199 Sarah Rivera: Supervising Associates in Private Practice

Business questions will enter the supervision room. That does not mean every business question belongs there.

In this episode, Sarah Rivera of La Luz Counseling in San Antonio talks about what happens when an LPC Associate owns and operates a private practice. This is a relatively new supervision reality, and many supervisors are still deciding where their responsibilities begin and end.

Sarah walks us through the tension between clinical supervision and business support. We talk about fee setting, marketing, intake documents, websites, liability coverage, after-hours availability, and the risks that emerge when a supervisor also offers business consulting.

We also discuss dual roles. A dual role is not automatically unethical, but it can become complicated when expectations are unclear, money affects judgment, or an associate feels pressured to purchase another service from the supervisor.

This conversation is about role clarity. The goal is not to ignore the associate’s business reality. The goal is to keep supervision centered on clinical competence, ethical decision-making, documentation, professional identity, and client welfare.

In this episode, you’ll learn:

• How to distinguish clinical supervision from business consultation
• Why private practice expectations belong in the supervision agreement
• What increased risk factors may require additional structure
• How fee-setting questions can be reframed as professional identity discussions
• Why supervisors must continue providing objective evaluation and feedback
• How outside business resources can protect the clinical supervision hour

A successful business may grow from strong clinical development. But business success is not the primary goal of supervision.

When the lanes are clear, supervisors can remain supportive without losing objectivity. Associates can ask questions without assuming every service is included. Both people have a documented system they can return to when the work becomes complicated.

Want to learn more? Check out this month’s free resource from Kate Walker Training. And if this episode raised questions about your supervision agreements, risk procedures, or documentation, these are the conversations we continue inside the Step It Up Membership.

Get your step by step guide to private practice. Because you are too important to lose to not knowing the rules, going broke, burning out, and giving up. #counselorsdontquit. 

Transcript

Why Critical Supervision Comes First

SPEAKER_02 0:00

The goal of critical supervision is to develop clinically competent and ethical mental health professionals. That the writing private practice may result from that growth. And that would be a wonderful and beautiful thing. But the business success is not the primary objective here.

SPEAKER_01 0:28

And if you're journalists, Dr.

SPEAKER_04 0:30

Kate Walker spending way too much time on Facebook marketplace. More of your associates' own private practices than ever before, and that's putting supervisors in a role nobody trained them for. Part clinical supervisor, part accidental business coach. Today I'm joined by Sarah Rivera of La Luz Counseling in San Antonio to talk about where that line actually is. How to support an associate's private practice without slipping into dual relationships, role confusion, or work that isn't yours to do. If you supervise even one associate in a private practice, this episode gives you language and structure you can use starting this week. And now, Sarah Rivera.

No Mini Me Supervising

SPEAKER_02 1:43

That's really the goal. One time I heard somebody say, um, what did she say? She was she was in the world and she was just about to get her first associate. And she was like, I'm just so excited because I can't wait. What did she say? I can't wait to make her my mini me or something. And I was like, that's the saddest thing I've ever heard. And she was like, What do you mean by that? And I was like, I hope that she's not your mini, you know, mini you, but like that, she's her own self. Like, that's not the goal here is to make them like little versions of you. Like, that's not the goal at all. Like the goal is to make sure that they're the best version of themselves. And so that takes a lot of time. And I love that we have the capacity to be able to do that over the course of a few years. I can tell you that the majority of the associates that I supervise in terms of accruing their 3,000 hours is pushing right around that 26 to 28 month range. And that's a lot of time that you get to spend with them. So you're able to not only teach them these things, but also to model within yourself the type of professional that you're hoping for their standard to be as well. So we always want to uplift them, encourage them, and all of that fun identity stuff that you'll be able to get to learn in the different offerings that Kate has. Um, I definitely recommend all things Kate Walker training. Um, just want to put, you know, a little shout out there. It's super helpful. Now, those are not the things that we're gonna get into today, though, right? We're talking about if we were to be supervising an LPC associate in private practice. But of course, that last one that sometimes I think it's a little bit harder for some, but is providing that ongoing evaluation and feedback that is part of the clinical requirements in being a supervisor. So don't ever negate the power of the feedback evaluation, those objective measures, and make sure that you're not forgetting to do that along the way when you're supervising um your associates. Does anybody have any questions just in the general expectations of clinical supervision as it stands outside of private practice? So in private practice, outside of private practice agency, but just in general.

The Rule Change And Fallout

SPEAKER_02 3:51

Okay, so once we get movement and grooving from there, I called it an update. It's in quotes because it's really not an update. It's it's a totally outstanding thing, obviously, which is why we're meeting here today. But there was an update a few years ago, specifically in 2022 and in 2021, where for the first time LPC associates and LMFT associates were allowed to own and operate their own independent private practice, not to be confused with operating independently. So around this time, the behavioral health executive council said, hey, we're gonna lift this restriction. And it was at that point in time, shortly after COVID, when LPC associates, LMFT associates everywhere were like, I'm gonna open up my own private practice. Before that time, it was strictly prohibited, meaning that we never saw. So remember back when I started in supervision, and many of you started in supervision, this was not a consideration. So prior to 2021, we weren't even thinking about associates owning and operating their own private practice. So it wasn't a conversation piece. That's what I was talking about earlier, that this is a fairly new kind of uh concept. And when I say new, this is why we're 2026, so max of five years, not even five years, but we're pushing only about four to five years when we're gaining information of what LPC associates and LMFT associates look like when they're in private practice.

SPEAKER_04 5:15

So LMFT associates, they could, the language was there, and that was part of the problem. They they had the ability, there was a sort of a pathway for them to have their own private practice. And LPC associates, that was one of their arguments. You know, if they can do it, why can't we? You know, we're going to class with them. We're sitting, you know, so that we're we're trained the same.

SPEAKER_02 5:38

So correct me if I'm wrong in everybody else too. Is it still correct that LMSW associates cannot own and operate their own?

SPEAKER_04 5:47

I wish Ashley Durbin was on here. Don't quote me. It's it's something to do with they can't own a business. So I'm not sure if the terminology is practice. So if you're a social worker, uh, we can get that answer for you if you have that as a question.

SPEAKER_02 6:03

Or if you have that as an answer. Um, but really what we're talking about specifically, and again, my total niche is going to be LPC Associates. So I tried to do a little bit of back end there. But if anybody has any more up-to-date information, please don't feel like you have to keep quiet if you're like, Sarah, that ain't right. Tell me, or put it in the chat just to make sure that we are sharing the rightful, you know, incorrect information. So again, with this update, LPC supervisors and other clinical supervisors really had to awaken this possibility that you could not only be overseeing a mental health professional who's a developing clinician, but also an entrepreneur. And it was at that point that with those two roles, there was a little bit of some conflict and tension emerging because it started to sound like what's my lane and what's not my lane? What's the supportive role that I want to have and what is not the supportive goal that I want to have? And so moving from there, I was kind of surprised at some of the things that I had been seeing just in uh kind of those online spaces. But I wanted to share this with you all because it's just something that I saw online. But there was someone who was um sharing their private practice kind of

When Supervision Sounds Like Coaching

SPEAKER_02 7:20

support that they offered during the clinical supervision experience. So private practice, preparation, and business mentorship. Interested in becoming your own boss one day? Learn the fundamentals of private practice for therapists, including fee setting, marketing, policies, and systems to run a successful business. Another one sounded like if you're looking for a supervisor who can ethically guide you towards kinking outside the box, tap into your creativity and take the appropriate risks needed to grow your own private practice while learning to manage work-life balance. I would love the opportunity to work with you. And so I think it's really important to just kind of say, like, it's out there. There are folks who are advertising as such. And so I wanted to take a quick pause. Tell me what your thoughts are on this. Is this something where you're like, yeah, that sounds like a great offering? Like, mine is similar to that, or eek. I have a little bit of some concerns here. And again, this is not to knock anybody who is advertising as such, but I would love to just kind of get a close track is what are your thoughts on hearing something like this?

SPEAKER_01 8:18

I I I mean, looking at this, it very it seems like it it is very um directed at just running a practice rather than their clinical skills. Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_02 8:29

That's what I take out of it. It's kind of sounding like some some business development, right? So promotion of some some business entrepreneurship. Like I can help you along your business building growth.

SPEAKER_01 8:41

Which is a very important part of supervision, I believe. I'm not a supervisor. I am going to start that soon. But yeah, I I I would like to see a little more um talk about the clinical skills.

SPEAKER_02 8:55

Right, right. And so that's really a great place to start. Is if you happen to fall into this category, it's really important to think what part of me is the clinical supervisor, what part of me would be a business coach at this point? Because that's what we're getting into. So when we start talking about business development, business structures, you're not necessarily in the land of clinical supervision. You're in the land of not clinical supervision. Anyone who's taken a supervisor's training course, you're not getting information on how to teach somebody else how to run a business. That's not part of being a clinical supervisor. And so with that in mind, Kate asks a good question. It's like, do they have the expertise to back that up? And back that up as evidence by what? So would they still be reliable if they've never owned and operating, operated their own private practice? Does that lose somehow lose credibility? What if they've owned and operated multiple other businesses outside of product private practice? Would that still substantiate enough for them to advertise as business coaches? And so we start getting into a lot of kind of questions here. But the reality is those who are advertising in this manner, it's suggestive that I can be your clinical supervisor and that's one of the hats that I wear, as well as your business coach, and that's the other hat that I wear. So with those kind of concepts in mind, it's really important for you to decide right now what is it that you would like to be as an LPC supervisor? The board offers very little guidance on this, and we'll talk a little bit about what type of guidance they give us, but there's a lot of gray, and the whole like it depends things really comes up. So

Board Rules Dual Relationships And Gray Areas

SPEAKER_02 10:45

what does it say? Well, really, like I said, very little within the LPC board rules, it says the supervisor must avoid any relationship that impairs the supervisor's objective personal judgment. Like, okay, like anything else? It also says that in terms of dual relationships, because that's a lot of times what you're gonna hear, like, well, that's a dual relationship. Well, let's kind of pause there and break it down. It really says a licensee, including you, must that and maintain professional boundaries. Nowhere does it say you cannot have a dual relationship, it's just saying you gotta stay professional in how you're conducting this dual relationship. So remember, it's very, very important that the the setting of the professional boundary occurs, the expectation of what that's gonna look and be like is stated well before everybody's on the same page. We've had a conversation and then we're moving. But if something is impairing a supervisor's objective judgment, what could that look like? And I'm thinking about that here, right? Is what would that even look like if it was impairing judgment? How could that look? And one of the ways that I was thinking about this, so as mentioned, you didn't get to see the photo that I've got, but I have another business, it's called the Counselor's Mentor. And I charge people, right, who are looking to own and operate their businesses, I charge them coaching, business coaching. That's $225 an hour. I have associates if you want to know my rate. I talk about money all the time. If y'all have any money questions, totally down top. Okay. So for my associate, I charge $75 an hour if there's somebody else in the room with you. So triadic or group supervision, we don't call it, we don't call it triadic as an individual. But when there's somebody else, one to one, it's $85. So $85 for clinical supervision an hour is $225 for business coaching. What could impair my judgment? I don't know. What if I start getting like greedy? What if I'm starting to get mad? What if I'm just said, oh my gosh, I just spent an hour talking about all of this business coaching and support, same as I did with that other client that I just had for coaching, and I'm making well over a hundred dollars less on on this. One is $75, one is $225. Like, could that impair my judgment? Maybe. Maybe if I'm not mindful of it, if I don't have expectations surrounding it, that's an example of where I can see this growing problematic. Problematic for the structures of the businesses. I can see it kind of like merging, blending, things are getting weird. So it's something to think about within this regard, is avoiding any type of relationship. So if they're a client with this business of private practice coaching, and they're also your supervisee, could there be problems that arise? There could be. There could not be, but it's up to you to decide what that's gonna look like.

SPEAKER_04 13:46

Any thoughts or questions here? We have one comment from Katie Dunham who says, I've had a couple of experiences with it, and it's been complicated, but worked out well, required a lot of boundaries and direct communication. Happy to speak to it uh a bit if there's time.

SPEAKER_03 14:02

Yes, Katie, we have time now. Speak to it, girl. Let's hear where you at?

W2 Versus 1099 And Boundaries

SPEAKER_03 14:07

Hi. Um I so I own my own group practice with my um my business partner, and we had associates who worked in our practice, and we switched from 1099 to W 2, and we're like, we're not doing the 1099 thing anymore. And one of the associates that was under my supervision was feeling some kind of way about the change to it. And so we were exploring like what the option was because we were no longer gonna do 1099. And so I was like, well, the other option of you don't want to be a W-2 is you are allowed to open your own practice if you want. And I you can still, because the you we have our business structure is weird because I don't really want to deal with other people's money. So we have, if you're fully licensed, they have their own PLLC and they just sub-lease from us and they operate under our brand. Um, but they have their own paperwork and they have their own LLCs and they do their own simple practice and all of that. So she decided to start her own business. And the other experience I have is a gal who was, I don't know if this is PC, but I we call I call them rescues when they switch supervisors. So she's a rescue who like she was she had a different supervisor and she was going to open her own practice and she had already been practicing for like a year. She only had like a year left of her hours, and she wanted to open her own practice, but her existing supervisor was uncomfortable with it. And I had my gal who was switching, and I had she had been under my supervision also for a year. And so I think for me, it was they've been clinically working for a year and working on skills before they were doing that. But I don't think I would, and they're also both second career therapists where they're both in their 30s. Not that you have to be older, but they've had other business experience to where that wasn't as much of an issue. But I had a rule where it's like if we talk about business for more than 15 minutes, then you need to book an additional session. And you can choose to have an and I charge 135 for supervision because I'm not as nice as you. Right. And so it's like if you if you're gonna talk about business for more than 15 minutes, then we need to move on. But the problem is the nuance of when it's do I charge a no-show fee? How does the no-show fee impact my client relationship? I'm mad at my client because they have a client balance. And now I'm annoyed with the parents. And so there are dynamics for the first gal where she never deal dealt with any of that. I did all the billing for all of her clients, I did all the back-end stuff and made sure everything was clean and all she had to do was see her client do her note. And so it's definitely we had a lot of conversations where she was like, this is a lot harder than I thought it was gonna be. Yeah. And so I think it takes a special type of clinician to do that. I typically, if associates ask me, I'm like, I don't recommend it. I was like, I'm a Slytherin, I'm an Enneagram three. Like, if anyone would have thought, like, oh, I could have totally done that as an associate. And I'm like, even when I was an intern, I had no interest in doing that because I'm like, I would like to get through and learn master one skill before I try to do too much at once. I think it's not titrated enough. And so I think if it was like a fresh LPC associate, that it would be really hard because even if I have an off-site associate, I make them send me all of the paperwork for the off-site place, and then I point out the gaps and typically trigger their clinical directors. And then, like my gal who works at one has an addendum where all of her clients have to sign something to follow my rules because they don't match her site's rules. And so I think it can be very messy. But yeah, my rule was you have to book an extra hour. Right. If you want to talk about that and you want to consult about that, that's totally fine. Um happy to stick your brain on it.

SPEAKER_02 17:57

And round of applause for Katie, please, everybody. Yes. I love when somebody just like writes the barrier and is like, let's talk about this. But as we all were hearing, there's a few other like themes within what Katie was sharing. And I was like, ah, do I have time to go there? The reality is, no, I don't have time to go there. But you're hearing that Katie mentioned something about group practice. And then also kind of the designation of uh W2 versus the W9. Right. And then it's kind of like, am I responsible for this or am I responsible for that? And now we're kind of crossing lanes. And then she also said the supervisor of like the second case that you were talking about, the one who transferred, that her previous supervisor was not comfortable with her owning and operating a private practice. Right. So we've got like quite a few layers that my ears were perking up that are additional potential complications. When I say potential, it means that they are not inherently complicated, but they have the potential to get very complicated. And so recognizing some of these nuances, if half of what Katie said sounded like a foreign language, that's kind of a good sign to pull back and wait until some of that sounds a bit more familiar because those are the kinds of topics that will emerge when overseeing LPC associates or LMFT associates in this position. And so it's these kind of subtle nuances. For example, I also have a group private practice. I have associates who work for my practice as employees, which also many moons ago, but none of which I supervise. So all of my supervisees have externals, what we call external sites. And so there's all these reasons as to why Katie does it like this, why Sarah does it like this, why Nicole might do it like this, why, you know, and none of these are wrong by any means. And that's where the board offers some kind of gentle kind of parameters, but it's up to us to decide what we want it to look like for the way we practice. Okay. Thank you again so much, Katie. All right.

SPEAKER_01 19:54

So we've got a question from Okay. Yeah, let's hear it. One, I'm a Ravenclaw. Um, but uh um interested to know if Katie, when and don't have time for this, but just thinking out loud. Um, if you have a rescue, do you start over? Do you do your entire curriculum? But my main question is, Sarah, if if um my my business partner, she's great, she's a supervisor, she's wonderful, she has a curriculum that she does with every single supervisee. It includes business practices. If she does not charge anything extra for that, that is just all-encompassing. Do you see any problems with that? When you say business curriculum, what do you mean by that? Yeah, she has her supervisor curriculum that she teaches every single one. That includes how to run a business.

SPEAKER_02 20:49

You know, how do you problem I see is private practice and no longer the unicorn it once was, right? Like I can remember a time in grad school, like almost 20 years ago, where that was like the unicorn. Like everybody is like, oh, dream was to become a private practice owner. That kind of meant like we made it, we all know now, but that's not accurate. However, what I'm seeing a lot more are associates saying, I do not want to do that. Like I know right now, I do not want to do that in terms of paying for a service. So they're paying us for a service. And if an associate says, I do not want to do that, and we take that time to instruct them on it anyway, it makes me wonder what's happening with the fee for service. So if there's an exchange of payment, I would really consider that to be potentially problematic if they say, I don't want it.

SPEAKER_01 21:47

Right. And if they are not interested at all, first of all, they're more than welcome to join our practice. But second, if they're not interested in that in that at all, we my my partner, she will do other things. If they're not She's not going to present that to them. She's going to give them that information in the binder that she gives them. So it's there if you want it, but she will not go into teaching mode on that if they're not interested in that. Absolutely not. I was just uh hearing the dual of a supervisor and then a business coach. Is there a problem combining those two if it's done properly? I guess is my question. Yeah. Well, why don't we go ahead and jump in?

SPEAKER_02 22:27

You if I don't answer your question in the next two slides, stop me. Because I do want to hit on it and I hope that I kind of addressed it a little bit. But I think it really comes back to in terms of those dual relationships, not how we avoid it, but how do we make it a complementary relationship without making a complicated relationship? Okay, because the truth is there may be dual relationships that emerge. Fun fact, like in a small town, if I was in a small teeny town and I'm their only counselor, we're gonna be dual relationshipping it everywhere. We're gonna go to the same church, our kids are gonna go to the same, you know, little um weekly meetup. We're gonna know people that know the same people, right? Dual relationships are a thing and there's a way to kind of make sure that they are ethical still.

Contracts Addenda And Clear Expectations

SPEAKER_02 23:14

Now, all of that, I believe, can be discussed during that contract term that you initiate with your associates. What I really encourage for you to do, if you have the ability to do it, is have that meet and greet with this hopeful, with the associate hopeful, right? They're not your associate to supervise yet, but just like any other kind of, I don't want to call it an interview per se, because if anything, they're interviewing you, but get to talk to them. Does it seem like a good match? Is this a good fit? We don't want to jump in blindly to any type of supervisory relationship with somebody that we really haven't even had a conversation with, even if they're very well kind of referred by somebody else that you trust, we really shouldn't jump into this blindly because their license is your license. So make sure that you have this meet and greet time to kind of start to get a pulse check of where they stand with private practice, where you stand with private practice. Are we hearing things that could be complimentary or complicated as we're kind as we're just having this very casual conversation? That's the first step. The second step, and one that I'm with Kate has on her Facebook groups, as she's mentioned before, but um a type of it's like a type of contract. And so I have one internally. It's something that I highly encourage, and it's not provided by the behavioral health executive council. This is separate from that agreement form. This is something that you have internally. And the way that mine is, I just kind of copied and pasted all kind of like the headers that I have in my personal contract. And where it really shines bright is in the private practice considerations. So even with the associates that have verbalized I do not want a private practice, I still have the private practice consideration in all of them across the board. When they say I do want to own and operate a private practice, there's an additional addendum that we'll kind of go through. But for the majority, all of the ones that I happen to have, I've got, I think two at the moment who are just saddling into that as they're near the very end. But we're talking about it then. So this is what to expect. This is how we're gonna work. We go through it. I email it to them even before they're live so that they can look over it and I say, talk to somebody about it, have somebody read it with you. Let me know what questions you have, and then we go through it together. So during our first, we call it orientation. So our very first associate supervise hour, we're going through this line by line, as well as some other do's and don'ts, expectations, indirect, direct hour specification, all the things, how to track your hours. This is what I'm expecting. On and on we go. So as it relates to this topic, this is what mine looks like, kind of in a nutshell, right? So if we're like, well, I even went there. This is just Sarah's example. This is not the standard by any means. Like, this is the ultimate standard. Be like me, not the goal. But these are just some things that I've found to be helpful to add. Sarah is saying, you can own and operate operate your own private practice. Like, I think that's a thing. Clearly, I'm in support of, you know, people having their own private practice. It's what I do for a living. So great. But this is what I expect. I need you to complete at least half of your direct hours. Your job right now is to be as strong of a clinician as you can possibly be. When you have a crisis emerge, when you have a suicidal assessment, I need you to not just be your first time when you're all by yourself in an office. I need you to have a little experience under your belt. I need you to get at least half of your direct hours under your belt. If you have any questions about that, they'll say yes, no, whatever. We talk about it. Then I also say, I need you to tell me before you open up your private practice. Like we're gonna, and I tell them that like verbatim, we're gonna have a huge problem if you decide to own and operate your own private practice. You launch and you don't tell me and I find out another way, we're gonna have a serious problem. And they're like, okay, yeah, I won't do it. Um, I just need to be aware of how far a potential risk could go with my license.

unknown 27:09

Right.

SPEAKER_02 27:10

So I'm telling y'all that. I don't really tell them that. Also, this is again just Sarah's, this is Sarah's world. You're living in Sarah's world for a minute. I need you to provide proof of training or coursework in some type of business practice relevant to operating a counseling practice. My fave, and you have it in your local large town, the small business development center, SBDC, small business development center, they have free business classes all the time. It's where I went. I wish I would have known it existed sooner if you're in private practice or own and operate another type of business. I highly encourage you to go to your local SBDC. Or you can also sign up for any other major cities, SBDC, Small Business Development Center. So here in San Antonio, where I'm located, is actually in ETSA downtown, which is a whole lot of fun. They have virtual and in-person. Go to those. Go to those. So I route them over to free resources. I don't even tell them to take my courses. I have those courses online, but to avoid the negative implication of dual relationship, I have never expected them to take my courses. It's just one of the ways that I have avoided that dual relationship getting complicated. So I say, show it to me, do it, people confident. And it's very basic, like how to set up an LLC. Like they help you there. How to market your business page, how to set up a Google My, you know, Google business profile. Like stuff that I'm not going to do for you. If you are paying me as a business coach, I will gladly do that with you, but you're not. So go do it on your own time. Tell me how it goes, and show me just a little bit of that and that you're continuing to develop yourself. Again, this is Sarah, the way Sarah does it. You don't have to. The board is not saying do it like this.

SPEAKER_04 28:53

This is just how I get.com slash bonus.

SPEAKER_02 29:35

Another part of that is I do require them to add me as an additional covered entity in their malpractice liability insurance. I usually will add them onto mine. It's just a little extra cushion in the event something not so great happens. And the reality as a anybody who owns a private practice or any other business knows that risk goes up quite a bit. And so it's just a little extra cushion in the event we might need it. I also may request for me to have access to their EMHR electronic mental health record. So this kind of varies because if it's like a huge chunk of change for them, I'm not going to require that. In some occasions, we've kind of looked at it together. We know if we're in person, they'll pull it up and we'll look at it together kind of thing. So it just kind of depends on what system they're using. I don't want them to be out of pocket adding me in as an additional user if it's kind of outlandish. And then May, the supervisee agrees to pay an additional $25 per supervision hour if keyword, if increased risk factors exist. This is just an example of what I got. So that's where I put it again in my right here. So it's with all the things under private practice consideration. So you can kind of see how I'm already kind of setting some firm designation of this is how I do it. Go over to Kendra. She'll probably does it different. Angela probably does it different. Jordan doesn't do it at all. You know, Georgina, she's about to do it. Like everybody's allowed because the parameters and the ethics say stay here somewhere. So as long as you fall in here somewhere, you're okay. And this is my best attempt at that so far. Can you give me an example of an increased risk factor? Yeah.

Risk Factors Insurance And Extra Fees

SPEAKER_02 31:17

So for example, if we have a private practice who specializes in working with a certain demographic or specialty type that could increase the likelihood of suicidal ideations and uh assessments late nights is another one for me, if I'm being completely honest. So if you're offering those evening appointments and I'm needing to be made available to you during the I work, I work 8 a.m., sometimes 7 a.m. to now, right? That's it. So if you're continuing to own and operate your private practice at 6, 7, 8, 9 p.m., which some people do and can, that to me is like, so you want me to be like on call just in case something happens. So for me, that's an additional kind of risk factor that we're looking at. Perhaps if they're working with legal things or stuff that's likely to ensue in legal matters, that's also an increased risk factor. So great question there. Can I charge a fee for associate subpoenaing when I'm supporting them? Can you charge a fee? Can you charge a fee? You probably could. In my experience, Michelle, when I've had a supervisee who has been subpoenaed and we have to talk about that quite a bit. If it's under 15 minutes or conversations, they text me all the time. They call me all the time, too. So that's a thing, right? Being a supervisor means that your associates are going to reach out to you, as they should have the ability to reach you. Right. That's, I believe, is just a basic associate right, if you will, is when they reach out to you that at some point in time, within a reasonable time, you should be responding back to them. So if it's within a reasonable measure, like 15, 20 minutes, I usually don't charge. When it hits the 30 minute mark, I'll say, let's add this into one or half of the four hours of supervision that you need this month. And they're like, okay, got it. So does that make sense? Like then we start getting into the supervision time when it's that for me, I do that half hour mark. But if I talk to them for 20 minutes, I'm like, whatever, I don't charge 22 minutes, I don't charge. 30 minutes, I charge as part of that four-hour requirement. So that's how I do it. Does anybody else want to answer Michelle's question? Can I charge a fee for um associate subpoena when the supervisor is supporting them?

SPEAKER_04 33:37

Remember, the board doesn't tell you what to charge, how to charge, if to charge anything. So you can do what you like. There are some ACA code of ethics that are changing in September 2026 where they will talk about like charging exorbitant fees to our clients who are going to court. But I think this is part of what I'm, I it's a huge part of why I invited Sarah here, because we don't know, right? We're we're doing all of these different things in supervision already. Now we're gonna throw private practice in. It's like, okay, how many plates are we gonna spin here? So um it's a it's a conversation, I think. Definitely.

SPEAKER_03 34:16

I'm happy to see it's quite like a caveat on their court fees, their own, like for their consent treatment for their clients that has a supervisor involvement fee. If you subpoena me, there's an additional, I don't know if it's like 200 or 250 an hour for supervisor involvement. That way I'll take the day off and I'll go with them. But that hasn't only happened one time and she got subpoenaed like the week after her license got upgraded. So it was a little different.

SPEAKER_02 34:46

Okay, so let's think about this a

What Belongs In Supervision Time

SPEAKER_02 34:48

little bit. I was thinking about some common topics, themes. Katie, you even mentioned talking a little bit about let me take a look at some of that intake documentation. I do the same with all of uh the associates that I supervise. And most of the time it's not enough. We have an addendum. Um, they actually get access to that, usually on our first or second orientation meeting, because it's likely that they don't have what's required as part of that intake documentation specifically and the informed consent. So when we think about is it private practice specific or general, that's where I kind of want your brain space to be. And for me, remember I was talking about keeping it in like keep it in its rightful lane. I have associates currently, one works at an assisted living center, one works at uh private practice, one works at child safe, one works at say youth, one work so nonprofit agency, like all the things, right? I've got one who is in private practice. I want us to think about if we were in a group setting, right? So you are um overseeing multiple associates, which is really fun. Don't let anybody tell you different, just make sure you have the bandwidth for it. I currently have seven. My magical number is 10. I just love it. I just love it. Okay, so if you're having a group supervision session and I've got one associate, let's just say there's five of them and one of those is in private practice, it's my job to say, does this apply to just per one of them, or can it apply to everyone? And so that's kind of one of the ways that I frame this to make sure that when I'm thinking about private practice, it's not its own like coaching time. It's can this be applied to others as well? So if a private practice associate says, Sarah, with the informed consent, like what was it? Like, am I hitting all of what I need to? We pop quiz that. And I'm like, you just decided to share with the class. Let's pull it up and we'll pop quiz it and say, what are we missing? And then I'll say, where do we find that? In our board rules. I pull it up. Where would it say, oh, billing? What does it say about billing? Okay, do you have a clause here about uh minors treating minors? Well, I don't often treat minors, keyword often. You don't often do it. Did you say never? Okay, then we need to have a clause there. And so we can definitely make that a learning experience where everybody is gaining something, not just that one. So it's important across the board. There are things in my experience that is very, very specific to private practice that would not apply to some of the employees or some of the associates that I have that are employed in nonprofit and agency work. And that's generally where I ask to pause. So when it comes to website optimization, I am not an SEO AIO guru, but I know a little bit. Like I know a thing or two part of running and operating your own, you know, websites and such. But I don't think that's an appropriate use of time when it comes to the clinical development of that practitioner. How else could you receive this information that you can still receive the support that you need? Well, the Small Business Development Center, again, I'm gonna really just toot their horn. They have multiple courses on this all the time from people who specialize in it. So I know we can set some time at a different time to talk about this, but as it relates to our time in clinical supervision, I usually will pause that. Critical intake documents all day. We're looking at everybody's all the time, all the time. Anytime there's an update to our rules, we're talking about it, what needs to change. And then we have to inform how do we inform our clients in writing of this change? So this is a very, very um kind of common thing. And so intake documents for sure. Fee setting, not normally, because when you work at nonprofit and agency, I don't know about you, but I was not in the executive decision or influencer decision for setting fees at any of those institutions. It is so far away and above me that's already been outlined in the grants that fund this program. Like, I don't have any role in setting fees when I'm working at SAU. They're free. Like, what if I were and we even talked about this? She was like, our no show, our no-show is out of control. And I'm like, and you can't charge, right? And she was like, No, we're not allowed to charge. She has no role with fee setting. However, in private practice, it's one of the most important pieces, right? That's the sustainability of your income and revenue generation. So I'm not saying that these topics are not important. My question is, are they relevant within the supervision? And from there, it really depends who is in the supervision room. So if you only have one LPC associate and they only work in a private practice, I can see how much of your conversation would include all of this. But the second that you bring another person into the room, would they also benefit from this information? Because they're paying you for a service. There are some of you I understand that may work in that nonprofit and agency work and they don't pay you for that service, and that's a slightly different conversation. But if we're thinking about private practice support, my hope is that you have private practice understanding. I want to let that sink in a little bit.

unknown 40:11

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 40:12

All right. We are moving in group and our time is moving. So if you've got any questions, interrupt me now. Here's the thing this is my thought. As supervisors take on additional roles with an associate, aka private practice support, it becomes even more important to be mindful of the role clarity. That's really what this comes down to is letting them know what role that you're in and making sure that is what they're asking or needing. Ethical boundaries and whether these roles can impact our ability to remain objective. Over the course of time, you're going to find yourself falling into other roles that we're not talking about here. For example, a mentorship role, right? Where you are just walking alongside somebody and saying, Hey, what's going on? One of my associates the other day, she was off, like she was not her best self. And I had to follow up with her and I said, What's going on? And her, you know, her eyes are like big and they start to kind of water. And he said, Talk to me, tell me what is it? You know, and so in that point, am I being that clinical supervisor and doing the well, it's a slightly different role that we're in, right? And so I'm not saying that these additional roles are bad roles, but we have to make sure that that is what's necessary and needed by the associate, that they are they have an awareness of what's going on. And I'll often say that, girl, I am March your counselor. But if I was, I would think a little bit about blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Right. And so it's kind of those statements that we make at the forefront. I am not your private practice business coach. But is that something that we need to talk about? Let's blah, blah, blah. Here are my thoughts. So sometimes making sure that you're setting parameters around those roles. And again, we're just talking about the private practice stuff, but there's other ones as well, too. Okay. Blah, blah, blah. We got to move quickly. Okay. Here is a thought. Okay.

Case Examples Rates Burnout And Marketing

SPEAKER_02 42:00

Let's pretend because I was thinking, hmm, what are some examples? Okay. An LPC associate, but you supervise, is struggling, she's in private practice, is struggling to determine what to charge for her counseling services. She's considering lowering her private pay rate to 25 bucks per session because she believes it may help her attract more clients and referrals. She asks you for guidance and wants to know whether lowering her rate is a good decision. What considerations are important in supporting the development of her professional identity? What's going to make this a relevant conversation for the supervisory relationship if there is a non-private practice person in a room?

SPEAKER_00 42:43

My concern would be that if you're going to lower your rates that much to attract a lot of clients, yes, you may attract more clients because it is a very low rate. But I would be worried that you would be taking on more people than you could ethically like how many more do you need to attract? Are you at risk of burnout? And then I would maybe have conversations just about the professional identity that they want and that they want to develop. And is this going to be a rate and that they can maintain long term? And I just feel like there's a lot of questions and discussions that need to be having around burnout, financial security, and professional identity when our rates are lowered that much more than maybe our peers.

SPEAKER_02 43:42

So thank you so much, Deborah. It looks like Michelle and Jordan are right there alongside of you to say what happens if the floodgates on this thing is opened? Um what are we going to do about that? But Jordan also adds an additional one is what's behind this here? We're hearing some financial insecurity. And for me, as a private practice coach or business, somebody help who helps with business development, we're talking about one of the four very dangerous negative mindsets. And I talk about them with my associates and colleagues all the time. There's some scarcity mindset going on here. Right. There's some imposter syndrome. You're a master's level trained clinician and you want to charge $25 an hour. Are you out of your mind? Like, hold on, hold on. Right? Well, I'm just an associate.

unknown 44:29

$25 an hour.

SPEAKER_02 44:31

Right. Like hold the phone. So I'm thinking, is there some imposter syndrome stuff going on? Wanting to get it right right away? Is there some perfectionism going on? So I think this could be something to kind of explore there with her to say, is there anything else behind this here that could be prompting you to consider this very, very drastically low grade? Is there some fear here, if at all? And of course, we always want it to be in a psychologically safe environment. So I don't often open up those doors if we've got brand new folks or faces and they don't have that relatability. But usually, I mean, my crew, they they really, really um learn to love each other quite a bit. I'm gonna be honest with you, they've got wonderful relationships with one another. It is quite beautiful. But as supervising, we have to make note like, can I open this up within these, with like with this certain group of people? And for the most part, yes, we can. So that's another thing that I was kind of thinking about, but taking a look, like Michelle said, some of that work life balance. So you're seeing how we can hit on some other topics without saying, yes, do it. Absolutely. The thing is, if I was a business coach, I would say, well, who's our target population? Is this within their kind of expectation for therapeutic services? $25 for a full session or not? What's our current market rate within the area that you're operating? What have you looked into? Who is it that you're kind of right? I mean, not that we're comparing by any means, but what is kind of the standard here? Let's see your your specialties. What is it that you specialize in? So thinking a little bit about that, if people say, I'll have a sliding scale, I'll get ready for some more admin and paperwork for yourself. And so we'll I'll do that with you. I highly discourage it, but I'll do that with you. And then we got to get into the informed consent, making sure that all of the billing and the fees and the information that they sign off on, it's all congruent there based off of the sliding scale that now you want to do. And why did she get the sliding scale and why didn't she get the sliding scale? Oh, because you know that they're capable of paying and they've been with you for the past year. Okay, cool. So, like that's where we would go if we were in the business kind of coaching side of things that may not be a relevant space from the critical perspective. That's not clinical, it's business. And so it's really important to know again which hat that you're in and for them to know which hat that you're wearing, which hat that they're wanting you to have. And so that's just a little thought.

SPEAKER_01 47:03

Okay, next one. I'm sorry, does this do you think this also would create the problem of patients not taking therapy as seriously or being as invested in the therapeutic process because they're only paying $25?

SPEAKER_02 47:19

I can't answer that one fully. What I would give you is a kind of a general, I don't want to jump too much into that because it's a pretty loaded question, but I've seen quite a few folks be completely committed with zero dollars, honestly. So it really depends on what kind of level or stage of change that they're in. If they're in the pre-contemplative stage, oh get me out of here. They're not gonna show up anyway. But if they're in that action stage of change, they're gonna pay you that 25 bucks and they're gonna be consistent, they're gonna do the homework and they're gonna show up. So it really kind of depends where they're at in their own healing journey, I'd say.

SPEAKER_01 47:52

Well, thank you for that perspective.

SPEAKER_02 47:54

That's that's great.

SPEAKER_01 47:55

I appreciate that.

SPEAKER_02 47:56

You're welcome. All right, one more. And an LPC associate has recently opened up a private practice and brings several concerns to supervision. During the hour, the associate requests discussions, primarily focus on website design, social media strategy, psychology today optimization, increasing referrals. What feedback should you provide to maintain a clinically focused supervision experience while still supporting her professional growth?

SPEAKER_00 48:22

I feel like these issues are not clinical supervision. And I think I would bring up like we can talk about this, but it'll maybe have to be outside of the clinical supervision because this is supposed to work on your growth as a professional. And I don't know, this is me. I don't know that I can have these conversations and find some way that for me that they would help you grow as a professional. So outside of the clinical supervision hour, or somebody, I'll refer you to somebody else who's a business coach and they can maybe help you with that.

SPEAKER_02 48:57

That's absolutely appropriate within this regard.

SPEAKER_03 49:01

As it would have been to address it as well. I think it's like you could talk about like, well, think about how you talk to an inquiry and you're trying how what's your elevator pitch? How do you sell what you do, or like how do you talk about your expertise or your skills or your training? Of like, can you put into words what you do in sessions? Or if you work with kids, how do you explain to parents what happens in the playroom? It's like building their confidence of the autonomy of like, do you know what you're doing? And can you explain what you're doing to other people? Okay, then you can market.

unknown 49:33

Right.

SPEAKER_03 49:34

Can I make a Canva? Okay. And so I think it's being able to help them critically understand like, do you know what you offer? And can you put it into words? And then, like, sure, if you want to look at your website stuff later, that seems more like a one-on-one thing. Or why don't you two that both have practices together look at each other's, enjoy? But I think it's getting them back to like, okay, this is how you're presenting yourself professionally and how you show up into the professional world. And so I think you can explore it that way, I guess.

SPEAKER_02 50:08

Absolutely. You can see here that there really is no right or wrong because we don't have any designation around

Final Takeaway And Resources

SPEAKER_02 50:14

that. So, one of the things that I just want to leave you all with is just remembering that the goal of critical supervision is to develop clinically competent and ethical mental health professionals. A thriving private practice may result from that growth. And that would be a wonderful and beautiful thing. But the business success is not the primary objective here. So just something to leave you with. It has been such a pleasure, and I would love to stay connected with you guys. It looks like this might be a better way for whatever reason it's not presenting correctly. But the counselor's mentor is the best way. I'll also just throw my email. It's the best way to reach me in the chat. It was so nice. Thank you so much for your feedback. It always helps when people talk back to you. So thank you for just your feedback. And I appreciate you all.

SPEAKER_04 50:59

Thank you, Sarah, so much for this. And I know it's a new topic. I mean, we talked about this. We went back and forth in email. Like, okay, what is this going to look like? So this is wonderful. I think it's a great conversation. And those of you who attended, thank you for coming on and doing this on a Thursday. I hope it helped. And please reach out to Sarah. Highly recommend Sarah. She knows her stuff and uh amazing supervisor too. So thank you again, Sarah. You're awesome. Of course. Thank you guys, and thank you, Kate. All right, bye. Everybody, have a wonderful evening. And that's where we'll leave it this week. If any of this landed for you, do one small thing before you close the laptop. And if you'd like a guided way to work through it, you can grab the before the rush self-audit worksheet at KateWalkerTraining.com slash bonus. See you next week. If you love today's episode, be sure to leave a five-star review. It helps other badass therapists find the show and build practices that thrive. Big thanks to Ridgley Walker for our original fun facts and podcast intro, and to Carl Dianella for editing this episode and making it sound amazing. See you next week.