Staying relevant and innovative in a changing mental health landscape (with Dr Catherine Hart)

[00:00:05] 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. I'm your host, Bronwyn Milkins, and today we are talking about innovation as a mental health clinician.

As a modern day mental health clinician, you might be feeling the pressure of fewer referrals, rising AI tools, and hearing all this talk of moving beyond one-to-one therapy. If you've ever wondered how to stay relevant and creative in a changing mental health landscape, this episode is for you.

We're going to explore practical ways to pivot, embrace innovation, and build a sustainable career without losing your professional identity. Our guest today is Dr. Catherine Hart.

[00:00:41] Catherine: Hi, how are you?

[00:00:43] Bronwyn: Yeah, well thank you. Thanks so much for joining us on the podcast. Could you please tell listeners who you are?

[00:00:48] Catherine: For sure. I'm Dr. Catherine Hart. I'm a clinical psychologist and I'm director of Succoris Psychology. Um, Succoris started back in 2019 with just one office, basically just me. And we've now got five sites and a pretty strong telehealth arm, and Succoris Academy now too.

So, um, we've, we've spent a lot of time thinking about how we can create meaningful change in the psychology industry for individuals, teams, and the wider psychology community. And innovation is one of our core values as a, as a service as well, just FYI.

[00:01:24] Bronwyn: It's good to know because I wanted to ask you how you became interested in innovation, and the reason why I asked that specifically is because, maybe I have an underlying perception that psychologists aren't innovative, like we're kind of traditional and I wondered, like, has innovation always been a value for you and how come it's a value in your business?

[00:01:44] Catherine: I think a lot of it's come from necessity, to be honest. Um, I think we saw pretty early on that those sort of traditional one-to-one models of therapy, whilst obviously really powerful, they're not necessarily all that accessible or sustainable, and that- those are again, things that we feel really strongly about in our company. And at the same time, a lot of people, clinicians coming through for supervision, for example, are saying that they really want to do more than just one-to-one therapy, they want to do, have more flexibility, more variety in their diaries in order to feel fulfilled.

So I think we've, we've kind of always been thinking about ways that we can be accessible and innovative as we've gone through. Um, but I also think that sometimes people think that innovation is a big flashy kind of business thing, or that you've got to innovate in really big ways, um, but I found it's been far more subtle than that for us. I think most of us aren't creating new apps or designing software to capture our clients' questionnaires or do all of those kinds of things. We're innovating in ways to try and just find small changes that improve client care or just diversify our practices a little bit. So I don't think it has to be a big, grand gesture, I think we can just be doing it in our own small ways.

[00:03:03] Bronwyn: I like how you say that because it immediately makes it more accessible. Because you're right, when I think of innovation, I was like, app retreat, clothing line, like, like things like that. But the way you're saying it is like clinicians can be innovative by making smaller changes that make big impact.

[00:03:20] Catherine: Definitely, yeah.

[00:03:21] Bronwyn: And you mentioned before that, okay, you've grown your business substantially and then you're introducing an academy... could you just describe that for us?

[00:03:30] Catherine: Sure. Yeah, and again, it, it came from this sort of innovative place because we had people within our company that needed training and clinical registrars that needed training. And what you find as you grow is that you're just repeating the same information over and over and over, and you're trying to train people, even if it's on an operations manual or it's inducting somebody, you're spending that much time taking somebody on inducting them, showing them through all the, all the different parts, maybe missing staff doing it differently from somebody else that, that innovation comes from really saying, okay, well let's just have that all in a centralized place so that there's a module on inducting staff and staff go through the module and then it's really clear. Okay, I can see that they've done X, Y, and Z, so I know they've been trained on it, and I can follow up with them, and that's an hour of my time rather than a day of my time.

And so it-, the innovation really came from that necessity of, uh, you, you can't be everybody for everyone all the time and doing all of those things. So, uh, just, just frees up your time really.

[00:04:32] Bronwyn: You mentioned that it was a necessity for innovation for your organization, and even in the example you just described, do you think more broadly innovation in mental health services is needed?

[00:04:43] Catherine: Absolutely, I do, yeah, absolutely. I think that, um, innovation is, um, a about making sure that we are meeting demands of our, our of our clients. And of course we know that there's a huge amount of demand at the moment for our services. And I don't think, you know, from talking to a number of clinicians, they, they tend to be saying the same thing. I can't imagine myself doing one-to-one therapy for six hours a day, five days a week until I'm 50, 60 years of age. I just, I mean, it just fills me with dread. I don't wanna do that. And so, if we're sticking to that old model of the way we do therapy, it's just not gonna work for anybody, I don't think, clients or clinicians.

So when we can innovate, we can often mean, it means that we can, um, meet the needs of our clients better. We can help us, it can help us reach more people. It means that we can be flexible. We can adapt to the changes that are happening in, uh, technology, in our environments, in mental health trends that's happening, um, as well as making sure that clinicians' wellbeing is looked after.

[00:05:46] Bronwyn: 100%. I recently came across some data, so it was a longitudinal study of adults, I think over like 10 or 20 years, there's about 20,000 adults, this is an Australian study, and they looked at predictors of job satisfaction. The top one was variety of tasks; that positively predicts job satisfaction. So when you're saying they're like a lot of clinicians, can't imagine five days a week, six clients for 40 years, I'm like, yeah, that makes a lot of sense to me.

[00:06:15] Catherine: Yeah, and and that's what we are hearing from people all the time, yeah. That, that having, having a, a variety of tasks, having all projects that they can work on, that they've thought about themselves, Hey, let's do this thing, let's try this thing. I think it's really energizing for people and, and it comes back to what you said at the start, I'm not sure that people see innovation and healthcare as going together necessarily. I think it's much easier for people to get on board with the idea of innovation when it's about, you know, um, I work in a different industry, perhaps it's a product based industry where I'm constantly improving a formula of a product or my marketing, or when I'm working in more of a business or an entrepreneurial kind of way, it's maybe more front and center of people's minds.

But I think, maybe in healthcare there's a bit of either skepticism towards it or a bit of suspicion of like, hmm, we've got evidence based practices that will be research based, I'll sort of follow that and if that changes, I'll, I'll move along with it. But other than that, I don't really find that interesting or I don't have that business mind or entrepreneurial spirit to make changes. And so I'm not sure if it is just anecdotal, but I'm, I think there's maybe a bit of resistance to healthcare and innovation. It's like a bit, a bit of a sticking point I think.

[00:07:34] Bronwyn: Yeah, I mean, just speaking about those personal factors, like, there might be some people who are like, oh, I don't have an entrepreneurial spirit. Could you just tell us a bit like was this something for you maybe and that you had to overcome, or have you always been like, nah, I'm gonna grow my business and then do this and that?

[00:07:49] Catherine: I think I've always been like this. I think I've always worked in places where I've seen what could be done better, um, whether it's systems or, yeah, processes. I, I just, that's just the way my brain works of like, oh, wouldn't that be better that way? Or wouldn't that be interesting if we tried this thing? And I, I, I also enjoy, like a lot of people do, just having lots of different projects and ideas and thinking through, oh, you know, that, that would be really interesting to try or, that would really help solve this problem over here. So, um, I dunno, I dunno that I would say I was necessarily innovative and I have a bit of resistance to the entrepreneurial word, but um, I certainly like solving problems.

[00:08:32] Bronwyn: That's a nice way of thinking about it, and maybe that's a helpful reframe for people who also don't like that entrepreneurial word. I think another aspect of innovation, particularly for clinicians, mental health workers, is that they see it as a bit risky. Like you said, it's like we've got the evidence based, here it is, here's what you do, maybe if I change one of these things, I like the police gonna come after me and be like, that's not an evidence based, that's unethical. So I guess my question is like, how can clinicians take innovative steps of that feeling like they're gambling their career?

[00:09:03] Catherine: I think that's a really important question to ask, Bron. I think it's really important because I, I think it, it's totally understandable. It's a, it's a really valid, realistic concern that does seem to be a major barrier to people implementing any kind of changes or innovation. There's a concern that, am I working within my scope of practice? Am I gonna get into trouble with AHPRA or my governing body? Or, um, a concern that if this fails as a project, how is that going to be perceived or the financial risk of trying something and it, and it, I mean, I say failing in inverted commas, but something failing, you know, or putting something out there and getting a lot of pushback from your peers. I mean, I can speak to that all day long.

Um, but, there's, there's two things that I take from, I think, so Nadine van der Linden, if you know her, her work and her podcast. Um, she talks about marketing and she she said recently, you know that in so many other industries, we have so much choice in the products we buy. She gives the example of jam on the shelves, right? In the supermarket, we have so much choice. It's the same product by and large. It's strawberries and water and sugar, and it's put in a jar, and the consumer has all of this choice about which jam do you buy, but for some reason we don't have that same mindset in mental health, it seems.

It's like, okay, well we are all gonna do it the same way, but if somebody steps out of that mold, they're slapped down or they're seen as a maverick, or there's pushback, um, but I don't really see it that way. I just see we're just delivering more choice to consumers and we're just making sure we stay relevant for our consumers. We are giving them choice over what services to use, um, and so creating something new and different might feel a bit weird because you do tend to get pushback from people, but I think that's usually the evidence that you're doing the right thing and you're on the right track.

Um, but of course, whenever you are going to put, put, put something out there, especially I think if it's like an online training or online, I mean, I, I wouldn't even do online therapy, I don't think that's appropriate, but online training, let's say there's some really clear ways that you can do that to ensure that you are staying in your, in your lane and you're not gonna get yourself into trouble about that. If it's okay, I would, I would pitch, um, Dr. Haley Kelly.

[00:11:31] Bronwyn: Oh yeah, we love, Haley.

[00:11:32] Catherine: ...and her Therapist Rising courses. She's got some really great courses and resources that help you navigate how to put online content out there and stay within your AHPRA or your governing body or whatever, stay within your, your lane really and not get into trouble. So her stuff's fantastic.

[00:11:51] Bronwyn: Yeah, I really love Haley's stuff because like, you know, even recently I saw like, you know, if you get business coaching from somebody who doesn't understand health professionals, they'll be like, oh, you just advertise this way and you can just like market to them this way, and they don't understand their ethical obligations. So it's really important to have somebody who does understand that and then encourages you to be innovative within that framework.

[00:12:11] Catherine: Yeah, and she really gets it. Obviously she was a clinical psych and she really understands the nuances of, of putting content out there. So yeah, I think if, if people are considering doing something like that, just get... have collaboration, have, have conversations, work with colleagues, supervisors, get consultants who understand the healthcare, and, and, and research ideas, try them out. Take small steps if you need to, just pilot it with a few clients or test it out, uh, you know, a new workflow, whatever with a few people before you launch fully into a, into a new thing. Just go slowly and try try it slowly. I can't remember who said it now. It was one of the business books that I read. He talks about like firing bullets before you fire your canon, like fire a couple of bullets until you get your aim right. And then when you know, okay, this is the thing that's gonna go well, fire your canon. Go at it, or, or, or full ball.

[00:13:03] Bronwyn: It sounds like that's a good approach for people who feel like, well, what if I fail? It's like you do slow and steady, you test it out and refine.

[00:13:11] Catherine: Yeah. I, I, and, um, makes me think about Jeff Bezos, who talks about, um, kind of type one and type two decisions. And he says, type one decisions are major decisions. They're usually, uh, something you can't come back from. There's usually a high risk, high cost involvement in those decisions, and absolutely you need to tread cautiously. Think about it, pros and cons, be slow, be deliberate. Really think about what's the benefit and the risks of doing this thing.

Type two decisions though are pretty easily rectified, even if they go badly. So it might be a new marketing campaign or something. I've thrown some money at it, it's not gone well, but I can rectify that and I can step back through that door. Uh, those decisions go quickly, make the changes, go with gut, go with instinct. Don't be tied up in bureaucracy with trying to make that decision, go for it. And so I wouldn't say always jump ahead and do the thing. I would say tread cautiously when you need to, but when it's the type two decision, go for,

[00:14:16] Bronwyn: That's great advice. Yeah. Nothing to add!

[00:14:19] Catherine: Well, we, we, we struggle in our, I guess in, in my business partnership. My husband is my business partner and he is very. Uh, money orientated numbers, risk averse, data driven, and he's kind of thinks every decision is a type one decision. I, I'm the opposite, I'm the type. I'm just like, let's go, let's try it. Let's give it a go. And so we do balance each other out, but sometimes we frustrate each other because he thinks I'm too spontaneous.

[00:14:43] Bronwyn: And he's like, this is a life or decision!

[00:14:44] Catherine: He's, too risk averse, especially when it comes to spending money. So we, you have to, you have to have a good instinct as to when is this okay to take a leap and when do we need to be more cautious?

[00:14:57] Bronwyn: Yeah, absolutely. No, and it's good to have somebody who can assist in that, um, and I guess that's the value of seeking advice and training from other people.

[00:15:05] Catherine: Yeah, totally. So talking about, um, fear, fear of failure, and I honestly think that the fear of failure is there all the time. I think it's probably there for everybody. I don't know that your fear of failure is necessarily going to go away. Um, I think, what do people say? Do the thing scared. I think that's, just kind of, you have to get used to that default setting that you'll be scared.

But thinking about why am I making this decision? Why am I doing this thing? Why am I innovating, needs to be grounded in your values, whether that's your personal values or your organization's values, your business values, why are we bothering to do this? And like I said before, innovation is one of our values, as is accessibility.

So I feel like we have been innovating right from the very start. Even when we talked about employing people rather than contracting them, it was quite innovative at the time, back in, back in the day, there weren't a lot of businesses doing that. But again, that felt to us like it was the way that we wanted to move our business forward in quite an innovative way.

Steven Bartlett, his book Diary of A CEO, he talks in there about, uh, one of his laws is out failing the competition, and he draws from somebody called Thomas J. Watson, who was actually the, um, president of IBM for 38 years. If you can believe that somebody was president.

[00:16:27] Bronwyn: That's a long time.

[00:16:28] Catherine: It's a long time to be president. And actually it was a really successful time for IBM. He, he was really innovative. He was really successful over that time. And his core philosophy pretty much was if you want to increase your success rate, you've got to double your failure rate. And he also said that every time they moved ahead in IBM, it was because somebody in the organization was willing to take a chance.

So I think that failure is hard for everybody, and I personally have a pretty strong failure schema. I know that that comes up quite a lot. I work really hard to view failures as opportunities as we're told we should do, um, which I know is kind of like a bit trite sometimes of like, oh, view it as a view, it as an opportunity. But if you can, if you can accept, okay, I am going to fail, it's inevitable, then you can reframe that into, okay, what am I going to get out of this experience, this opportunity to make sure that this is not a actual failure, it is an experiment, is how I, this is how I reframe it for myself. This is an experiment. And with experiments, we need to know that- we need to be able to disprove it as well as prove it, right? So either way, either outcome is helpful for my experiment. So this is an experiment, and then, it's gonna be so much easier if you get feedback that disproves your, I don't know now, you're the researcher... hypothesis, null hypothesis. I'm like, I don't know! You know, here's my null hypothesis being, being accepted, then you're gonna be less, you're gonna be like, oh, that's, that's interesting because that's given me more data that's given me something else to think about going forward, um, rather than like, oh my God, that's another $2,000 down the drain that I've just spent on this project that's not gonna go anywhere.

Um, so I think that's a nice way for people to think about fear or failure is like, it, it's telling, it's motivating you and it's hopefully a way for you to see that it's important and the outcome is, um, giving you data no matter what.

[00:18:26] Bronwyn: Absolutely. I really love your reframe of that, and I think it speaks to like failure is needed and is necessary, but we just don't often hear about it as well. Like I always think, you know, nobody's like, I applied for five grants and I missed out on four of them... nobody's posting about that, you only hear about the grant that they got.

[00:18:44] Catherine: That is also really, really important, isn't it? We don't hear about, and like I say, I read a lot of business books and I listen to a lot of business podcasts and things, and it's really refreshing for me hearing those, because quite often they will be talking about all of the failures that they've gone through on their journey to get to this point.

But I think in, day-to-day language, we just hear about this product that's been developed or this other, this new service that's just popped up and taken over, you know, this huge market share. We don't actually see the trajectory that it's taken the founders 20 years to get here for bankruptcies along the way, or these changed ideas that we don't hear about that stuff, do we?

And so it's pretty hard for us to hold in mind that when we see success, whatever that looks like to us, there will have been so many failures along the way. And actually in the research it de- it shows that those companies that are really successful, it's because they have a very, very high failure rate.

[00:19:45] Bronwyn: That's interesting. And I feel like not hearing about the failure as well can lead us to underestimate the hard work it takes to get there. So I heard a quote from somebody really successful and they were like, everybody wants to be where I am, but nobody wants to do the hard work to get here, and yeah. Does that resonate?

[00:20:01] Catherine: God. Yeah. you? know, you hear, oh, you're so lucky to be, you are like, well, hold on a minute.

[00:20:07] Bronwyn: Yeah. This is blood, blood, sweat, and tears!

[00:20:09] Catherine: There's some hard work as well.

[00:20:12] Bronwyn: Yeah, absolutely. But we can get discouraged, I guess was my like my point as well. Like we can get discouraged really early and being like, I'm investing all this time and it's like, yeah, like that's how much time it actually takes to and work it takes to get along this road.

[00:20:24] Catherine: Yeah. I, I, and that, that it really does resonate. There are so many people who are like, oh, I want to do this thing with you. And then when you give them a few tasks, do they go, ah, actually I don't, can't be bothered. I don't, I just want the outcome. I don't really want to do it.

[00:20:37] Bronwyn: Yeah. But I think as therapists, it's like, you know, as psychologists, we've done the hard yards to become qualified as psychologists. I think a lot of early career listeners, it's like we've overcome hurdles, we've gotten into where we are, we had a lot of strict requirements, we know what it takes. So I actually think in a way, like, you know, early career psych are a well positioned to be able to take on the grit and determination that's needed.

[00:20:57] Catherine: Yeah. May- maybe they should just keep, keep going with it. Just in embrace it.

[00:21:02] Bronwyn: Yeah, absolutely. Was there anything else you wanted to talk about with fear of failure?

[00:21:07] Catherine: No, I feel triggered enough now.

[00:21:09] Bronwyn: That's fair. I think you gave us some really important insights there.

So one thing I wanted to ask you about was clinicians diversifying their skills. So an early career dilemma, that is, I think universal, is that early career psychs feel like they need to get more credentials in therapies and they feel like they need to have these under their belts and collect 'em, like collectibles. How important is it for clinicians to diversify their skills or services in today's climate? Or maybe, we can think of it differently and maybe just innovation within the same therapy. What are your thoughts?

[00:21:41] Catherine: If I'm understanding correctly, Bron...

[00:21:44] Bronwyn: Yeah, I made that confusing!

[00:21:46] Catherine: No, I, think there's may be a couple of parts to that though. I think it, it makes me think about, um, Steven Bartlett's book, Diary of a CEO. It's, it's sort of a business and marketing book, but he talks about filling your buckets in the right order. And so he talks about your knowledge is your first bucket. Your skills is your second bucket. When you filled your knowledge bucket, it's going to flow into your skills.

So as clinicians, making sure you've got those really firm foundations is the be all and end all, I think. Nobody's gonna take those buckets off you. You're always gonna have those no matter what job career you go into. So your knowledge and your skills are super important, and I think people underestimate how long it takes for them to get those buckets filled too.

[00:22:29] Bronwyn: 100%.

[00:22:30] Catherine: I know, it's like 10,000 hours of practice to gain a skill, you know, Angela Duckworth's idea of, of this. So knowledge and skills has to be there first and foremost before you can then start filling other buckets, which are things like you building your network, building your resources, building your reputation. And so I think when people are looking at innovating in projects, they need to really make sure that they've got the knowledge and the skills base there firmly underneath them before they start thinking about how do I change this up or innovate, personally, I think.

[00:23:01] Bronwyn: No, I completely agree. And I was just thinking like I was just reflecting on my journey as an early career psych, and so much brain space in the early years are dedicated towards gaining the knowledge and skills in therapeutic approaches. And you do need a variety of ways of working with different clients who have different needs. And then you need to gain those skills over several years to become comfortable in knowing different ways to ask questions and deliver interventions and adapt for your client's needs like neurodiversity and culture. And that's no easy task, it does take a number of years to do that. And it's only like now that I've kind of approaching, you know, my fifth and sixth year of practice and I'm like, oh, maybe I have some free brain space to like dedicate to thinking about other things like innovation.

[00:23:41] Catherine: Yeah, and that's the other aspect of it too, isn't it? It- it's, you've got to be able to stick your head up above the day-to-day stuff to be able to think about this and implement it. And, um, even for it to feel like psychologically safe for you to be able to take risks. It, it needs you to have some stability underneath you, um, in order to do that, I think. Yeah, totally.

[00:24:01] Bronwyn: Thinking of brain space, many of us don't have much of it when we're working in mental health, we've, we've dedicated it towards the clients. But what role do you see, uh, networking or collaboration play in staying innovative and relevant?

[00:24:16] Catherine: I, I pretty much think it's everything. I, I don't know that you can be innovative in isolation necessarily, even if that's just borrowing from ideas outside psychology, whether that's business or education. I think even reading, listening to podcasts, collaborating with peers, attending networking events. I attend this networking event and it's a business thing, but the amount of times I've come away from that with a whole pad of paper of ideas, of ways that I can implement some of those, those ideas into my practice. And then not even talking about healthcare, they might be talking about say a, you know, a product based business, not a service based business, but often I come away thinking, oh my goodness, I've got all these ideas and thoughts about what I can do here.

So I think that collaboration just means that we, we can share the load when we are struggling. We can spark some creativity. It makes our services richer, it makes our ideas richer, and I think it gives us, yeah, ideas, flexibility, and helps us with problem solving, I think when we're taking ideas from other, other areas of, of life.

[00:25:21] Bronwyn: Yeah. I really love networking as well. I guess I don't see it as networking, I just find it really energizing to connect with people, um, and connect with people with ideas and like perspectives and. I can learn from. So like yeah, even if it's not a strictly business decision, I just like engaging with people and I think that's a nice, like, wellbeing thing actually.

[00:25:39] Catherine: Yeah, totally. If, if you get those, you get that enjoyment from it, it's absolutely essential, yeah.

[00:25:45] Bronwyn: Yeah, totally.

Our audience is early career focused and you mentioned earlier that the skills and knowledge base is needed, and I completely agree with that. Do you feel there are mistakes that early career psychs can make in trying to innovate perhaps too early?

[00:26:02] Catherine: I dunno if this fits within that completely, but I, I wrote an article recently that, that seemed to get a lot of response on LinkedIn, there was a lot of people resonating with it, and that was around people stepping into doing their own thing very quickly, and without maybe those knowledge and skills buckets being filled fully first. Um, and whilst I'm all behind people doing their own thing, um, and, and launching and, and innovating and trying new things, I think we also have to be realistic with our skillset and knowledge and just really make sure we're doing that in a safe, ethical way. That we're not, yeah, putting out online therapy, for example, that's actually going to get us into trouble, or opening a clinic when we actually don't have any business acumen and there's a potential of people's jobs and, you know, clients therapy going down the tube, and you know, there, there needs to be some risk mitigation there too, to balance out the enthusiasm and innovation that comes with that. Um, but that's not to dampen people's enthusiasm. It's just to say, you know, do it in a thoughtful planned way. Do your research, pretty much.

[00:27:15] Bronwyn: Because there's a, like, you don't know what you don't know aspect with that, yeah. Um, so it sounds like consultation is very important and being thorough in that. And so meeting your enthusiasm for innovation with care and consideration.

[00:27:30] Catherine: Yes, well put.

[00:27:32] Bronwyn: Yeah. That sounds sensible.

[00:27:34] Catherine: Absolutely.

[00:27:34] Bronwyn: We, we talked briefly about, maybe there's a tendency in mental health for people, a bit of tall poppy syndrome, I guess is what we were describing earlier. I assume you've experienced some of this as well, being an innovative person. Just wondered how you cope with perhaps, uh, negative or implicitly negative, comments or jeers from colleagues.

[00:27:55] Catherine: That, that feels hard as well because it is, it is something that happens quite a lot and it's something that's happening currently, so it feels quite raw. Um, no, I think, I think it's really important to acknowledge because I think it happens more than we think. And I was only talking about this yesterday actually with, with a, a business consultant of mine and I, I was saying, I think maybe I was quite naive in thinking that psychologists in particular healthcare workers are, uh, sorry, everybody, but emotionally mature and, you know, respectful and thoughtful and reflective because that has not been my experience with a lot of people online. And that you can get some really quite hurtful, damaging things said about you, your company, the kinds of things you're trying to create. So I acknowledge that it can be really hurtful, it can be really upsetting. And certainly there's a, a part of me that often reacts to that with, oh dear, I better go hide. I better go cry. I better pack up this, this project because it's, you know, it's upsetting people or it's, it's not what people want to see.

But, I think when I can healthy adult my way outta that, what I've come to realize is that usually people's response to stuff like that shows you're on the right track. It shows that you are perhaps innovating in a way that they wish they had or that you're doing something that's just, you know, pushing the envelope a little bit, and that's not a bad thing. And as long as you're doing it with a, with the ethical values based framework behind you, I think it's probably a better indicator that you're on the right track and you are, you're, you're doing the right, right thing actually.

[00:29:40] Bronwyn: I love how you've described all of that, because you're acknowledging how hurtful it can absolutely feel. And that initial response of being like, I'm just gonna go hide this feels really awful... Um, but then also acknowledging like in schema language, it's like your actions have activated a bully mode in somebody else, um, and it's not about you, it's that they're responding in a particular way because they're activated.

Because I totally have the opposite re response to people who are innovative. Like if I see somebody who thought of something and I'm like, I wish I had thought of that, I'm like, they're a genius. I wish I had thought of that. You go and like, I'll be like, yeah, great work! Um, it doesn't activate a bully mode in me, but for somebody else, they might feel jealous and resentful that you thought of it first, and that's what they wanna do. But they haven't taken those steps to do that, and then they attack you.

[00:30:26] Catherine: And it's really good to acknowledge it too, Bron, 'cause I have the same reaction to people. I'm like, wow, you're putting something out there. Even if I don't necessarily think it's great, I wouldn't buy, I'm, I'm just like, you put something out there. Whether it's a record, a book, a project, whatever. I'm just like, yes, absolutely, you go for it.

And I think maybe what the difference is is that, I don't know for you, but for me, I've put stuff out there and I know what it takes to put yourself out there. And so if I see anybody doing that, I'm gonna champion that because I know it's really hard. And I think maybe that other people that are the bullies are the ones that aren't putting themselves out there for whatever reason and feel a bit resentful because there's somebody else doing what I really would really like to do, but I'm a bit too scared to do it.

[00:31:13] Bronwyn: Yeah, I'm totally thinking like a few years ago maybe when I first started the podcast, um, Phoebe Rogers came on the podcast and she has a great program where she talks about her own personal experiences, um, with dating. And then she's released a book helping other women with dating. And I've followed her for a few years now and she does a lot of work, so much work around it. and it really highlights to me that it's like if somebody was to try and like take her down. It's like you just don't see what happens behind the scenes. I barely have an understanding of what happens behind the scenes, but I can see that she works very, very hard for a great service that she provides.

[00:31:46] Catherine: Yeah, and, and I think that's, that's the other part of it is just not really realizing with this naivety I think I had that people would be bothered to comment and, you know, make, do stuff like that online. I just was naive. I'm just, I'm still sometimes like, why are you even bothering to tell me that? Like, you've gone out of your way to be horrible to somebody that you don't know.

[00:32:13] Bronwyn: Yeah. Uh, preaching to the choir, Catherine, we, um, had an episode, um, that I recorded with somebody else about therapists owning their own shit. Um, and we talked about this because I had the same perception, and I did a episode where I reflected on like, the past years of practice and I said the same thing. I was like, it really shocked me because I had this like almost idealized perception of other people in the profession, and maybe I shouldn't have had that and I should've just seen them as human.

[00:32:35] Catherine: Well, yes. That's a good, it's a good point. You're more evolved psychologically than me. It took me, it took me a long time to work it out.

[00:32:43] Bronwyn: It's okay. We all, we all get there.

[00:32:44] Catherine: And, and then there's a lot of, uh, substances being consumed at 3:00 AM and there's a lot of, maybe, altered states.

[00:32:52] Bronwyn: Totally. Absolutely. Definitely. So maybe just to help tie up our conversation, Catherine, when we think of innovation, it doesn't have to be big, right? Could you give us a few examples of small steps or describe what small innovation looks like?

[00:33:07] Catherine: Yeah, totally. And again, I think we often think innovation is gonna be this huge, groundbreaking, different thing, and um, it really doesn't need to be. It, it might just be. I mean, some of these sound almost silly, but it might be that you implement a drinks menu in your clinic and you have a concierge that comes and greets your clients and makes that whole experience a far more pleasant experience for your clients, improve your client satisfaction.

It might be that you recognize that there's a lot of repetitive tasks being done by yourself or your administrator and you implement some AI around booking software or, um, a chat bot. Chat bots are actually really easy to implement and use, and they will just be answering major questions that you have on your website or when clients are, um, calling up. It can, you can have an automated system that will literally just, um, answer some of them major questions that you get and then pop them through to an administrator as and when they need to do that.

Um, it might just be changing how you do your intake process and streamlining that maybe with some AI. So even though I'm talking about about ai, it doesn't need to be a a huge, major new, new product that's really easy to use now. And there's some stuff out there that's, um, really easy to just tag onto your website or onto your, um, practice management software, for example.

[00:34:33] Bronwyn: So it really comes back to what you said about solving problems is something that you consider yourself good at, but it's innovation.

[00:34:41] Catherine: Yeah. I think it's, it's keeping data, so it's looking at, okay, well what are, what's the data showing me in my workplace, in my clinic, and where there are problems, using that data then to then help you solve the problem and then reassessing. Going back, okay, we've implemented this project, go back, what's the data telling me now? Has it worked? Has it not worked? And that's, you know, carry on from there.

[00:35:03] Bronwyn: What do you think are the challenges for mental health clinicians in the future? Like the biggest challenges? I know that's a huge question, but what do we need to prepare to innovate for?

[00:35:14] Catherine: I think that people are considerably worried about aI technology currently and worrying about how are they going to implement that or use that, or actually is it going to take over our roles and those sorts of conversations. I personally just think that you are only going to become redundant if you don't embrace it and learn to use it to your advantage. And again, within the code of competencies and the code of conduct coming out, digital competencies throughout, all of that. So we really do need to be moving ourselves in that direction, otherwise, it's pretty quick to miss that button, miss the bus on that one. If you, if you're stepping away and just saying, oh, it's not for me, I don't understand it, I don't want to, you're going to be, you're going to be left out pretty quickly.

Um, so if you, if you can get ahead, if you can understand some AI, you can find some tools that are going to help streamline your processes in any way, and you're using AI, it's going, you're going to be innovating and you're going to be adhearing to the code of conduct, and you're going to be ahead of your competitors or you ahead of, you know, other people in the market.

[00:36:18] Bronwyn: Do you think AI will replace therapists?

[00:36:21] Catherine: No, I don't. I think that human connection is vital and I don't think, I don't think AI can do that. I don't think AI will ever be able to do that, and we've already seen some of the issues that have arisen from that. I think no matter how smart it gets, it's not gonna be able to do that. I think we need that human connection. But I think we have to get on board with using it.

[00:36:42] Bronwyn: How have you used it in your practice?

[00:36:44] Catherine: Oh, so we have, um, chat bots and agents, so they're slightly different things. Um, our intake process now as well has some AI embedded in it. Our website has some AI embedded in it. Um, we are looking at some other ways as well of incorporating it to make that. Uh, more streamlined, ma- mainly with our admin processes. AI has been really useful, especially when you can use like a, use it for maybe, um, like repetitive tasks that need doing; super, super easy.

Um, but with my online courses and things, AI embedded there in, in, you know, the lead, the lead generation and sending out, um, contacts, emails and stuff to people, that's all AI in embedded in there. Booking systems, you know, bookings, cancellations, that's a really kind of low hanging fruit for clinicians to use, be using AI with.

[00:37:35] Bronwyn: Yeah. I agree with embracing, and I also agree that I don't think it'll replace us. I think the therapeutic relationship is like the strongest thing we have, the most human thing we have, and it's, it's a good thing.

[00:37:44] Catherine: Yes, it's, it's the only thing we have left after

[00:37:46] Bronwyn: Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly.

Well, Catherine, what do you hope that listeners will take away most from our conversation today?

[00:37:54] Catherine: I would like people to start to think about innovation as not being, uh, you don't need to be a huge tech genius. You don't need to be taking wild risks. It's about being quite flexible, creative, and values driven. But if you want to stay competitive in your field, you do need to innovate in how you're practicing. And part of that, I think is about working smarter, not harder, is the, the take home from that. As well as seeing failures as learning opportunities.

[00:38:21] Bronwyn: Thank you so much, Catherine. You're a really good role model for this, for this topic because you live it and breathe it and you do it. So I really appreciate your insights here today.

If listeners wanna learn more about you or get in touch, where can they find you?

[00:38:34] Catherine: Uh, mostly on LinkedIn. I'm pretty active on LinkedIn and I'm always really happy to connect with people who are curious about innovating or building their better workplaces, um, incorporating DBT into their programs or if they want to know about the training portal, um, the clinical registrar program, any of our innovations, currently, then, um, send me a message on LinkedIn.

[00:38:55] Bronwyn: Well, I'll make sure I pop all those links in the show notes, and listeners do get in touch with Catherine. She's really friendly and awesome.

Uh, listeners, you found this episode helpful, do follow the podcast and share it with somebody who might need a little inspiration today. That's a wrap, thanks for listening to Mental Work. I'm Bronwyn Milkins. Have a good one, and catch you next time.