coffee or I'll send that, but like, here's a link to my calendar, let's chat.

But I was just honest. I've started prior practice in in Footscray. I work mostly with adolescents. I don't have people in my network that I can refer to for working with kids. Can I meet with you and I found that more helpful than GP practices 'cause they, they don't know what we do, whereas you've, you're a psychologist so they already have an understanding of that. And so that was too hard. And then I spent a lot of time writing those initial GP letters really, really well and being really thorough in that.

[00:16:55] Bronwyn: Hmm.

[00:16:56] Marie: And then I got, would get some referrals through. So, um, now the website, um, the website does well, podcasting. So being a guest on other people's podcasts and talking about the skillset. So if I kept promoting and I'm improving the marketing side, I'm an AMHSW, I'm an a-, people dunno what that is.

[00:17:15] Bronwyn: No, they don't.

[00:17:16] Marie: Um, but if, if I was to say, you know, when's the right time for couples therapy, here are things that resources I recommend to clients. I start to create a reputation or a vision for people of, she knows what she's talking about for couples therapy and then the qualification doesn't matter as much.

[00:17:34] Bronwyn: I find that much clearer and I would be more likely to refer to somebody who says, I help people with couples and teens, more than I'm an accredited mental health social worker because to me it's, it's too much of a broad description. I still dunno how you can help and who you can help and who I can send to you.

[00:17:51] Marie: Yeah. Which is exactly the conversation we had around niching.

[00:17:54] Bronwyn: Yes.

[00:17:55] Marie: It kind of fits into that. So it's, and we've talked about it in, I think an episode around should I start a private practice? And I'm just looking at out my list of all our episodes to see which other ones, we've talked about it, I think in money, but like we've talked about it in a few where once you go into private practice, if you're a sole practitioner or even in a um, contractor, 'cause you're still technically your own business, you then become a business owner. And if you want clients, you have to be comfortable marketing and selling.

And to some extent, even if I've seen some people, they move from a group practice into solo and they're like, well, I didn't have to do marketing and stuff, but you took your client load with you and so someone else did all the marketing, and then you pulled that and you've maintained those relationships. You need something you need, potentially some sort of website, a Psychology Today profile, you might need to get on other databases. So I'm on the Gottman, um, what's called like the Gottman Network, or there's like a registered, I dunno, something for Gottman therapist. I get a lot of my referrals from that referral network. Um, it might be through the, like the EMDR, like EMDR Association of Australia has a find an accredited practitioner. So registering for a few of those. There are different registering. Oh, I guess search, I, what would you call, like directories for neurodiversity affirming practitioners, Asian practitioners, BIPOC practitioners.

So there, there's ways to really figure out who you want to work with. And then you can't help people if they don't know you exist.

[00:19:30] Bronwyn: Exactly.

[00:19:31] Marie: Marketing and sales is essentially reputation and bums on seats to help them, we need to be, have some level of comfort to talk about this language, 'cause that's that's what it is.

[00:19:46] Bronwyn: Yeah, so maybe for this listener who sent in the question, maybe you wouldn't be recommending necessarily focusing on GP referrals, but broadening out the scope of, of who you're meeting with and who you might receive referrals through.

[00:19:58] Marie: Yep. And, and, and you can be creative use, use your strengths. If you're really good at writing, maybe write some blog posts and do some SEO work on your website. If you like talking. Maybe, um, put yourself forward for some podcast episodes. If you want to... I mean, you could work with a, I don't know if you, if you specialty was, um, sand tray therapy with um, I don't know, early childhood trauma, you might, your networking might be childcare centers.

[00:20:26] Bronwyn: Hmm.

[00:20:27] Marie: Not GPs or pediatricians. So it might be running a couple of free trainings for the local childcare center and then leaving some flyers behind. It could be working with a pelvic health physio and saying, well, if you're working with moms who are post giving birth and they're struggling with these things with their child, here's a person I can refer to.

So GPs are only a very, very small bit. I know whenever I've gone to see a mental health professional, I've known who I've wanted to see, and then I just go get the mental healthcare plan, not, not the other way around. And even when, even with my physio, um, I went and got the enhanced primary care plan, whatever it was, and I was like, they're like, who do you wanna go see? I'm like, this person. So I'd already done all that work myself.

[00:21:12] Bronwyn: Yeah. Um, no, I think that's really solid advice and yeah, just to speak that it is about getting in front of the people who are your target audience and building that reputation and trust, like with some set of populations like LGBTQA plus populations. Um, it is like largely word of mouth, like who is a safe practitioner that I can see. Same with like different, um, cult- practitioners with different cultural backgrounds.

[00:21:38] Marie: Great. Hopefully we've solved that person's marketing thing.

[00:21:42] Bronwyn: Yeah. Good luck. I hope it works. Yeah, I, yeah.

[00:21:45] Marie: It's tricky. It's, it's really, really tricky. And if you do go into, if you do go into GPs, I think it's really practicing being confident, being clear, being concise, having some digital assets that you can then forward as an email and something handout, good quality printed. Um, so again, this is where the business side comes in. You need a good logo. You need, I've seen so many flyer where I can't read them. They're messy. Their fonts are awful. Good graphics, good visuals, a clear font, contact details, you know, that clearly shows what you do, how you do it, who you serve.

[00:22:24] Bronwyn: Yeah, I, I agree. Whenever I've gone to see GPs, um, I've brought a one pager with me of who I am, what I do, my approach. I found that they've been most interested in whether I do evidence-based approaches, I guess they just must receive a lot of marketing from people who perhaps don't align with evidence-based approaches. So they were interested that I do do that.

Um, and then they were interested in good communication, ethical practice. So I had a few gps ask me about confidentiality and how I manage that, um, and whether I can help with certain populations. So they asked me a few questions about that. And yeah, I found being succinct, knowing how I approach things and what, what my approach is, really helpful.

[00:23:05] Marie: Yeah, and it's touches on all of this can really sting and it's rejection. You might have to do a hundred calls to get one. Yes, it is a numbers game and just accepting that maybe you need a business coach or a supervisor. But you might do... And I, I mean, I think of stories. Um, there's one that stands out of the, um, the, I guess founder of Keep Cup of she-, I listened to her in a podcast episode of how many, like, I think it was like tens of so and so people, like she got to like a hundred people rejecting her before she got a yes. So that's part of it.

[00:23:43] Bronwyn: Yeah, totally. Yeah.

[00:23:44] Marie: And they don't mean it. They don't mean to, they're not saying you are shit. You are terrible. Like I had someone book in for a clarity call and I'll share the, and they booked it in and they canceled it and they booked in a different time. And I was like, so I keep having to block out 'cause my, I've got two diaries that needs, they don't speak to each other. So someone books in they clarity call. I then have to manually block it out from clients. And then last minute she canceled and I was like, oh, for F's sake, like that's a client spot. It wasn't personal. I messaged her saying, Hey, I saw you canceled the appointment. Just wanna check that you, um, everything's okay. So was like, uh, I think it was very something like, oh, let me just read it out. It was very interesting. It was sort of like, just like an no, I'm fine or don't need it canceled, like, really just abrupt. And I was like, excuse me, like fine. Um, and then a few days later, uh, I think she said, please cancel. That's it. And I was like. I was like, okay. I was like, no problem. Let me know if you wanna make another time, if there's any information I can send you. But inside I was like, oh my God, what have I done wrong? Is she like, is there a typo inside? I just freaked out. And then a few days later there was like, oh, sorry. Our organization's gone through a whole bunch of stuff. Now we have different needs and requirements. Here's what we need. Can you quote this so it, it's staying engaged 'cause you just, it, it's a lot of rejection.

[00:25:04] Bronwyn: Yeah, and I guess that highlights that it's probably not personal.

[00:25:08] Marie: No, no. And even, and even if it is, then let them, not everyone has to like us, which is really hard.

[00:25:14] Bronwyn: Cool.

[00:25:15] Marie: Cool. Do you have any questions? 'cause I've got then another one, um, not from this person, but I've got a-

[00:25:21] Bronwyn: Now I'm happy to hear another one from you.

[00:25:23] Marie: So the other one, it's more of a, it came up in conversation with someone, so I'm trying to rephrase it as a bit of a question, but I guess it's how do we pay it forward and lift each other up while also being in some, in some ways, feeling like we're competition.

[00:25:38] Bronwyn: Uh, my immediate thought is that... this is a difficult mindset for me to empathize with because I don't share it. I think that you can only benefit from investing in other people. I understand that there are some scarce resources, but I think there's enough space for all of us in the mental health sector. I think there's enough demand, particularly in Australia, that we don't need to have this kind of like, and I put, I'm like pushing out my elbows here, like get away from me kind of, uh, mindset. I don't, what do you think?

[00:26:15] Marie: I agree. I- I'm very big on collaborating.

[00:26:17] Bronwyn: Yeah.

[00:26:18] Marie: And so I think if we. Help each other. And again, it's a scarcity mindset. And I think some people, maybe it's an Australian thing of tall poppy wanting to cut somebody, cut somebody down, um, but I see it where people just copy blatant copy people's website content or program or that person's doing that, I must do that. And it's a bit of that, um, and almost like, you know, the Instagram kind of this idealized thing of what something looks like and not recognizing maybe the time or effort that goes into that. So there's that.

But also I know when I see people, I, I like to hang out on LinkedIn, and they're talking about other people who are in their same profession, that helps, that actually builds trust for me. So if I see someone saying, I don't know, like I bumped into these two other speakers at this conference, and they're all people who might, but all want the same keynote speaking events or might want the same, um, organizations to pay them for training. But when they collaborate together, they elevate that content further.

[00:27:23] Bronwyn: -agree.

[00:27:24] Marie: So it's like having, um, a restaurant like in a little strip of shops and if it's just one pizza shop, they're only gonna get so much traffic. But if next to the pizza shop, a pasta shop opens up and then maybe a sushi shop opens up before you know it, instead of competing, they might actually draw... They're likely to draw more people there. 'cause then they have choice and they can boost up the economy of that little strip mall for the community. I don't know. Maybe it's not the best example, but I I...

[00:27:52] Bronwyn: No, I think it's a good one because it's, I guess like, I was thinking in psychology, sometimes there's a bit of a, a war between non... nonclinical psychologists and clinical psychologists, and sometimes each side can say mean things about the other. And I don't like it for several reasons, but one of the reasons why I don't like it is because it makes us all look bad, makes us all look like petty children. Um. And that doesn't look good for mental health. Um, and I want people to be investing in mental health.

So I think we can do a lot by, uh, elevating each other, um, not only for ourselves, but for the professions as a whole and for mental health workers. The whole sector benefits when we collaborate together. Because it still is a very underfunded sector. Um, you know, like even family violence, which is just requires huge amounts of funding and is completely underfunded in many areas and has to fight for funding over and over. When we collaborate together, we can elevate the status of, of mental health and, and services that really need attention.

[00:28:46] Marie: Yeah, and I agree about the seeming like petty children. 'cause then you think if you're already infighting amongst you and people get wind of that, you just, it's almost like when you look at politics and it's like just if you all stopped picking on each other and your campaigns, instead of saying what you can do, it's about how shit the other guy is... that makes you all look shit. And it, and it, you lose trust across the board. Like there's no integrity behind that.

So I think celebrating other people's wins, if you've got colleagues or friends, uh, in the space who are posting on LinkedIn, comment on it, share their post saying, this is a really great perspective, or, I love that Bronwyn did this. I might do it differently, but I love this... like you can have a point of difference. You can have a difference of opinion and still elevate the entire profession.

[00:29:39] Bronwyn: Yeah. Um, I think the other angle that I was thinking with this question was about finding your unique selling point, um, because you might feel like you're in direct competition with somebody. Um, maybe it's, maybe you have a sushi, sushi shop and you and your competitor is a sushi shop. Oh, that's a really hard word to say. Like for my example, I'll change it to pizza shop. Wow, that was such a tongue twister.

 If you think you're in direct competition, you're probably not. There are unique selling points. So one pizza shop might sell margarita pizza only, and then you specialize in a cheesy crust pizza. So there is a, a different audience there is different ingredients on the menu that you can capitalize on. And I think even let's say that you're a trauma practitioner and you think you're in competition with another trauma practitioner, there's gotta be a difference there. Maybe they see adults, you see adolescents.

So I'd really be capitalizing on the unique selling point. And even if you both see adolescents, there's gonna be something different about you, your training, your experience, what you bring to the presentation that you need to work out and bring out in yourself and your marketing.

[00:30:46] Marie: And, and don't be, don't be narky about it. Don't keep badmouthing them because it just makes you look bad. it breaches trust. So if you are sitting there going to a GP being like, oh, so you've referred to person X, oh, they don't do things like, don't, don't, don't even just put the big high school gossipy feelings aside and just share what you do. Because, especially now with telehealth, you could have a client on the other side of the world. There is... That's fine. You could branch out into research, into corporate training, into on demand courses, into publishing, writing, journalism, and if there is some healthy competition that elevates both of you, because it shows you what's possible. If someone else is doing something or has a business model that creates a bit of envy for you... that might be a chance to say, maybe I didn't know that I could want more? That more was possible? That how dare they put themselves out there can turn around to be how brave of them, maybe I can put myself out there. So even a little bit of friendly competition can elevate the standard for both of you.

[00:31:57] Bronwyn: Yeah, I usually like, I'm just thinking of my reactions when I see somebody, I usually think to myself, that's genius. Wow. They've done a really good job at that. Like, that's impressive. That's usually my reaction. It's not, I guess it, I guess it is. It's not really envy. I'm just really impressed that they've done it and I'm like, I wish I thought of that, um, I guess that's, yeah. I wish I had thought of that. Is my, like the, the most response I get to that. But I use it as a way to think about how could I do things for me? I can see what they've done, how could, how could I take that as inspiration maybe for something that I wanna do? Because if I'm resonating with it that says something about me and what my hopes are, what can I do with that? Yes, I guess I use that as that rather than a negative thing to be like, oh, there shit, or whatever.

[00:32:40] Marie: But our, our collaboration is an example of this where we would be potentially in direct com- competition if someone has one hour a week to listen to a podcast around mental health or kind of social work, they might have one hour to choose between us and it could be a very much like, no, no, don't go to Mental Work, come to, but at the end of the day, they'll either like your voice or not, they'll like my voice or not. You'll have guests that are different to my guests. My format might be different, and all I can do is get some inspiration. We can collaborate and then I can look at my own analytics, listen to who my ideal client is, what my USP is, that's unique selling point for people who dunno, and I can keep refining that and I might get some ideas. And I've learned from you and we've shared ideas about how you do things, how work... Mostly it's around streamlining our workflow and we found that we have more in common than, um, against each other by actually being podcasts, being like, oh, how do you do that? How do you record that? What things do you use? And that's helped me improve rather than being in direct competition.

[00:33:49] Bronwyn: Yeah. So yeah, there is opportunity to learn and absolutely coming back to, like, if there's more people, it elevates us all. That's how I think of it. I'm like, if there are more people podcasting about mental health and working in mental health, that works great and I'm very happy for that. I'm happy for more podcasts. So don't see it as direct competition. I see it as more value for people who are interested in that area and they can cycle between different podcasts. I do the same thing. I go between different podcasts and then I come back. Um, it's not a big deal.

[00:34:14] Marie: So hopefully folks you can see an example of it working well and an example of the networking working well because that's how we connected is through LinkedIn of all places and have done over a dozen episodes now together. And yeah,

[00:34:31] Bronwyn: Mm-hmm.

[00:34:32] Marie: I think that's, that's it for that question.

[00:34:34] Bronwyn: Cool.

[00:34:34] Marie: Can leave it at three.

[00:34:36] Bronwyn: Oh, I enjoyed that. That was fun. It was good to think about different things.

[00:34:39] Marie: Yeah. So if people have a question that they would like on the Inside Social Work podcast or Mental Work, reach out to your preferred podcast provider. Uh, Yeah. respective podcast. Um, some of it will collaborate on together and others might do as a solo on our respective platforms as we try and cram in all of the busy stuff that we are doing.

[00:34:59] Bronwyn: Yeah, so I reckon like with some questions, I tag them as like, oh, I reckon this would go 10, 15 minutes. And then others make it to a fully fledged episode if it can be fleshed out a bit. So do send them through. I'm really enjoying going through them.

[00:35:13] Marie: Me too, and I'll pop a link in my show notes to that. But if you find me on LinkedIn or Instagram, you can just DM me and if you say, please say share this anonymously, we'll definitely honor that we're not gonna out you. Um, but yeah, bring us your tricky questions about mental health, working in mental health, private practice, social work, psychology. .

And I'm even really keen to hear from people who are not working in this field. What interests you about our podcast? You might be a client or a service user, or a lived experience practitioner, or someone who is not qualified in this space, who finds us interesting. I'd love to know what your questions are. How do we, um, go behind the scenes and tell you what we do and why we do it, how we do it?

[00:35:57] Bronwyn: Yeah, I'd be interested in that too. And I'd find it a little bizarre. You know, once I had a person describe my voice as mellifluous. I, I think it means like melodic. And I was like, that is not how I see my voice at all. So please don't write in and say that.

[00:36:12] Marie: Please do. Maybe we'll make Bronwyn a t-shirt.

[00:36:15] Bronwyn: Yeah.

Well, thank you for listening. This has been a collaboration between Marie from the Inside Social Work Podcast, and Mental Work, which is hosted by me Bronwyn Milkins. If you wanna write in with a question, send me a DM. I'll pop the link in the show notes. Have a good run and catch you next time. Bye.