The hypnotic voice

There are many different types of voice out there, loud and soft voices, fast and slow voices, high pitched and deep voices, confident and un-confident voices… In the same way, there are many  hypnotic voices out there. When you listen to some hypnotherapists, what you hear could be different to what you might expect a hypnotic voice to sound like, but that’s not to say that the voice in question is not effective at delivering hypnotic suggestions. Many people have preferences for their favourite type of hypnotic voice and the way your voice sounds can influence the rapport that you have with your clients.

For example, if you hate fast, nasal-sounding voices, you’d probably prefer to see a hypnotherapist who has a slow, deep, rich voice, as you’d likely be able to connect to it better… However, this is entirely subjective. Also, some people are less focused on the type of voice than they are by what’s being said, whereas for others a hypnotic voice can ‘make or break’ the therapy session.

Whilst on the topic of different hypnotic voice types, it’s also worth taking into account that some people have accents, which on the face of it may seem to be unhelpful if the people you’re hypnotising do not have the same accent. However, it can actually work in your favour. Think about it, if you’re in a conversation with someone who has an accent, you generally have to listen to them even more intently in order to focus on what’s being said, right? I love being hypnotised by people with different accents, because I tend to have to really pay attention; the same will be true of hypnotherapy clients. So if you have an accent, embrace it!

Components of a good hypnotic voice

Voices are made up of various different components, but what key qualities should a good hypnotic voice have?

Speed
Hypnotic voices do not need to be slow! However, a slow voice can often be relaxing and easier to understand, this is why a slower pace can be beneficial for hypnotherapists, but remember, it’s not mandatory.

Clarity
Now, this one is much more important than speed of delivery. Ensure that when you talk, you are able to be understood. It would be pretty pointless doing a hypnotherapy session with a client if they couldn’t actually understand what you were saying!

Intention
It helps if you can convey your ‘intention’ using your voice. Whether it’s hypnotic intention or your intention to help someone. Making your voice congruent with your message works wonders and your client will pick up on that on a subconscious level.

Pitch/Inflection
Generally, ‘commands’ are given with a downwards inflection, whereas questions have an upwards inflection. Aim to keep your inflection either level (think more monotonous) or with a downwards inflection, rather than having upwards inflections that may make you sound unsure or like you’re questioning what you’re saying (unless asking questions that is).

Depth/Tonality
Your natural voice is your voice, so you’re going to have to kind of play to your strengths with how your voice actually sounds. That said, there’s nothing stopping you from learning how to develop the richness of your voice. A voice coach may help, if you feel this is an area of concern.

Breathing
Breathing is an integral part of your hypnotic voice. Your breath needs to be able to support what you’re saying, so ensuring that you can breathe sufficiently well is important. If you struggle breathing, exercise and dietary changes may help. If you struggle with not having enough breath, there are exercises you can do to expand your lung capacity and exert control over the amount of breath you use whilst talking (check out Google for more of these).

Pausing
You don’t need to be talking all the time! Sometimes pausing is very helpful, especially when you’re giving the client a lot to think about. If you ask someone to visualise a scene, then you carry on talking about something different, they haven’t necessarily had enough time to engage with the scene you suggested before. So, allow yourself time to pause. It’s also a great opportunity for you to arrange your thoughts so you know what to say next.

Volume
Ensure that your volume reflects the environment you’re in. Don’t be too loud or too quiet. You need to be heard, but you don’t want to make someone cringe by shouting relaxing suggestions at them!

Confidence
Above all, your voice must convey confidence in yourself and what you’re saying. People can pick up on confidence (or the lack of it) in the way a voice sounds. So, strive to be confident. Mean what you say. Be sure of yourself. Commit to what you’re saying. Omit ‘uh’s’ and ‘um’s’ from your vocabulary, and ensure that your voice sounds as confident as it possibly can!

Voice care
As a hypnotist, it’s a good idea to take care of your voice, because your voice is your tool. Without a voice, you’re not going to be doing any hypnosis. Voice strain can be common amongst new hypnotists, so these ways to warm up your voice in this video with Dr Kate:

So, whatever your voice sounds like, it can probably be used effectively for hypnosis purposes, sometimes naturally, other times with evaluation, modification and practice (not everyone naturally has a ‘hypnotic’ sounding voice, but most people are able to learn to develop one). The best way to develop your voice is by recording it and listening back to yourself. By doing this, you can hear what works and what doesn’t.

We hope that this blog on the hypnotic voice has been helpful to you. If you have any more questions about this topic or anything else for that matter, do please get in touch, because we’re always happy to help!

– written by the HypnoTC team

It’s a good idea, if you’re a working hypnotherapist actively seeing clients, or if you have trained, but have taken some time off, to engage in a ‘skill audit’ at least every year, to ensure that what you’re doing is still working and that you’ve not slipped into any ‘bad habits’. Also, it’s worth noting whether there are any ‘new approaches’ out there that could benefit you and your hypnotherapy practice. Sure, the stuff that you learned during your hypnotherapy training may be great at helping the majority of clients (hopefully), but it’s good to keep an open mind when it comes to tools that you want in your therapy toolkit.

So, going back to the first point, it’s all too easy when you’re seeing clients day-in, day-out, to simplify your techniques and scripts so that they’re quicker and take less cognitive processing (for you) when using them during a hypnotherapy session. However, just because something’s easier, doesn’t necessarily mean it’s better. Many long-term hypnotherapists can get stuck in just such a ‘rut’ without even realising it. The mind likes simple routines, and by leaving out ‘tricky parts’ over and over, we can end up doing things completely differently (perhaps even less effectively) than the way we learned in the first place. It’s like parallel parking our cars, if you remember and stick to how you were taught to do it by your professional driving instructor, you can often park perfectly in one attempt. But when we try and ‘make things easier’ by not checking our mirrors first, or not aligning our car in the right position beforehand, it can in fact make the whole process less effective (and perhaps make even more work for ourselves)!

This is why taking a little time to ‘check in with yourself’ every 6 to 12 months can be a good idea. If one of your tutors or peers were to watch you working with a client, would they think you’re being as effective as you could be? Would they recognise the techniques that you’re using and understand the purpose of them? You might think it’s ‘easy’ to get sloppy, but the side effects are not so easy to stomach. For instance, it’s not easy to receive negative feedback, nor to have clients returning more often because the session wasn’t effective. Especially when you know they might have responded better if you’d been on your ‘a-game’. Engaging in regular hypnotherapy supervision is a great way to get this kind of feedback from a third person perspective and to help you work on keeping your hypnotherapy skills fresh and effective. Because we all want to be as effective as we can possibly be, for the sake of our clients and our business reputations.

As well as keeping a check on your core knowledge and practical abilities, it’s also worth keeping an eye out for any new techniques, scripts, models and approaches that you feel could benefit you and your practice (or that could disadvantage you by not knowing them). It’s great to have a broad range of hypnotherapy skills and techniques to use in any situation, but also, some clients may look at your competitors and notice that they offer ‘more’ than you, and then choose to work with them instead of you (yes, it does happen)! For instance, some hypnotherapists might offer Ericksonian hypnotherapy, cognitive hypnotherapy or analytical hypnotherapy… Others may offer rapid inductions, some support their hypnotherapy skills with other therapies such as EMDR, Counselling, REBT, NLP, etc. or specific techniques such as ‘regression to cause’ or the ‘fast phobia cure’. Indeed, there are hundreds (perhaps thousands) of hypnotherapy techniques and models out there. Many of these models and techniques are made up of ‘standard approaches’ that are often taught on good hypnotherapy practitioner courses (so perhaps, if your initial training was high quality, you already have all the ‘building blocks’ in order to break down those techniques and replicate them yourself). That said, it’s still worth keeping your ear to the ground, and as a part of your career as a hypnotherapist, it’s generally recommended that you should get at least 16 hours (2 days) CPD training per year. Continuing your professional development will certainly benefit you in the long run, and is a great way of testing yourself and stopping your skills from going ‘stale’.

Sometimes learning new hypnotherapy techniques and models can be pricy, however, a great way to get a ‘taster’ is to attend hypnosis/hypnotherapy conferences. Many of the people that are selling their models and ‘new approaches’ will attend these conferences and let you know about what they’re offering. This gives you a chance to make an informed decision about whether to take your training further (sometimes you can even take a training course with one of the presenters at the conference itself), as well as a chance to see how a vast range of different hypnotherapists work. It’s also a great way to network with other therapists and even make some new friends in the industry. On this topic, both Kate and myself will be attending, speaking and presenting courses at HypnoThoughts Live 2019 in Las Vegas (Kate is offering a pre-conference EMDR course and I’m offering a post-conference stage & street hypnosis course), and we also frequently attend the UK Hypnosis Convention too, along with a whole plethora of other big names in the hypnosis world. So, perhaps we’ll see you there!

In closing, don’t let yourself get into poor habits. It’s better to challenge yourself and keep things fresh, than to get lazy and offer a sloppy service. It’s good to learn new skills and to refresh skills that you already know, but keep in mind that not all of the ‘new hypnotherapy techniques’ on offer are as ‘groundbreaking’ as they might seem, so do some research before you spend your hard earned money!

We hope that this blog on keeping your hypnotherapy skills up to date and current has been helpful to you. If you have any more questions about this topic or anything else for that matter, do please get in touch, because we’re always happy to help!

– written by the HypnoTC team

What is research and how do I conduct hypnosis research?

In simple terms, research is finding out about something. It becomes more valuable research when you take an organised or systematic approach to find out facts and then be able to draw conclusions from those facts. For example, if you wanted to find some post-qualification training to boost your CPD record, you might think about what you need, search for courses that meet your general criteria and then look more closely to see which particular course is most suitable for you. Thus, fundamentally, with any research, you are likely to have a research question (what you want to find out), a way of conducting that research (methodology) and some analysis of the data, to the form conclusions.

There are two main types of research. Primary research creates new information (‘data’). For example, if you were to study your last 50 clients and see how many sessions they had as an average. Secondary research explores existing data, such as looking at a number of smoking cessation research papers. To decide which type is most appropriate for what you want to find out, it can be good to consider what you want to research and why.

Also, research can be either ‘deductive’ or ‘inductive’ in its approach. Research that is deductive or ‘top down’ works from a specified theory to a hypothesis, tested by observation leading to confirmation, or otherwise, of the hypothesis. For example, a theory might be that all clients with an external locus of control prefer a direct and authoritarian hypnosis approach. You might then seek information to ‘deduce’ whether this is or is not true. In contrast, you might want to take an inductive (bottom up) approach, whereby you make specific observations, to ascertain patterns leading to a tentative hypothesis, leading to a theory. Thus, you might observe the preferences of your external locus of control clients to ascertain which hypnosis approach they preferred.

Deciding upon your hypnosis research question

The very first part of any research is going to be the establishment of a research question. You might already have an idea about what you would like to find out, so you may read around the topic and look at what has already been written about it, getting a broad understanding of the relevant facts and information, whilst checking whether your intended research has already been conducted. This will lead you towards a general research question such as ‘what hypnotherapy approach do external locus of control clients prefer?’. You might stop here, particularly for a simple research project. Alternatively, you might return to the literature to seek out specific research that either supports or opposes your research question. Finally, you will finalise your research question to the specific words and style (hypothesis or question) that is most appropriate.

You might word your research question as a question, such as ‘Do behavioural approaches work better than cognitive approaches in addressing anxiety?’ or as a hypothesis, a statement, such as ‘Behavioural approaches work better than cognitive approaches when addressing anxiety’. For a question, you will be seeking an answer. For a hypothesis, you will be seeking to prove or disprove your statement.

 Choosing your hypnosis research paradigm

Whether you define it explicitly or not, your research is likely to have an overall philosophy or paradigm of approach. Paradigms come from common beliefs and agreements about how problems should be understood and addressed. There are quite a few different ‘styles’ of research, ranging from highly scientific (e.g. positivist) through to very broad (e.g. constructivist). Whilst a positivist approach would consider that there is a single reality, known and measurable (see ‘quantitative’ further on), a constructivist approach would consider there is no single reality, and thus reality needs to be interpreted (see ‘qualitative’). Another view is a pragmatic approach, which considers reality is constantly being debated, interpreted and redefined, and therefore the best approach to use is that which solves the problem or finds the answer.

Each of the key paradigms (such as positivist, constructivist and pragmatic) have their own views on reality (‘ontology’), how knowledge is found (‘epistemology’) and how the answers are sought (‘methodology’) and what particular tools (‘methods’) are used.

You may either adjust your research question or hypothesis to be a good fit with your chosen paradigm, or, more commonly, choose your research paradigm to best suit your research question or hypothesis. For example, if you want to know the number of clients you have had for smoking cessation in the past year, then this can be measured and would fit with a positivist approach. If you wanted to find out those clients’ reasons for seeking hypnotherapy to stop smoking, then this would better fit a constructivist approach.

Methodology and designing your hypnosis research study

The most common forms of research that you are likely to conduct are: primary research, systematic review, and meta-analysis.

New data or review of existing data?

Although we tend to think of primary research as conducting experiments, there are a range of approaches you can use when you are seeking new data. ‘Experimental’ research tends to have an intervention. This can be as simple as a hypnosis MP3 or a series of hypnotherapy protocols. You will also have a control group who don’t receive the intervention and allocate your participants randomly to either the intervention group or the control group. This enables you to compare the groups to observe any difference. This can be good when you wish to find out whether a particular approach has any effect at all.

If you don’t wish to have a control group, then you may prefer ‘quasi-experimental’ research. Here, all research participants (or ‘subjects’) receive the same intervention. This is a great approach to use when you want to see if there are differences in how a technique affects different types of people. Thus, to use our ‘locus of control’ example, you could give all of your participants a hypnosis technique and then assess whether those with an external locus of control responded differently to those with an internal locus of control.

Our third type of primary research is that of ‘non-experimental’ research. This has no intervention; it is just measuring something that already exists. For example, if you assessed twenty clients to see how many were internal and how many were external locus of control.

It may be that instead of seeking new data, you wish to revisit existing data and you are likely to either conduct a ‘systematic review’, which is a review of all the relevant papers on that topic (thus broad), or a ‘meta-analysis’, which is a more focused analysis of the most relevant papers on that topic. Thus, if you wish to look at certain hypnotherapy trends in the research field by assessing how many studies have used certain approaches, then a systematic review offers a formal structured way of reviewing (collecting and summarising) all of the relevant (specific criteria) empirical evidence on this that apply to your defined research question. They are a great way of getting a general feel for a particular aspect of the research field. However, if you want to combine the results from those studies to get more focused data, then a meta-analysis can be used to combine numerical results from a number of studies and analyse that numerical data with statistical methods.

Numbers or words

As you may have already observed, some research approaches are more focused towards gaining numerical data (e.g. measurements) and other approaches will seek textual data (e.g. words spoken in an interview).

Specific data collection methods

There many be a number of different tools that you could use to gain your data. You are likely to select the one that is most appropriate to what you wish to achieve. Popular methods include:

• Questionnaires and surveys can be used to collect either numerical or text data. Although, with the latter, you are likely to get brief answers that you will then analyse numerically (quantitatively).
• Interviews are a great way of getting large amounts of relevant information (qualitative), to then analyse and look for patterns and themes (thematic analysis). These are great for seeking people’s experiences (phenomenological).
• Observations and focus groups can save time by gathering more than one amount of data at a time, although as your attention is spread, you are likely to get less detailed data.

Hypnosis research data reporting and analysis

Your method of analysing your data will depend on whether you have numerical or textual (words) data.

‘Statistical analysis’: You might prefer to explore your numerical data manually (with the assistance of a calculator most likely!), or use a computer-based programme such as SPSS (Statistical Package for the Social Sciences). Depending on the amount of data you have, you may only be able to conduct a ‘descriptive’ analysis, where you look at the data itself and what it represents. For example, looking at the average (the mean), the middle point (the median), the most common (the mode) and the range (from lowest to highest). If you have sufficient quantity and relevant type, you can also explore your data with ‘inferential’ analysis. Here you consider whether the data can be generalised to the larger population. The type of analysis you conduct will also depend on the type of numerical data you have.

‘Thematic analysis’: There are many different analytical tools, both manual and computer-based programmes, for analysing the words that are in your data. These words may come from text-based questions, surveys, interviews and a number of other sources. For example, you might do some research making a note of all the different explanations of ‘what hypnosis is’ that are on YouTube and then exploring common themes or patterns (that would actually be interesting!) The most common form of manual analysis tends to be ‘thematic analysis’ and ‘NVivo’ is a popular software programme used to explore vast amounts of word-based data.

Drawing conclusions and making recommendations for your hypnosis research

You will consider the research field and question(s) and discuss the data analysis in relation to the literature, the research field and the questions. At the end of the discussion you will summarise and draw conclusions from your discussion and may choose to make recommendations, such as for further research in a particular area.

Writing up your hypnosis research

When you conducted your initial review of the literature around your topic, you are likely to have read some research papers. Even if you only want to publish your research on your own website, giving it a structure makes it easier for people to understand and absorb your information. You may have already noticed from research papers you have read, that there is a fairly standard structure to presenting research. This can differ between experimental and non-experimental research. The most common structure is that used for primary (experimental) research.

Hypnosis research ethics

Wherever you conduct primary research, there will be ethical considerations. Some key points to think about are:

Voluntary participation: Will the individuals have the right to choose whether to participate or not?

Confidentiality and anonymity: Will confidentiality be maintained? Will their privacy be invaded? 

Informed consent: Will people be involved covertly, or with their knowledge and consent? Will the full nature of the study be revealed or is the participant fully or partly deceived? Is there a risk of harm (mental, physical, emotional) to the participant? Will the participants be vulnerable e.g. age, mental capacity?

Conduct of researchers: Will you respect intellectual property? Will you act with honesty, objectivity, integrity, carefully and openly? Will participants be treated fairly, with consideration and respect? Are you competent and possess sufficient expertise to conduct the research? Will participants have a right to withdraw and be informed of this?

Anyone can conduct research. Students often may have a research project as part of their studies. If you conduct research with the support of an organisation or educational institution you may be more likely to get participants, particularly if the organisation or institution has an ethical research policy and review procedure for proposed research.

Hypnosis research supervision

The final point is on the topic of hypnosis research supervision. Just as a professional hypnotherapist is likely to engage in regular hypnotherapy supervision, with an appropriately trained (in supervision) and experienced hypnotherapist, it is also good to engage in research supervision. There is increasing interest in hypnosis research (and hypnotherapy research), amongst the public and from professionals and academics.

Hypnosis research is moving beyond the traditional academic research laboratories and into the field, with ‘evidence-based practice’ becoming understood and used, and ‘practice-based evidence’ becoming more widely accepted. Whether you want to share good practice, a new technique you have developed, or even some great outcomes from a well-known application, there is much a hypnotherapist can share.

However, research skills are rarely taught on practitioner courses. So, supervision is helpful, to guide you through the entire process, from initial concept to publishing your findings.

If you would like private research supervision, I can help. For more information, visit: https://hypnotc.com/hypnotherapist-research-supervision/

We hope that this blog on hypnosis research has been helpful to you. If you have any more questions about this topic or anything else for that matter, do please get in touch, because we’re always happy to help!

– written by Dr Kate Beaven-Marks
(HypnoTC Director)

Perhaps you spent a few weeks, several months or even years working towards your initial qualification. After that effort (if indeed it was), why would you then want to carry on your development journey? Surely you are ‘done’, know all you need to know and there is no point in learning even more or engaging in ‘continued professional development’ (often known simply as CPD)… Sadly, this is a common perception (or misconception), often surprisingly from those who have minimal training and through to those who have more extensive training.

There is a view that if we tread water instead of moving forward, we are actually going backwards, because others are moving forward. Not developing yourself can have an impact in a short period of time. With little input into your ways of thinking, you could become stale within a year. There is no need (unless you want to) to jump in and learn every new ‘model’ or train with every new ‘guru’, regardless of whether they bring little or no value to your business. However, it can be good practice to keep aware of what is on your professional horizon and whether any change to your business or practice would be beneficial. If you are competing for clients in a busy area, then being ahead of the pack can make a huge difference to your client base. This is where CPD comes in…

From a personal perspective, continuously developing yourself helps expand your world view, gaining knowledge which can result in enhancing your skill profile. This can have vast benefits for your professional practice, whether it is seen as bright new ideas for developing your business, new ways of working with clients, or even how to take care of you!

Continuing professional-development is more accessible than you may think.

The traditional options, such as workshops, magazines, research articles and books remain popular. However, technology continues to expand our options, with widespread access to the internet. The world of informative and networking sites and apps (such as YouTube, Facebook, WhatsApp, Lynda.com, Instagram, LinkedIn, and Audible) enable us access to non-traditional learning options. As we are becoming ever more accustomed to multi-tasking, we can gain new knowledge listening to a podcast, whilst travelling to work, exercising or even cleaning the house. Learning truly is available for us in a format we most prefer, at a time that is right for how we learn best, 24/7/365. So, what are some of the less traditional learning formats for continued professional development that you could consider?

Audio Books

You might already prefer to listen to a fiction book, rather than read it (whether in paperback or e-reader). Beyond a good story, a significant number of non-fiction books are available as audio books and programmes (yes, including hypnosis/hypnotherapy ones!).

 Podcasts

Whilst an audio book can be rather one-dimensional (the material is often read as printed in the original version), a podcast tends to be more dynamic. A popular model is the podcast interview. Podcasts tend to be longer than soundbites of information and shorter than an audio book. They are also often more personal, gaining some insight into the views and perspectives of both the interviewee and interviewer. For hypnotherapists, popular podcasters include Howard Cooper (Rapid ChangeWorks), Adam Eason (Hypnosis Weekly) and Jason Linnett (Worksmart Hypnosis). Here are some links of both myself and Rory featured on these particular podcasts:

Kate on Rapid ChangeWorks [CLICK TO LISTEN]

Rory on Rapid ChangeWorks [CLICK TO LISTEN]

Kate on Worksmart Hypnosis [CLICK TO LISTEN]

Rory on Worksmart Hypnosis [CLICK TO LISTEN]

Kate on Hypnosis Weekly [CLICK TO LISTEN]

Rory on Hypnosis Weekly [CLICK TO LISTEN]

TedTalks

TED talks vary in length, often ranging between 3 mins and around 20 minutes. They’re a great way of getting informative and educational viewpoints of leaders, academics, experts, public figures and everyday men and women with something to say. Topics are broad and a great way of finding out more about diverse topics including science, technology, creativity, education and business (not to mention hypnosis!).

 YouTube

Whether you are looking at the finer points of double-entry book-keeping, proof that hypnosis can reduce/remove pain, information on the psychology of leadership, tips on Rational Emotive Behaviour Therapy for Hypnotherapists, information on how someone reacts to stress, recommendations for hypnotherapy reading books, or any of millions of other interesting topics for exploration, there is likely to be something relevant on YouTube. Often, the videos are of relatively short duration, which means they’re great for continued professional development as you can fit some learning in, even with a crammed schedule.

 MOOCs

A MOOC is a ‘Massive Open Online Course. There are a vast number of online courses, open access classrooms (virtual) and even universities providing access to free training. Often this will go beyond traditional learning materials, such as reading content and videos of talks and may include a range of interactive activities, forums and rapid feedback.

 Training

It could be said that the only way we really know or learn to do something, is if we are challenged to use it or apply it from a different perspective. Just because you’ve attended one training in the past, doesn’t necessarily mean that you won’t benefit from further study with another hypnotherapy training company/school. Many different trainers teach in different ways, which help students and hypnotherapists to engage in ways (and with topics/materials) they may have not in the past… Also, on the topic of teaching, by teaching others what you know, you will be able to gain a depth of understanding of your own knowledge of that topic. It is this challenging of your knowledge that can also lead to greater insight and learning.

Networking events

Finding out how others do what you do, their thinking, approaches, what works and what doesn’t, can put you on the fast track towards success, if you are open to learning from others. However, rather than simply taking the information from others, be prepared to share yourself. Not only will you help build beneficial reciprocal relationships, but you may discover you know more than you realised. Talking to others is a great way of finding out your views on a whole host of topics and spreading good practice throughout the hypnotherapy industry. 

Mentoring/Supervision

Having a mentor or supervisor is usually a different relationship to having a teacher, coach or colleague. Saying that, you will be able to negotiate quite how your mentoring relationship will evolve. Often a mentor/supervisor will be someone who has already been where you are now, whether in the same industry or a different one and has relatable expertise. This may be directly related to your core practice, or more broadly focused on business. There are many different mentors and supervisors out there. I personally offer both 1-to-1 supervision and group supervision sessions, which are useful for learning how to work with complex clients, how to get more clients and how to take care of your own mental health as a therapist. Supervision can be some of the most beneficial continued professional development, as it is specifically tailored to your own individual needs and requirements.

An interesting and relatively new form of mentoring is that of ‘reverse mentoring’, where you are mentored by someone who is younger than yourself, giving you access to potentially fresher approaches for thinking and working. For example, this can be particularly helpful if you are at a loss amidst the sea of rapidly emerging forms of social media.

 In whichever ways you choose to engage in continued professional development, it can be good to know where you are starting from. A self-assessment of your knowledge and skills, identifying any gaps is a great way to begin. However, whilst it is great to be focused towards filling those gaps, it can also be useful to learn something beyond your familiar world; this is a great way to expand your horizons. Who knows, you may find something that really works for you in a way that you might not have expected.

Finally, as mentioned at the start of this blog, your ‘attitude’ towards learning is important. No longer are you a child at school; those old ways of viewing learning, whether positive or less so, are not relevant to now you are now. Keeping a positive attitude, focused on what you want to achieve, can help your continued professional development journey occur in most beneficial ways for you.

We hope that this blog on continued professional development (CPD) has been helpful to you. If you have any more questions about this topic or anything else for that matter, do please get in touch, because we’re always happy to help!

– written by Dr Kate Beaven-Marks
(HypnoTC Director)

Optimising hypnosis conferences

There are a growing number of hypnosis conferences and conventions, both in the UK and internationally. Some are highly diverse, others more focused around a particular topic, such as pain. Often conferences are allied to a particular organisation, although a few are independent. Attending a conference can have many benefits, including meeting CPD requirements, developing new skills, gaining new knowledge and networking with your peers and profession ‘experts’.

As hypnosis and particularly hypnotherapy is quite an isolated profession (you are often self-employed and work alone), it can offer a great opportunity to mix with others having similar and different experiences. A conference is likely to be an investment of your time and money.

By preparing for your conference experience, you can optimise that investment. These 10 tips will help you to get the most from any hypnosis conferences that you choose to attend:

1. What do you need?

Before you even consider a hypnosis conference as a way of gaining some form of professional development, assess you own professional needs. What are your strengths? Where are your limitations? What new knowledge or skills would benefit your present work? What would enable you to gain expertise or broaden how you work?

2. Choose the right hypnosis conference for you

When you know what you need, look at the speakers and topics offered by a hypnosis conference and consider whether the selections will meet your needs. If, say, only one talk out of ten was of interest or use, then could you get that information any other way? Too much choice is less of a problem, as can be seen further on.

3. Do your research and plan your schedule before you get there

Many hypnosis conference organisers now, at the least, promote the conference agenda on an website prior to the conference. Larger conferences tend to use mobile phone apps. These offer enhanced functionality, such as being able to read session plans, speaker profiles and flag up your chosen selections. It can be good to look at what each talk will give you. This can help you make informed selections.

4. Try before you commit: Find out what ‘experts’ are really like

If you are interested in more specialised training, but have yet to commit to a trainer’s longer course, by sitting in on an hour or two at a conference, you will get a good idea of what they are like. This can help you understand whether their style suits your preferred way of learning.

5. Do something different

As well as attending presentations that will directly benefit your practice, it can be good to pick something you may not usually go for. That hour’s investment of time could open up a whole new aspect to your practice. Alternatively, pick a presentation that will challenge you, or get you to expand your comfort zone. You might be surprised at how motivating this can be.

6. Conference recording

Many hypnosis conferences offer an audio recording of the entire conference. Whilst you might record a speaker yourself (with their permission), the quality is unlikely to be ideal, and you would need to be there to make the recording. Professionally recorded audio will have much better quality. It also tends to delete ‘dead’ time (such as during exercises or practical work), so you only get what is useful to you as a listener.

If you are not fond on taking copious notes, then investing in the conference recording can be a useful way of getting a reminder of the talks you were present for and also any others that you missed.

7. Make choices wisely

For the larger hypnosis conferences, there can often be several ‘streams’ or choices at the same time throughout the day. There may be a range of workshops and talks including lectures, demonstrations, seminar/discussion groups and innovatively-designed sessions.

If you find yourself with several clashes for the same time period, it can be useful to make a ‘decision criteria’.

If you are going to get the conference audio, then you can know you can listen later to the ‘talking only’ style lecture presentations.

Now, consider, whether any demonstrations will be understandable just from the audio, if so, then these too could be reviewed from the conference recording.

8. Divide and conquer

Whether you go with a friend, or make a friend at the conference, it can be useful to have a conference ‘buddy’. Rather than both attend the same talks, deliberately go to different talks. Then meet up afterwards and share notes. This gives you a ‘two-for-one’ level of information, direct from source.

Even better if you can form a small group. Then you can all share information. By sharing information, you are also reinforcing your own learning, so added benefit.

9. Something to share?

Do you have something to share? Consider putting in a speaker proposal yourself. These are often sought a year in advance so contact the conference organiser in plenty of time. Do your research and explore what past speakers have talked about and how they have structured their talk. Follow that as a guide.

By being a speaker at a conference, you are gaining more from your professional development experience and increasing your professional profile, both amongst your peers and to your clients.

10. Use it or lose it

When you get home after the conference, take time to reflect on what you have learned and experienced. To reinforce your learning, consider writing a reflection on your experiences. You might even talk to colleagues about what you learned, or share it within a practice group or supervision session.

The more that you engage with what you have learned, the more you reinforce that learning and develop greater insight and understanding. This is particularly important with practical skills. Skill fade reduces when you practice!

These are just a few tips and strategies that can help you to get the most out of your hypnosis conference adventure. Kate regularly presents at international conferences (such as Hypnothoughts Live in Las Vegas and the UK Hypnosis Convention in London). If you’re based in the UK (or nearby) do consider attending the UK Hypnosis Convention this November.

We hope that this blog on how to get the most out of hypnosis conferences has been helpful to you. If you have any more questions about this topic or anything else for that matter, do please get in touch, because we’re always happy to help!

– written by Dr Kate Beaven-Marks
(HypnoTC Director)

How can a hypnotherapy article benefit your business?

Just imagine, you are asked to work with a journalist on a hypnotherapy article in exchange for them mentioning you in the article.  How exciting! Think of the ‘free’ publicity. Is it really free?  If it is a telephone or in-person interview about something you are doing or have done, or you write an article for a magazine or paper, then you are likely to just invest your time.  If it is a therapy session (smoking cessation, phobias and performance anxiety are popular topics) you are likely to invest both your time and perhaps pay for your therapy room, and indeed treat them just as though they were a client…. Without being paid.

To balance that, there is the potential for exposure to a vast number of people (depending on whether local paper, national or international) that you may never have reached by your conventional advertising and promotional strategies.  It can be a great opportunity.  A hypnotherapy article a few months ago, in Men’s Health (featuring both myself and Rory) gave a positive and balanced view about performance anxiety and the benefits of using hypnotherapy to address it.

More recently I was featured in an article in the Style magazine of the Sunday Times (see full article below this paragraph) gave a more individual account of a stop smoking therapy session, and the author disclosed a fair amount of personal information which may have made the article seem more ‘real’ to readers.

Both of these articles generated a considerable amount of enquiries from the public and others in the media.

(Click article to view a high-resolution copy)

Being mentioned in the press, especially if it is a positive mention can be reinforcement to a potential client that you are an expert.  A brief mention in the Daily Mail a few years ago, talking about how I taught hypnosis to the students at Eton College, resulted in numerous enquiries.

As it still comes up on a google search of my name, it shows potential clients I have been around for a while.  It further enhances a perception that I am an expert, as perhaps not just anyone would be let loose on future prime ministers!  It further helped that the journalist mentioned a high profile public figure (David Cameron) and Prime Ministers Questions in the same article.  The hypnotherapy article also followed one about Prince Andrew.  All raising the visibility of the article by association.

You may be invited to write articles about some aspect of your work.  Recently I was published in Massage World, where I wrote an article about hypno-massage (that was even on the front cover).  This promoted lots of interest from massage therapists about how they could incorporate hypnotherapy into their therapy practice.

Working with journalists, giving them a free therapy session, in return for mention in an article can be more complex.  Whether free or paid, if you conduct therapy on someone, unless previously agreed (and I suggest you get it in writing!) then you are bound by confidentiality.

In reality, this means that they could write their article with unexpected content or from a completely different perspective to the one you were expecting, and you generally cannot present a counter-argument.  Once it is published, any inaccuracies, from your perspective, will remain publicly accessible.

It can be good to discuss expectations prior to the start of the actual therapy session (less of an impact on rapport).  This may include whether you will have an opportunity to view (or even comment upon) any draft articles.  It can be a gamble, because no matter how brilliant a therapist you are, it takes two for the therapy to be effective.

There are likely to be a number of factors present that are not usually part of a standard therapy session. Perhaps the most significant is the motivation of the journalist towards the session.  Do they actually want the change / positive outcome, or are they just going along with what their editor wants?

There may be a theme, angle or perspective to the hypnotherapy article.  It can be useful to understand the publication it will be going into; what their principles and target audiences are.  Alternatively, the journalist may already have a perspective that they wish to write the article from, or it could be part of a themed series.

Often the journalist will do some research about you in advance so will have an idea of how you work.  They may also come into the session with some prepared questions.

If the journalist records the session (with your knowledge, or without), then by listening back, it can take them back to the start of the session (with their problem as it originally was).  Repeated listening to the recording can not only give their problem back to them, but actually strengthen it.  This can result in a poor outcome, even more so with a good subject! Also, if the journalist takes notes, they are likely to be distracted.

A part of them will remain in ‘work’ mode, and thus with a weaker subject, they are even less likely to get full benefit from the session. If they do neither, and just intend to remember the session, then a part of them will be ‘keeping record’ and thus can also impact on how much they engage and commit to the session. Being distracted like this generally means a less accurate recall of the session.  Not just what was done, but why…

However, all hypnotherapists are likely to remember being in class during their training and getting positive outcomes from the practical work.  Even though a part of them was monitoring and observing what was going on (‘student’ mode), they were still able to work on real issues and get helpful change. Several factors can help make the session more likely to be positive.

To minimise any note taking, it can be good to provide the journalist with some key information about you (a mini biography) prior to the session and to clearly establish goals for the session. This can be really helpful when they come to write their hypnotherapy article. It can also be helpful to let them know that you will happily answer questions about the work after the session (preferably at a later date to avoid immediately unpicking your work). As most journalists are skilled at creating rapport, this is something you can make use of within the session to enhance your therapeutic work.

However, do remember who you are working with; that they are both a client and a journalist.  They will be used to getting people to talk. Be careful not to get caught up in the moment and share or disclose more than you usually would.

With all of the above, it can seem that hypnotherapy for a journalist is fraught with problems.  Though it has the potential to be a bit of a minefield, with some clear understanding and preparation, it can be a very effective way of reaching a much wider audience that ever expected.

We hope this blog on hypnotherapy articles, journalism and the media has been helpful, and if you have any questions relating to this blog, do please get in touch, because we’re always happy to help!

– written by Dr Kate Beaven-Marks
(HypnoTC Director)

There are many different routes to becoming a hypnotherapist. Some people start their career in hypnotherapy by taking a workshop, such as a taster day or a ‘rapid hypnosis’ workshop, and then decide that it is something they would like to explore further, leading them on to full practitioner training. Other people just decide to ‘be a hypnotherapist’ and set up as one with little-to-no training (…hopefully, at the very least, they have read a good, and relevant, book on the topic). In the UK, whilst there is currently no legislation that directly requires hypnotherapists to have a certain amount of training, from a civil law perspective, if you work outside of your competence, and don’t work in a way that is ‘fair, just, and reasonable’ you may be neglecting your Duty of Care.

With the ever-expanding choice in training, some students and novice hypnotherapists try taking the ‘short workshop’ route, going from one ‘expert’ to another (‘Guru shopping’). They attend a mix of short courses, intensive workshops and masterclasses, in the hope that if they attend enough of these brief training events, that these will cumulatively add up to something more professional/substantial. However, it doesn’t tend to work that way, as they can miss some of the key fundamentals of hypnosis and hypnotherapy, together with associated psychological theories, and practice-based information, which can lead to significant gaps in skills and knowledge. In a way, it could be like trying to make a complete jigsaw puzzle picture out of a few different pictures. Although all may have a seaside theme, they probably won’t join together well enough to make a clear picture…

Some of the therapy ‘gurus’ and hypnotherapy techniques are heavily promoted and advertised, and can be targeted towards those novices (and even some established therapists) who have limited training/knowledge; offering ‘revolutionary methods’ as diverse remedies, ‘curing anything’ whilst being both ‘fast’ and ‘easy to apply effectively’. It’s an attractive idea, and whilst it would be great to have a ‘pre-packaged, quick, fix-all technique/model’, in reality, many of these courses and their ‘special models’ or ‘ground-breaking, modern techniques’ are in fact re-packaged ‘standard approaches’, delivering a ‘jazzed up’ version of the basics, whilst leaving out much of the underlying theory and supportive information that would allow for a much more informed and scientific (i.e. evidenced) base from which to learn and practice effectively. In fact, many of these techniques (or the parts of their sum/variations thereof) are taught on good foundation/practitioner level training courses.

By gathering skills and knowledge, piecemeal, it may seem like a quick route to becoming a hypnotherapist, yet there is a significant risk that either students will be missing some important information (such as where hypnotherapy can be contra-indicated and why), or that the information they have gathered doesn’t quite ‘link together’ in a practical ‘working model’ (such as how to advance treatment beyond the initial approach, if said approach has not worked for the client). Furthermore, key points, such as legislation, practice management, record keeping, client intake, challenging clients, various treatment approaches, conditions, and so forth, that may be automatically covered on a longer course, don’t tend to be relevant to shorter, more topic/method-focused courses. Another key point that may be glossed over (or dismissed) on the shorter courses, is that by not meeting the UK minimum competence standards set out in the Hypnotherapy Core Curriculum, it isn’t possible to register with the hypnotherapy profession’s voluntary regulator, the Complementary and Natural Healthcare Council (CNHC). Such registration can be a source of reassurance for the public, that a practitioner has had adequate training.

So, is the only answer to take a full practitioner course? Not necessarily. If you have a broad range of training, it can be worth undertaking a knowledge and skills analysis. One of the most relevant ways to do this is to assess your knowledge and skills against the UK Core Curriculum for Hypnotherapy [CLICK TO DOWNLOAD PDF].  If there are only a few gaps, then you may plan a way to meet these. However, if there are a vast number of areas, it may be simpler (and more worthwhile to your development as a hypnotherapist) to consider a longer practitioner level course, thinking of the overlap areas as revision.

Instead of taking the ‘guru shopping’ route, we (as well as many other professional hypnotherapy practitioners) would recommend getting a firm foundation knowledge and skills first. This can save you time, effort and money in the medium and longer term. Whilst it may take a little while longer to complete your initial training, you are likely to be able to break down and identify key components of a wide range of models and techniques, and adapt them to suit your own therapy practice. At the end of a practitioner-level hypnotherapy training course, you will be able to assess your own knowledge and skills, and then consider from an informed perspective what the various ‘guru’ and ‘technique’ workshops are offering, giving you the opportunity to assess whether they are necessary/helpful/something you don’t have but would use.

Although ‘guru shopping’ may not be an ideal route for initial training, and can leave the novice hypnotherapist confused and limited in terms of knowledge, skills and competence, it certainly can be an interesting way for qualified hypnotherapy practitioners to develop and expand their knowledge and skills.

One way of looking at it, is that the hypnotherapy training world is like a vast restaurant. To one side, is a huge, diverse buffet. Here you take your plate round hot, cold, spicy and sweet options, all cooked by different chefs of varying skill, putting on your plate some of each of the ones that catch your attention. Some taste great, others aren’t quite to your taste (but it’s fine, because you only took a small portion). However, it’s a lot more likely that by mixing the whole plate together, it may not taste all that good. On the other side of the restaurant, is the set menu, cooked by professional, Michelin-starred chefs. It still has choices, and the dining experience may take longer (as it’s cooked to order), but each meal has been carefully designed and balanced with a distinct end goal in mind.

We hope that you hunger and strive for the best training available to you, especially at the start of your foray into hypnotherapy, and that this blog has been helpful to you. If you have any more questions about this topic or anything else for that matter, do please get in touch, because we’re always happy to help!

– written by the HypnoTC team

Hypnotic suggestions form the basis of all that we do as hypnotherapists. Aside from when we use various ‘techniques’ (think NLP, psychotherapy, CBT, etc.) in our sessions, the rest of our ‘therapy work’ is generally ‘suggestion-based’. But what makes a good hypnotic suggestion? Do you need to ensure that it is a certain length? Should it be directly or indirectly phrased? Do you need to use sneaky ’embedded’ language? What about turning your suggestions into metaphors? These are all valid questions, and ones that I hear quite frequently. The thing, however, with delivering effective suggestions is that many people try to run before they can walk… Trying to include complex language patterns, ’embedding’ your suggestions conversationally and creating in-depth therapeutic metaphors (just as a few examples) are all great ways of delivering suggestion… if you already know how to deliver basic ‘direct suggestions’.

If you can’t create simple direct suggestions, you’re probably not going to get very far with the more complex stuff… (and when you get to a point that you do understand how to effectively create direct suggestions, you will be much more able to effortlessly expand your suggestion-creating skills into more indirect and complex areas, maybe without even realising how good you have become in such a short space of time).

So what is a direct suggestion? Well, it is exactly what it says it is; suggesting that someone do something, using direct language. For example; “take a nice deep breath, then exhale and relax…” – you are directly suggesting the resulting behaviour (or thought) that you wish the client to engage in. Simple, right?

…So how do you get good at doing that?

The best thing you can do. especially if developing suggestions isn’t one of your strong points yet, is to get to grips with how to directly suggest your desired result. Figure out how to most simply state the thing you want to happen (or want them to think), and then work on figuring out numerous, slightly different ways to say the same thing (or variations on a theme, because although repetition is good, it can be more effective to give many similar suggestions rather than the same one over and over). So, for example, if you want to tell a smoking cessation client how bad cigarettes are going to taste after the session, you could suggest:

“Any time you smell cigarette smoke, you will notice how awful it smells”
or
“When you pass by a smoker, it will smell horrendous”
or
“The longer you don’t smoke, the more the smell of cigarettes repulses you”
or
“Even just thinking of smoking will cause you to imagine a foul, stinking taste in your mouth”
or
“Cigarettes make you smell horrible, each puff staining your body, teeth, hair and clothes with its gross stench”

The above examples are all pretty much telling the client to understand and accept that ‘cigarettes smell gross’. You could create a whole direct suggestion script based on how cigarettes smell gross, and (for the right clients, depending on motivations / drivers) it would probably be a very useful thing to add in to your smoking cessation therapy session.

So, start simple (you can do this now if you want)… Think of some things that you might want to tell different client with different issues / goals and write these things down in a list. A couple of examples to get you started; what would you say to someone who wants to stop eating chocolate? Someone who has a phobia of birds? Someone who has trouble getting to sleep at night?

Once you have a few things listed, then think of one key phrase / suggestion that would fit with that issue / goal. To follow with the examples above: “Any time you think of chocolate, you will go and have a glass of water” / “You will easily relax whenever you see a bird… The more birds, the more you can relax…” / “When you lay down in bed, you will find that you mind clears, and you can easily go to sleep.“

…and then start to think of various different and direct ways to tell them the same thing (or similar), creating a number of different, direct hypnotic suggestions. Keep your suggestions framed positively (towards positive things, rather than away from negative) and as descriptive as possible in as few words as needed…

As well as this, during any hypnotherapy / hypnosis sessions that you do, think in terms of ‘what can I say to get them to do what I want them to do, in as few words as possible, without diluting the message and without being indirect / permissive’… Maybe even try going through an entire session of hypnosis / hypnotherapy using only direct suggestions. This will definitely get you on the road to becoming a suggestion master!

Then, once you have gotten used to creating and using (important) these direct suggestions, you can begin to move onto more ‘indirect’ methods. A great tool that can help you out with this (whether you’re just starting out or looking to improve from where you’re currently at) is our pack of ‘Hypnotic Language Cards’, which you can buy on Amazon [click here]

 …based on the language patterns of Milton H. Erickson, and adapted by Dr Kate and myself, these language cards will definitely help you on the road to becoming a master of hypnotic suggestions. Something that all hypnotherapists should certainly be working towards…

SO, we hope this blog has been super helpful, but if you do have any more questions on how to create hypnotic suggestions (or anything else for that matter) do please get in touch, because we’re always happy to help!

– written by the HypnoTC team

Using client feedback to enhance your therapy practice

As a therapist, it can be useful, and informative, to get feedback from your clients. Simply asking “What do you like about the way I work, and what could be different?” can be very helpful for both client and therapist. Having the confidence in yourself as a practitioner to ask for feedback can communicate to the client that not only are you secure within yourself, but that you are open to input and to change.

Whatever feedback you receive is information about how others experience you as a therapist, delivering a professional service. At times, however, you may receive inaccurate opinions, ill-founded comments about your behaviour, tactless words about your approach and even biased judgements, but do remember, your clients are unlikely to have your communication skills and are more likely to be personal and subjective, rather than objective. However, whatever they do say, and how they say it, offers another element of insight into their thoughts.

When receiving feedback, do listen closely and actively, and seek clarification of any points which are unclear.  Remember, you do not need to justify your work.  If the feedback was unpleasant, you may want to give yourself time to reflect on it and evaluate it for relevance.  Remember, feedback is offered for consideration, but you do not need to accept it as truth!  By seeking feedback, you are expanding your self-awareness, offering yourself opportunities to explore your own strengths and areas for development.

Getting feedback: Do it right…

Whilst it can be highly beneficial to seek and gain feedback, it is important to do so at the right time and in the right way.  For example, by getting feedback at the start of the next session (or if only one session, at a later date) rather than at the end of the therapy session, you avoid giving the client an opportunity to ‘unpick’ the work. This also allows some time for the client to consider the key points they wish to provide.  Face-to-face feedback is often a more constructive conversation than the ‘flatter’ forms such as email or text.

Do consider your body language, both when seeking and receiving information.  Where feedback is provided in other ways (rather than in person), do be particularly aware of your choice of words, to avoid misunderstanding.  Also, be aware that if feedback is passed from one person to another, it may lose some aspects in its translation.  This can be more common in feedback situations that are not two-way communications, such as questionnaires, feedback forms and emails.  In addition, both Skype / internet and telephone interviews miss out on possibly vital body language.

Consider what you would like to achieve from gaining feedback and how you will use it. Ask for specific examples, their views and ideas with open questions, such as: “How do you feel the session went?” and “How could we have worked on this differently?” 

During the actual receiving of feedback, it can be helpful to consider there are several ‘stages’ for receiving feedback. A useful way of remembering this is with the acronym ‘ROAR’:

Receive:
Be aware of your immediate reaction; avoid defending

Organise:
Organise your thoughts ready for the next stage

Assess:
Assess your own performance with consideration of the feedback received

Respond:
Thank the person for feedback, respectfully disagree where appropriate (an appropriately), and indicate where you agree, keeping focused on what can be achieved in the future. Also, during the receiving of feedback, you may also wish to consider your level of engagement…

Level One: Personal listening:
Focused on own, internal voice and thoughts, including what we think about what they are saying

Level Two: Considered listening:
Focused on what we think or feel about what the client is saying to us

Level Three: Engaged / Active listening:
Completely focused on what the client is saying, and using active listening approaches to gain facts, considered meaning and evaluate intention

Level Four: Connected listening:
Completely focused on verbal and non-verbal communications, including identification of surface and deeper meanings and feelings

Feedback topics

Some topics you can seek feedback on, include how the client felt about:

• How the session was commenced
  (such as introduction, limits of the work, confidentiality, expectations and information)
• How the therapist helped to identify their areas of concern
  (such as the use of open and Socratic questioning, avoidance of judgements or prescription)
• How both the hypnosis and therapy within the hypnotherapy session met or did not meet their expectations
• The therapist’s interpersonal skills (verbal and non-verbal)
• Whether the therapist listened to them actively
• Understanding things from their point of view
• Accepting what is said without judgement
• Displaying warmth and empathy in in safe environment
• How the session was conducted
• Whether you challenged them
• Overall level of satisfaction with the experience
• General feedback relating to their experience of the therapeutic process

Personal vs. professional feedback

When you receive feedback, do ensure that you separate technical / professional feedback from personal feedback, and avoid justifying or defending matters raised.  It doesn’t necessarily matter what the client thinks of you as a person, the important thing is what they think of you as a therapist and what they thought of the session.  Also, do remember, you have control over your attitude (open and interested, rather than defensive and closed.

Feedback formula

When seeking feedback, it can be useful to clients to give them a model to help structure balanced (negative and/or positive) feedback.  The ‘SEOR’ system works well for this:

Situation:
Describe, who, what, where, when e.g. “Last week, when we worked on my fear of mice…”

Expectation:
Explain what was expected e.g. “I thought we would look at where my fear came from…”

Outcome:
What happened and how it related to expectations e.g. “Because you worked on my reactions both now and those that might occur in the future, it surprised me and wasn’t what I expected…”

Result:
The outcome’s impact e.g. “I was pleasantly surprised that I did not have to go back into past memories, and yet I am now much more confident around mice.”

We hope this blog has been helpful, and it is important, because working with feedback can generate greater mutual understanding and enhance the effects of therapeutic engagement… but if you have any more questions on how to effectively get feedback from your clients (or anything else for that matter) do please get in touch, because we’re always happy to help!

– written by Dr Kate Beaven-Marks
(HypnoTC Director)

Do you sometimes wonder how to most effectively engage in a difficult conversation?  Some people may say that good conversations are a matter of common sense… they may be; but they are not always common practice.  Perhaps a client is regularly late for their appointment, or maybe you have a colleague who doesn’t communicate enough.  Imagine perhaps that a client is voicing their concern in a less than positive or tactful manner, “this is rubbish, it doesn’t work, you aren’t any good…”. 

What stops you communicating with them about it?  What could go wrong?  It can be good to be alert to any limiting beliefs that you might have (e.g. “They won’t like me anymore”) and strengthen your positive self-beliefs.  Be aware that you are in charge of your own destiny, no-one else.

The start of effective communication begins with listening…

Do you hear yourself interrupting?  Particularly with “yes, but…”?  Are you diagnosing before you have heard the full story? Do you find yourself giving or dictating solutions?  Do you turn it back around to yourself, with “Oh, me too…” or are you constantly writing everything down, thus avoiding eye contact and distancing yourself.

Effective active listening skills includes reflecting back, summarising and clarifying their views (“So what you are saying is that it sounds like you…”),  appropriate eye contact and asking non-leading questions.

How do you deal with difficult conversations?

Take a moment to honestly think about how you would deal with the following situations:

• Someone is complaining about a person you like very much
• A client asks your opinion and then says “yes, but” to your suggestions
• A colleague takes credit for your work / ideas
• You are critiqued unjustly

How would you usually deal with difficult conversations such as these?  Are you an ‘Avoider’, a ‘Full Attacker’ or a ‘Mediator’?

An ‘Avoider’ avoids getting to the point, floats and drifts around it

A ‘Full Attacker’ attacks the issue like a sledgehammer

A ‘Mediator’ communicates with respect, and is focused on a defined outcome

Where a conversation starts in conflict, or develops into conflict, asking questions slows down conflict, whereas defensiveness speeds it up.  However, be aware of how those questions can trigger unwanted responses…

 “Don’t you think” = I think

“Did you”…”Have you” = You should have

What are you working with?

With difficult conversations, and particularly when giving feedback, you are not working with their personality or their attitude, you are working with their behaviour.

Describe their behaviour in a neutral state; “What you did/said was X….”

Explain how you felt; “I felt X…”

Indicate understanding; “I understand X…”

Inform; “In future X…”

Remember to include open questions (what, how, when, where, who), avoiding why (analytical, potential for judgement or blame) and avoid closed (yes / no) questions.

Therapeutic feedback

Effective feedback to and from clients is a vital part of therapeutic communication.  Alongside active listening and rapport building, feedback management, both the giving and receiving of feedback, has many benefits, not least enhancing working relationships and our overall effectiveness as therapists.  We communicate feedback all the time; how we speak, listen, our tone of voice, our words, even the silences between the words.  Whether we acknowledge it or not, we are giving feedback all the time.  Feedback not only conveys information from one person to another about behaviour or actions that have occurred or may occur, but also influences the nature, and likelihood of its occurrence or recurrence.  It can be conscious (deliberate, verbal) or unconscious (non-verbal, body language)…

It is better when our feedback is precise and helpful, and phrased to refer, without interpretation or judgement, to specific observed and perceived ways of behaviour, not the person (or personality) themselves.  In addition, it is better when given at the right moment and presented in a way that the recipient can use and respond to.

Feedback enables the client to explore their strengths and areas for growth in an engaged manner, taking ownership in the process.  Where feedback is balanced, accurate, well-timed, clear, specific, it can help the client perform more effectively (e.g. presentation strategies), inform the client about effects of certain behaviours (e.g. healthy eating), correct misinformation (e.g. about myths) and check for understanding (e.g. “…you are saying you are coming for hypnotherapy primarily to reduce stress”), whilst avoiding the provision of opinions e.g. “You really ought to attend therapy more regularly”

In effective feedback, there needs to be value and understanding.  Both parties need to feel that they have been understood, and that what has been communicated has some value e.g. “This is important because…” “That is interesting because….”

Providing positive feedback is an opportunity to motivate and give praise, hopefully inspiring the person to do more of what will get them more praise, building on positive feelings and commitment. Giving effective feedback and receiving feedback well, are skills that can be developed with practice.

How to give feedback

There are a range of feedback types, with descriptive approaches being the most commonly applied:

Describing the behaviour or action

Evaluating the behaviour action introduces an element of critique

Emotional feedback can be less helpful from a therapist, as it communicates from a feelings perspective, yet can offer insight when provided by the client

Interpretative feedback develops insight and awareness by showing a ‘different perspective’.

Self feedback is where the therapist wishes to help the client develop their own self-reflection skills. They can ask the client to reflect and consider what feedback they would give themselves.

When considering how you give feedback, also consider the influence of cultural diversity.  How we communicate may generally (though unintentionally) be confusing or even potentially impolite, for our clients.  Being culturally aware is useful, and checking with clients can get some helpful feedback too.

Before giving feedback, it is useful to first consider why you are planning to give feedback.  Consider whether it is necessary, why you are giving it, will it be helpful? Can you be honest? Are you able to speak with respect? Can you be compassionate?  The key purpose of giving genuine and authentic feedback is to raise the client’s awareness of what they are doing. It may be that you are working with a client’s denial of their self-destructive habits.  It is a skill to be able to tolerate uncomfortable situations as a therapist, staying connected to and present with the client in that moment of the therapeutic process.  Sometimes, it is those difficult moments, particularly where a client faces up to their own accountability, that offer the most growth and development.

A genuine intention to help or provide information will come across to the client in how feedback is received and is more likely to generate a positive response.  Do remember, also, that feedback is ‘offered’, the client always has a choice whether they will accept it or not.

The feedback process

Communicate your feedback effectively

When giving feedback using the right language is important, and as hypnotherapists and hypnotists we (hopefully) understand how to phrase and frame our comments positively, avoiding any perception of judgement, criticism or attack (as such an approach is unlikely to enhance the situation). Thus, avoiding communications such as “You didn’t do xyz…” and instead using “If you had xyz, it would have…” or replacing “You didn’t handle that very well” with “How could you have handled that situation differently?”  will generally be a more effective choice when giving feedback.

A feedback model for communicating changes to behaviour is ‘D.E.R.I.S.T’:

Extra tips

Here are 9 more useful tips on how to enhance your feedback communication:

1 – Take time to consider what you want to say.

2 – Offer rather than push your information and suggestions. Instead of giving advice / opinions, present ideas and reflections.

3 – Be factual, speaking from your own perspective, offering observations of what you have seen or heard, rather than giving assumptions or interpretations, which can be misguidedly built from incomplete information.

4 – Be specific, such as “When you laughed I felt upset because I wanted to be taken seriously”, as opposed to generalisations, such as “You never take me seriously”.

5 – Be selective and avoid giving someone too much to do at once.

6 – Be supportive, rather than critical. Work from a position of ‘unconditional positive regard’.

7 – Make it personal, by using “I” in your feedback, such as “I felt disappointed when you didn’t attend your appointment”, rather than “You have failed yourself by not coming to the session”.

8 – Listen, be honest, respect boundaries.

9 – During feedback, having a congruent tone of voice enhances the impact of the feedback.

We hope this blog has been helpful, but if you have any more questions on how to give effective feedback to your clients (or anything else for that matter) do please get in touch, because we’re always happy to help!

– written by Dr Kate Beaven-Marks
(HypnoTC Director)