Uriah Guilford | Managing Your Time and Being Productive In Private Practice | TPOT 176
The Practice of Therapy Podcast with Gordon Brewer
Release Date: 05/03/2021
How Therapists Can Use Social Media Without Feeling Fake | Jazzmyn Proctor | TPOT 424
The Practice of Therapy Podcast with Gordon Brewer
Marketing can feel uncomfortable for a lot of therapists. Most of us were trained to be neutral, private, and to keep the focus on the client. So when someone tells you that you need to show up on social media or talk about your work publicly, it can feel a little strange. But visibility matters more than ever when it comes to building a private practice. In this episode, I’m joined by Jazzmyn Proctor, a therapist, podcaster, and marketing mentor who helps clinicians show up online in ways that feel authentic and sustainable. Jazzmyn shares how she started building her presence while still...
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Scaling a Private Practice with Intensives, Classes, and Conferences | Dr. Wyatt Fisher | TPOT 423
The Practice of Therapy Podcast with Gordon Brewer
Couples therapy can be some of the most rewarding work we do as therapists, but it can also be one of the most challenging. Many couples don’t reach out for help until things feel like they’re falling apart. By the time they sit down in your office, there are often years of resentment, hurt, and miscommunication built up beneath the surface. In this episode, I’m joined by Dr. Wyatt Fisher, a psychologist and couples therapist who has spent years refining his approach to helping couples work through those deeper issues. Wyatt shares how his own personal and professional experiences shaped...
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Doing Couples Therapy as a Husband-and-Wife Team | Kiana & Andrew Joyner | TPOT 422
The Practice of Therapy Podcast with Gordon Brewer
If you’ve ever thought about offering couples therapy in your private practice but felt intimidated by the complexity of it, you’re going to love this conversation. In this episode, I’m joined by Kiana and Andrew Joyner, a married duo who run their practice together and specialize in couples work. Kiana is a licensed therapist, and Andrew is a certified professional coach, and together they bring a really unique dynamic into the therapy room. We talk about what it actually looks like to do couples counseling as a husband and wife team, how they divide roles between therapy and coaching,...
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Diversifying Your Income Without Burning Out | Jenny Melrose | TPOT 421
The Practice of Therapy Podcast with Gordon Brewer
If you’ve ever thought, “There has to be a way to make money in my private practice besides just seeing more clients,” this episode is for you. In this conversation, I’m joined by Jenny Melrose, host of the Practice to Profit podcast, and we dive into what it really looks like to diversify your income as a therapist. We talk about moving from one-to-one work into one-to-many offers, creating resources based on the same questions your clients ask over and over, and building income streams that do not require you to be in the therapy room 40 hours a week. Jenny shares practical ideas...
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Private Practice Profit Margins: What’s Healthy (and What’s a Red Flag) | Gretchen Roberts | TPOT 420
The Practice of Therapy Podcast with Gordon Brewer
Running a private practice usually means you did not set out to become a numbers person. You are trained to help people, not to read profit and loss statements or stress about tax projections. But the reality is this. If you own a practice, you are running a business. In this episode, I sit down with of to talk about the financial side of private practice in a way that feels practical and doable. We unpack how to use your financial reports as a management tool, what healthy profit margins actually look like, and the payroll mistakes that can quietly drain your profit. We also talk about cash...
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Treating Neuroplastic Pain in Therapy and Private Practice | Dr. Melissa Tiessen | TPOT 419
The Practice of Therapy Podcast with Gordon Brewer
What if chronic pain isn’t a sign that your body is broken—but that your nervous system is trying to protect you? In this episode, Dr. Melissa Tiessen, a clinical psychologist and neuroplastic pain specialist, joins the show to unpack a paradigm-shifting way of understanding chronic pain and persistent physical symptoms. Drawing on neuroscience, trauma-informed therapy, and real-world clinical experience, Melissa explains how pain can exist without tissue damage—and why that realization can actually be good news. You’ll learn how neuroplastic pain develops, why symptoms can move,...
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Diversifying a Private Practice Through Couples Work | Erin Valente | TPOT 418
The Practice of Therapy Podcast with Gordon Brewer
What if couples therapy isn’t about fixing the other person at all? In this episode, Gordon sits down with Erin Valente, a couples therapist based in Los Angeles, to talk about one of the most common mistakes couples make when they come to therapy—and why real change doesn’t live with one partner, but in the relationship itself. They explore why couples work can feel intimidating for therapists, how regulation and co-regulation shape meaningful conversations, and what it really takes to help couples move out of blame and into connection. Erin also shares how she’s structured her...
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Free Continuing Education for Therapists | Tobin Richardson | TPOT 417
The Practice of Therapy Podcast with Gordon Brewer
In today’s episode, I’m excited to introduce you to Tobin Richardson, the founder of a platform called Save the Therapist. When I first learned about what Tobin is building, I knew this was something many of you would want to hear about. Continuing education is a requirement for all of us, but let’s be honest. It can be expensive, time-consuming, and sometimes hard to fit into an already full schedule. Tobin saw that problem firsthand and decided to do something about it. He created a platform that offers high-quality, accredited continuing education for therapists that is completely...
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Preventing Burnout in Private Practice | Dr. Julie Merriman | TPOT 416
The Practice of Therapy Podcast with Gordon Brewer
There are some conversations you record where you know right away that they’re going to land differently. In today’s episode, I sit down with Dr. Julie Merriman, a therapist, professor, and longtime advocate for helpers who are quietly burning out. We talk about something that hits close to home for many of us in this profession: what happens when we’re really good at helping everyone else, but don’t know how to receive ourselves. Julie shares how so many therapists become what she calls “floating heads of competence.” We’re full of knowledge, skill, and clinical insight, yet...
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When Narcissism Walks Into Your Therapy Office | Dr. Anthony Mazzella | TPOT 415
The Practice of Therapy Podcast with Gordon Brewer
If you’ve ever found yourself thinking, “Why is this client so hard to reach?” or “Why does every conversation turn into a power struggle?” this episode is for you. Today, I’m joined by Dr. Anthony Mazzella, a psychoanalyst who specializes in working with narcissistic dynamics. We go far beyond surface-level conversations about narcissism. This isn’t about labels, buzzwords, or quick fixes. It’s about what’s actually happening underneath the behavior and what truly helps. We talk about why arguing over “reality” never works, why confrontation often backfires, and how...
info_outlineIn this episode, Uriah of Productive Therapist joins the show. Uriah thinks that life is too short to burn out early. So, Uriah gives us tips on conquering the overwhelm and growing your practice seamlessly with the least amount of stress possible. First, we chat about how you can conquer the email overwhelm by using the inbox zero method and only checking your inbox three times a day. Later, Uriah reveals the three keys to productivity, and we talk about personal knowledge management.
Meet Uriah Guilford
I am a licensed therapist & group practice owner. I want to help you be more productive, profitable & happy with your business and your life. Basically, work less and get more done!
If you have achieved any level of success in your private practice then you can relate to the following. You have more tasks to complete than hours in the day. You work super hard because you are passionate and want to grow. Sometimes you neglect your self-care and other important things in your life. Not so great right!?
That is why I have built a team of amazing virtual assistants for practice owners just like you! Hiring a virtual assistant in 2012 was one of the best decisions I ever made. It allowed me to double my business income without feeling like I was losing my mind. Actually, go on vacation and not be tied to my iPhone the whole time.
And serve my clients better! It made such a massive difference for me and it can for you as well! If this sounds interesting, check out our services page and the most frequently asked questions we get all the time.
Helping Therapists Conquer Email Overwhelm
Do you feel frustrated and overwhelmed with your email inbox? In Uriah's 7-Day Email Transformation Challenge, there are basically seven days of tips that have pretty quick action steps. On day two, he talks about batching; it's the simple idea of taking similar tasks, putting them together, and doing them simultaneously. So when you apply that to email, it means checking and processing email at certain times, but not throughout your day, not constantly.
Uriah has made a massive change just this week - whenever his workday is done, he will close his email so that when he gets back to the computer the next day, he won't see his emails right away. Uriah created a schedule to process emails three times a day: nine, twelve, and three. Uriah hasn't been perfect. However, this week has made a huge difference so far because he is getting a lot more things done when he is spending hours away from his inbox. Typically, when someone has an email – they feel the urge to respond to it right away. Take away the urge!
Reaching Inbox Zero
Inbox zero means processing all your emails to the point where there are zero emails left. Uriah personally likes to be at inbox zero. Whether you have ten emails or one hundred emails, responding to the essential people and taking care of the things that are top priorities will be crucial. When you pay less attention to your inbox, you may not process every email you have. However, you can snooze the emails that are not urgent for you to respond to that day. Gmail has the most powerful tools for organizing – it lets you create filters and sort messages to prevent inbox overload.
The Three Keys of Productivity
Uriah highly recommends checking out Michael Hyatt's book, Free to Focus A Total Productivity System to Achieve More by Doing Less. In the book, Michael speaks about the three keys of productivity: elimination, automation, and delegation. So, Uriah likes to strategize with therapists to remove things from their calendar and their to-do list. We automatically add things that we think we need to be doing to our calendar. So whatever you can eliminate from your schedule and your to-do list is going to help you free up your time and let you focus on the important stuff. Also, automate anything that you can! For instance, Gmail has filters that you can help automate your email process. Lastly, delegation is Uriah's favorite productivity hack. Anything that you can get off your plate and have somebody else take care of for you will immediately free up your time and help you be more productive.
The Problem Of Success
When you start a private practice, you have a revenue goal. However, you don't know what it will feel like you when you get there. Handling all the calls while seeing clients while updating QuickBooks is going to be overwhelming. Also, we may not be the best person to be taking on all of these different tasks. You can find a competent person, whether it's a virtual assistant or somebody you hire, that comes into your office to take over that role. If you are busy seeing clients, then your phone is going to be sent to voicemail. In the meantime, those people are calling other counselors and shopping around. So, it's critical to have someone answer your phones while you're in session – you simply cannot do both! Most people wait too long to hire someone to help with their phones.
Personal Knowledge Management
Personal knowledge management encompasses how we take in, collect, and access all kinds of information. If you just think about it as a therapist, all of the CPUs, training, and information that we collect over time becomes hard to organize and find when you need it. Uriah has been actually using Evernote, it's been around for a long time. He uses that for basically everything. Whenever Uriah has an idea, he writes it down! The nice thing is that a lot of them are tagged, and they're easily searchable. He uses Evernote to track his goals, it's basically his second brain. Another app that Uriah loves is Todoist – it's a task manager you can trust for life.
Being transparent… Some of the resources below use affiliate links which simply means we receive a commission if you purchase using the links, at no extra cost to you. Thanks for using the links!
Uriah’s Resources
Productive Therapist
Guilford Family Counseling
Resources
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Win at Work and Succeed at Life: 5 Principles to Free Yourself from the Cult of Overwork
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Meet Gordon Brewer, MEd, LMFT
Gordon is the person behind The Practice of Therapy Podcast & Blog. He is also President and Founder of Kingsport Counseling Associates, PLLC. He is a therapist, consultant, business mentor, trainer, and writer. PLEASE Subscribe to The Practice of Therapy Podcast wherever you listen to it. Follow us on Twitter @therapistlearn, and Pinterest, “Like” us on Facebook.