STP 34 | Scaling Your Therapy Practice with Awards with Leo Debroeck
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Microphone (Yeti Classic): What's holding you back from hiring a virtual assistant. I know for me. Sometimes, I feel like I just don't want to make a mistake or I don't want to make another mistake. Well, guess what? I've I've hired maybe 50 virtual assistants in my past for working with. Therapy practices and I've made most of the mistakes you can make.
Microphone (Yeti Classic): And Whitney Owens does an interview with me on her podcast. The wise practice podcast about. Just three of those mistakes. And I wanted to share those with you so that you don't make them in the future. We talk about hiring virtual assistance with mental health experiences, hiring virtual assistants that understand tech and also hiring virtual assistants.
Microphone (Yeti Classic): Not based on your gut feeling, but based on empirical data. So.
Microphone (Yeti Classic): Take a listen to that. There's also a couple other tips in there about hiring a virtual assistant, also on her web page and on her show notes. I have a link in there for you to get a virtual assistant job description. With 10 behaviors to look for. Is well as questions for you to ask in the interview.
Microphone (Yeti Classic): About how to draw out those behaviors. So you're making great information. You're getting the data you need. On the behaviors you're looking for to make the best hire for your virtual assistant. So head on over to Whitney owens.com and click the podcast page. And you will see our, our interview there.
Microphone (Yeti Classic): Make sure you go to the show notes and look at some of the links there for resources on virtual assistance.
James Marland: . Welcome back to the Scaling Therapy Practice. This is James Marland. Today we have a special guest, Leo d Brock. Did I say that
Leo Debroeck: right? Oh, nailed
James Marland: it. Yes. Right. Good. Don't, don't ask me to do it again, Leo. I'm gonna stick with Leo. Yeah, that's good luck.
James Marland: Yeah. For the rest of the episode he is a licensed mental health counselor. Child mental health specialist in Washington State. Oh, that's kind of far from me. I'm in Pennsylvania. Mm. So you are way up northwest, right? Way up in the corner. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, well, we'll talk about that in a second. He's the pre president and founder of the Counselor's Choice Award, L l C, which reviews and promotes.
James Marland: Scientifically validated counseling products, therapeutic tools and books. He's written several children's therapy books, which are self-published and available on amazon.com. We'll get those links for you in the show notes, and uses it for therapy settings, addressing grief, self-confidence, addiction, neglect, abuse, and others.
James Marland: And I, I identify with this last sentence here, Leo. He has a di, he had a difficult time summarizing himself in three to five sentences for James to read as an introduction. And I think that's one of the hardest parts of coming on a show is like, how do I write about myself? But you did a good job. I, I I, oh, good.
James Marland: Learned a lot. So, Leo, welcome to the
Leo Debroeck: show. Yeah, thank you kindly. It's it's been nice up in here, Washington. I'll say we had our first. Day over 65 degrees in over 125 days and there were people out with socks and sandals. I call that the Washington uniform and, you know, short sleeve shirts and tank tops 'cause it was 60 degrees and I was one of them.
Leo Debroeck: It was
James Marland: great. Are are people used to the, I guess it's cold there. Oh yeah. Are people just used to it? So when it, when it hits 50, 60 here, I'm in shorts in a t-shirt. But I'm just imagining people get their shorts on a little earlier in Washington.
Leo Debroeck: Every chance you have to get vitamin D, we take it like we've got a saying out here.
Leo Debroeck: It started as a joke, but now people just say it, the mountains are out, which means that it's not cloudy, so Oh, that's great. Yeah, it's, it's like, it's not even funny though. It's just like a saying now because it just doesn't, yeah. The mountains
James Marland: are out. Oh, look. It doesn't clear up. That's great. So I, I, you are one of the few people I've interviewed who in a, a colder weather climate.
James Marland: Normally I've been interviewing people from like Florida and Georgia and they're like, It's, it's 70 degrees here in February.
Leo Debroeck: I'm not into that. I'm just, I'm sorry. Like I know some people love that. I'm just not into it. I'll take the cold any day.
James Marland: Did you, did you grow up
Leo Debroeck: in Washington? I did. So, you know, we, I grew up, we didn't have a lawn, we had moss.
Leo Debroeck: Mm-hmm. You know, and I, I grew up like with. We didn't have ac. No one here who makes you know, you know, an average income is gonna have an AC machine. So anytime it got over 80, you, you find something to do to stay cool. Mm-hmm. So I've been conditioned to be afraid of the sun at this point, I think.
Leo Debroeck: It's just pure operant conditioning.
James Marland: So, you have, you have mountains. Does that mean there's like skiing and mountain activities?
Leo Debroeck: Oh, oh, do we ever, so, the hiking out here, everyone always talks about, which is great if you're into hiking. Yeah. I'm into anything where I can get away. People maybe, I don't know.
Leo Debroeck: That's probably a bad thing for a therapist to say, but I love our beaches here. They're overcast. They're windy. The sand is brown. You know, and hard and you can just be out there and it's so peaceful. There's nobody out there. But if you go hiking around here, anytime in the spring or summer, the trails are packed.
Leo Debroeck: You know, people with their dog and their kids are out, which is. Beautiful and lovely for them. But if you're just trying to get away, it's the, to me, I think the Washington beats are where it's at. Honestly. No one ever talks about 'em. No one ever thinks about 'em. So they're perfect.
James Marland: Now. Do, do they make is it, is it like are there rocks and stuff where it makes lots of sounds?
James Marland: Or is it just like a
Leo Debroeck: gentle. There's a few kind of cobblestone beaches left a little closer down to Oregon and stuff. Not too far away, but no, it's, it's imagine a world where Bob Ross was very, very sad and depressed and that he only had one color palette and it was gray. The gray color palette.
Leo Debroeck: That is what it looks like. Yeah. Okay, cool. It's
James Marland: great. It's perfect. I just remember one of my favorite times one of my favorite vacations. I went to Maine. And there were lots of beach. It was cold though, like it, it was like July and it was still cold. The, the water was cold, but it, it didn't feel overly crowded there, but the scenes and the wa the water, even though I didn't get in the water, I, I really identified with what you said.
James Marland: 'cause that was my favorite part to sit in and listening and walking. Like the views and the overlook and lighthouses and, I don't know, it was just amazing. I wanna, I wanna go back, but it's a, it's a good you know, 15 hours from where I am, so That's fair. Yeah. I guess that's an excuse though, isn't it?
James Marland: You do what you want, so.
Leo Debroeck: Yeah, totally. Is, I, I, I know we both have a fondness for lighthouses.
James Marland: It would, yeah. I noticed in your logo you have a lighthouse and yeah. For the scaling good choice. Yeah. The course creation studio, I have the lighthouse. I, I've always been fond of them. So, let's, let's talk about our, a tool or tip or tech of the week.
James Marland: Do you have one that you wanna, you
Leo Debroeck: wanna share with people? I am, I do, but I'm gonna just like caveat it first. I'm super biased. Because I published my seventh book this week, last week. Awesome. Yeah, so I'm a little biased. I think that one's great. Personally, it's called The Trust Hotel. It's aimed for kind of middle school aged kids to early high school, and it's, it's up on Amazon.
Leo Debroeck: So the Trust Hotel is about trying to understand. Trust like you would floors on a hotel where there's a lobby where you know, you'll, you'll get to know anyone, you'll have a coffee with them, whatever. And then there's the first floor kind of crappy rooms, not stuff you're worried about being broken. And then it kind of goes up until you get to the penthouse where that's anybody you can trust.
Leo Debroeck: And then there's a dog house where it's like, People who have wrecked one of the rooms, and maybe you gave 'em a psych a chance, maybe you didn't. It's up to you. But now they're in the doghouse, they're not allowed back in. Right? Mm-hmm. So it's, it's a cute little, you know, short, I think it's 28 page book or whatever that you can do in a therapy session.
Leo Debroeck: It's made for school counselors and therapists. And I absolutely adore it, but I'm biased, obviously. Sure.
James Marland: Well, you get, yeah, yeah. The, the trust hotel.
Leo Debroeck: Yes. And,
James Marland: On Amazon, Cool. It sounds like a neat little therapy tool to use. So my, my my tip of the week is just watch out for how much information you're consuming.
James Marland: Mm-hmm. I'm, I'm still reading the book. The, the four, I think it's the four Hour Work Week by Tim Ferris. Reading is a. Quotes, I'm listening to it on Audible because I like to listen to things while I'm doing other things. And I don't know about, I don't know about you, but I, why, why do I feel like I have to listen to it at 1.5 or 2.5 speed?
James Marland: I don't, same way, but, but that's what I do. And so anyways, I'm listening to it and, and he was really challenging us to, you know, how much time are you wasting by consuming information that you don't use? That could be even good stuff, like newspapers or watching the news or even like, not, not bad stuff, but like social media posts and YouTube videos.
James Marland: I know like for whatever reason, when I click on a YouTube video or a Facebook video about something, it always goes to like things that I'm interested in or like, like spaceships or car crashes or. Just like informational things and it's endless. And then is, is my life any better? Like, did I improve my life by watching one more car?
James Marland: You know, car crash video or Dash mm-hmm. Yeah. I guess they're dash cam videos. Yeah. Like my life's no better doing that. So he, he's really challenging. To, to be like, cut that, cut that stuff out. Your life's no better, and you can do better stuff with your time. So I'm like, oh, that's, that's pretty good. Tim Ferris
Leo Debroeck: I'll, I have to say like going through like your YouTube history or something like that, and you're just like, why did I, who clicked on this?
Leo Debroeck: And you're, yeah. Oh,
James Marland: it just goes and goes. So that was very, very challenging. So that's my tip of the week.
Leo Debroeck: Thank you. I like that one. I'm gonna use that one too, honestly. Well,
James Marland: the harder part for this, the action step was go on a go on an information fast for seven days and I'm just like, oh man. Like, yeah, just like, just just do few simple things and turn off the other stuff to detox yourself.
James Marland: It's like a detoxing 'cause we're addicted to it. I'm addicted to information. Useless. I'm addicted to useless information, but
Leo Debroeck: it feels like you're being so productive. 'cause you've learned something though.
James Marland: But yeah, not really. Yes. But just before the show, I clicked on like, like why this Marvel actor was fired.
Leo Debroeck: Super useful to
James Marland: your life, I'm sure. Right? I won't even remember
Leo Debroeck: it. You wanna take their job, that's why you're gonna go.
James Marland: Yeah, for sure. But I spent five minutes reading this article about somebody I didn't even know because it had the word, you know, Marvel in it, but mm-hmm. Okay, so let's let's get into a little, our interview with Leo.
James Marland: Leo, I ran into you because you had this an interesting webpage. It's the Counselor Choice Award or what's, what's the web? What's the U r L actually
Leo Debroeck: Yeah, it's a counselor's choice award.com. It's the full, full U R L though. Okay,
James Marland: great. And I hadn't heard of too many of those types of awards before, and I thought it would be interesting for the audience as part of what, as part of like, you know, scaling through community or scaling through.
James Marland: One of, one of the things that people are always looking for are testimonials. Like, oh, this works. So how does that work? So I thought I'd bring you on the show and let you, you talk about your, you know, how you got started and what, what it does for people. So yeah, how, how did you get started with this?
Leo Debroeck: Yeah, that's so I have a mantra that there isn't a somebody, people always say, oh, like, oh, somebody should go take care of that. Somebody should go do this. And it started out where it was, oh, somebody should write therapy books 'cause there really aren't many four therapists to use. I said, yeah, somebody.
Leo Debroeck: And then I started doing it. Now I'm seven books later. And it kind of also I ended up working with a coworker to help doing the illustrations and things like that. And we worked together and it was actually really fun to do. And, you know, we would have conversations around the water cooler so to speak, to say, you know, somebody really should help.
Leo Debroeck: With all of these therapy sites that were coming out at the time, the online help, that they didn't vet therapists. You know, some of them were claiming to be licensed that just flat out weren't. Mm-hmm. And we're like, wow, somebody really should like have a way to. A better business bureau of sorts to make sure that like these places are legit someplace that both therapists can use as well as you know, consumers, you know, to be able to identify what is this?
Leo Debroeck: Is it really legit? Mm-hmm. They're like, yeah, somebody. Should do that. And here we are, somebody. Yeah. So I am somebody. The, so we, and some of my coworkers kind of started this because we wanted to make sure these therapy tools and products that get advertised actually have some validity to them and get some sense of review.
Leo Debroeck: So our slogan reviewed by licensed mental health therapists is kind of our, our, our go-to because everything we post, everything we do has to be reviewed and we kind of base. All of our work on the scientific model, how a academic journal, peer review journal works, where their user submits it. And then at me, I would be kind of the editor in this case.
Leo Debroeck: I send it out to my volunteers, the people who review it. And then if everyone approves, we, we host their information, we make blog posts about it. We put 'em on our honorees, we throw the information out on social media. We let them use our logo on their website. We know, like we let them blast it because if it's a good tool, you can't drown out the bad stuff.
Leo Debroeck: There's always gonna be it, but you can make good stuff louder. Mm-hmm. And that's kind of been our, our goal. So we've decided to do this in. Three different big ways. The first way is if someone has a therapy product, a book you know, the Receptionist is something I know you've had for
James Marland: this. Yeah.
James Marland: Michael Ashford. That's
Leo Debroeck: right. Yeah. He was awesome. We're, he is honestly the best. I love him. We're, we're kind of working together to go through his product at the moment as well. See if it meets. It sounds like it's probably gonna get approved. I'm waiting on one more person. Oh, so you
James Marland: can submit like, not not just therapy books, but products used in a therapy office.
Leo Debroeck: Precisely. Like anything that's gonna help a therapist and we want to look distinguished for therapists to find We're gonna do it.
Oh,
James Marland: that's cool. That kind of puts a little twist on it too.
Leo Debroeck: Exactly. Right. Because I mean, there's another one brighter Visions, I think. I've been working with them and they make websites and mm-hmm.
Leo Debroeck: They make it real easy, the things that make being a therapist. For the therapist as opposed to being the business owner. Right. Or being you know, working on scaling your practice, which as you know, is a lot of work, but it doesn't really have to be. Right. That's the reason you're listening to this podcast mm-hmm.
Leo Debroeck: Is because it really doesn't have to be, if you know what you're doing, work smarter or not harder. Things that like, that can all, you know, submit for Counselor's Choice award and, and.
James Marland: Sorry, go ahead. Go ahead. No, my comment was not related to anything. The work smarter not harder made me think of Scrooge McDuck cocktails.
Leo Debroeck: Well, I mean, I would love to swim in money too, honestly. Yeah, I know. I mean, I'm not gonna turn it down, but I, yeah. Yeah. Well that's kind of the other mindset we, we have to keep in mind is that people think. Rich people are these these bad people that are taking advantage of others? And that's just not the case.
Leo Debroeck: If you're running a good business, you're gonna be available to help more people than if you're scrounging for pennies every week. If you're, you're needing to do this. Stuff like Counselor's Choice Award is meant to make that easier for you to run a better business, find the things that you need to do that.
Leo Debroeck: So we, we don't charge anything to apply. It's free to apply because we ask for donations, either donations of your money. To help. I mean, the websites aren't free or donation of your time to be a volunteer if you're a licensed mental health therapist. Mm-hmm. Or psychologist, things like that.
Leo Debroeck: And in my experience, 85% of people donate one of those two things when they submit an application. Now, I don't tell my reviewers whether they've donated mm-hmm. Or chosen to volunteer or anything so that we kind of. Keep it separate. But as a result, anyone can, we, there's no ceiling or floor there.
Leo Debroeck: They can just, anyone can apply for it. And we can send it out to reviewers who are volunteers. And it really makes it really accessible that way. So it's just you know, these big therapy products and tools, but anybody who's got a book, anybody who's got something that, that can help us.
James Marland: So you can, you can submit your own stuff you're saying like if I most people do. Exactly. Yeah. Most people submit their own things. Like there's no, like, hey, well, what if I like somebody else's stuff? Am I allowed to submit?
Leo Debroeck: Totally can't. And we've done that for a few things. Like Claudia Black's pretty well known.
Leo Debroeck: We had someone else kind of submit her stuff and we're like, yeah, she's, she's got great stuff on addiction. Why, why wouldn't we approve this? Why wouldn't we have that? 'cause this is extremely high quality work that she does. So someone else submitted hers and you know, now she's on our list of honorees and everything too.
James Marland: And in the vetting process do, if, so, if something isn't, doesn't like pan out or they don't get approved, do you give them recommendations on how to improve? Or is it just a yes no binary
Leo Debroeck: thing? Yeah. And, and that's part of the the efforts that the volunteers do really, really good work in, which is that 90% of the time we just have to come back with more questions or more specifics.
Leo Debroeck: Mm-hmm. But if it's, if it's a no you, you kinda can tell pretty quickly the. Idea is that we're, we're looking to be able to give feedback here mm-hmm. For, for them, for the positives or the negative. Have a list of, you know, unapproved honorees, like avoid these courses or anything like that.
Leo Debroeck: But that'd be rather malicious. I kinda like that idea though. The, the the idea is that when you submit, if there's certain things we're gonna tell you, Hey, you know, this is missing. You know, any sort of scientific validity. Has this been, has this been tried in different settings before? Things like that.
Leo Debroeck: So it's, it's pretty rare that we're gonna just telling you like, sorry, you get rejected or get ghosted. It's, it just doesn't happen. Okay. Yeah, the the other area that surprises a lot of people is we do it for group and private practices. We've even done it for an inpatient hospital. So if you just have a private practice or even a small group practice and you're looking to be able to look a little bit more distinguished in your area, you can throw it in for yourself there as well.
Leo Debroeck: More than happy to be. The application's pretty straightforward. It's. If you're running a good practice, you're doing already from, you know, what, what is your wait list And mm-hmm uh, how long is it? You know, do you, what do you do when you're out of the office? Do you have someone available for crises?
Leo Debroeck: You know, do you accept hospital discharges? And then the big one is, do you accept everyone and everyone anyone? And a lot of people are gonna be like, oh yeah, well, I'll accept anybody. And then the next question is, What qualifies you to do that? You know, what are your specials, what are your trainings?
Leo Debroeck: 'cause if you're accepting everyone and anyone, you need to be basically the Renaissance man and have credentials in everything. Right. So it's, it's just, it's common sense stuff. Yeah. Like if you're running a good practice and it's, it's meeting certain standards will give you the, the logo to put on your website will blast out that, you know, you've won the award.
Leo Debroeck: Things like that. 'cause we really want these private practices that, that do those basic standards that beyond just licensure to, to get recognized. It's not easy. Yeah. It's
James Marland: one, one more, one more voice when they could be choosing a lot of other things. Oh, this person. Has has been nominated or recognized, so.
Leo Debroeck: Mm-hmm. And, and think about this. If you're trying to grow your practice, and I'm a therapist looking at what place to join, you know mm-hmm. After I've gotten my license mm-hmm. I'm gonna be looking for one that's also more distinguished, one that's more got some kind of recognition besides just that we're licensed.
Leo Debroeck: We've got our business license, we've hung a shingle. 'cause a lot of places aren't gonna be joint commission authorized and things like that if they're kind of not gigantic. Right.
James Marland: Sorry. The LA one, the hospital I worked for was Joint Commission accredited. Yes. What a nightmare that, yeah, there was so much extra work.
James Marland: So much extra Mark. Anyway, sorry. Yeah, yeah. I'll, I'll get over that. Little
Leo Debroeck: flash of pain. A deep breath. It's okay. And joint commission is a sort of trigger word for me because where? Where like, are they coming in today? Are they review, are like, is it today? Is
James Marland: today, yeah. I didn't study. Oh man. Oh, fun times.
James Marland: Fun times. Yeah.
Leo Debroeck: So, that's, that's kind of the other. And then the last big piece for us is just starting this year, we've put in for accreditation for providing continuing education credits. So we now provide free continuing education credits that are accredited for some really, I think, dang good courses.
Leo Debroeck: I say that because I made a couple of them. But a lot of. Group practices and private practices are trying to showcase their expertise and providing continuing education credits not only provides extra income and it's super easy to do. You don't need, you know, special, heavy equipment or anything like that.
Leo Debroeck: But it, it also is a nice way to be able to. Help the other people in the profession. So what we are doing is we will host the videos, we will go through the accommodation requirements everything that's hard to do and all the person needs to do is focused on making a really high quality course.
Leo Debroeck: And this is where good business versus bad business comes in. There is a. Grimy thing a lot of other places do business-wise, which is when is you sign up for with them to sell their education course with them. You lose exclusivity. You cannot sell it anywhere else. You cannot teach it again. Mm-hmm.
Leo Debroeck: You cannot do anything. You're, you're, you're, you're just. You're stuck. In fact, there's one place I was talking to that you can't even teach the same material. So if you spent eight years in, you know, grad school learning something mm-hmm. And got your PhD, and now you've taught this course, which you wrote your dissertation on, and you taught.
Leo Debroeck: Course with them, you can never ever teach that course ever again, even though you spent years of your life. That's awful. And they're a nonprofit, by the way, in California. And I'm like, why is that? Okay? Why is that allowed? Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. It's, it's unethical. So we don't sign for exclusivity. In fact, we work with other people to get your course in more places.
Leo Debroeck: 'cause if it's a really good course, we want it to be out there as much as possible. Mm-hmm. So if they, people don't know how to make a course, they've never made one before, but they're interested, I'll talk. Or someone from our team. Well, to show them how to do it, we have templates to go through. We will show them the list of requirements for different accreditation standards.
Leo Debroeck: It's, it's way more accessible. I, you can literally make a course in a day or just between your no-shows in a week. Mm-hmm. It's, it's not hard if. You're already an expert in that area and you know a lot about it, which a lot of people have specialties. So we've, we've kind of expanded into that area recently because the businesses way that they're being run, they need to be taken down.
Leo Debroeck: Like they, they just need to be punched in the face because it's not okay. And, and someone, someone should do something, right? Someone should run a business differently so that people can get good continuing education courses. Well, We're someone
James Marland: cool. So that, that's really interesting. So you're making it easy for people to use their expert knowledge to help other people and earn some
Leo Debroeck: money, I guess.
Leo Debroeck: Yeah. Passive income. 'cause we do asynchronous courses. And it actually adds up quite a bit once you get, you know, three or four courses going. Cool. You can quit your day job, but, you know, go on vacation, spend that 15 hour trip up to the beach. It's not a bad idea.
James Marland: Well, that's, that's part of the, that's part of the problem with only earning money when you're behind the chair and somebody's in front of you, right?
James Marland: Mm-hmm. Like, you can't, if you need to pay the bills, you can't stop it. Like you can't stop seeing people going on vacation is not just. Going on vacation. It's going on vacation and missing a week or two of work, you know? Mm-hmm. So it's like extra hard. So how do you add a revenue stream that might not make up for, you know, quitting therapy completely.
James Marland: Mm-hmm. But, but how do you use, you know, maximize, maximize your skills, like, maximize the knowledge that you have in, in using it in an alternative way, like, Not, not a hundred percent pivot, but like an an addition to what you're doing. And I think online courses, C cu courses, training courses video courses, it's It's just so much easier now than it, it used to be like, the technology's good.
James Marland: Mm-hmm. The cameras are good. The, the microphones are relatively cheap, you know.
Leo Debroeck: Yeah. Depends on the day.
James Marland: It, well, it, you can go down the thousand dollar rabbit trail, but most of the time For what? For what we use, you know, a hundred dollars is fine.
Leo Debroeck: So, yeah. Well, the thing is like, I know every single therapist has taken a bad course, right?
Leo Debroeck: Mm-hmm. One that is either too advanced or too basic, or just not something they're gonna use, and it's a waste of everybody's time and energy, right? Yeah. The time that could be better spent being a therapist, we'd really like to nip that in the butt. I went to this one course where the, the person wanted to talk about a book.
Leo Debroeck: Then they just left for like three minutes to go get the book in the middle of the course. I'm like, what? What's this? What did I just pay for? Like yeah. How is this allowed? So making sure that you've got, you know, good material for then you know, what you're buying is gonna be of quality. Mm-hmm. Is, is so important when it is that easy when anyone with a microphone and camera can do it.
Leo Debroeck: Unfortunately that lowers the bar quite a bit too. Yeah.
James Marland: So how do you, how do you help them ensure quality then when they're making the, the courses?
Leo Debroeck: Yeah. We've got about 15 things they have to do. It's, it's, but they're. Like that's how you do anything, including getting a business. It's a just a bunch of tiny steps.
Leo Debroeck: So everything from do you have recent you know, cited articles within the past 10 years? Because if it's not within the past 10 years and you're citing research from the 1940s or sixties or something mm-hmm. Okay. There's gotta be a real good reason for this. So it's gotta be recent research, something that's current.
Leo Debroeck: There needs to be. Depending on the material, like a, a case presentation of sorts. Obviously not a real case, but something that can help them kind of really digest it. It can't be, you know, a bunch of videos just shackled together and stitched to make a course. It actually has to be, you know, you're presenting materials.
Leo Debroeck: So fairly straightforward. Fairly straightforward things that you'd think is actually a pretty low bar, but you'd be surprised you know, if you'd never made a course before, you don't know what you don't know. Uh mm-hmm. You don't know what to ask. Some of the other pretty straightforward ones is that you are able to.
Leo Debroeck: Have a a, a post-test that is adequate, you know? Mm-hmm. If someone who's never taken the course can pass the post-test, which is why this stuff is reviewed by therapist. You know exactly what's gonna happen. They're not gonna watch it or they're not gonna read it and they're gonna click next to the post-test and you're like, we.
Leo Debroeck: So we have a little bit stricter requirements and when we get reviewed, we have our reviewers take the post-test first, and if they can pass it without doing the test means either they're already an expert in that area, in which case we'll pick, get a different reviewer, or they need to write a better post-test.
Leo Debroeck: Oh, very interesting. It's not great for the buyer side 'cause they want an easy post test, but like, we're, we're more obsessed with quality than quantity.
James Marland: Yeah. That you're, you're for those people, that's not your audience. You don't want the people who just want the easy course. Your audience is somebody who actually wants to learn something or be inspired or, you know, get, actually get use from their mandatory credits.
James Marland: So how many courses do you have right now?
Leo Debroeck: Last time I checked about a dozen. I've got a, you know, I've getting like one or two coming in a week at this point. Because that's kind of the nice thing about it. Once I've trained people on how to do this, they can just, Sending it in. And what a lot of therapists are doing is one person I work with, they have their courses available on their site.
Leo Debroeck: So they can take them there if they want, or they can, you know, anyone that they direct our way, they're gonna get a, a fee split for that. And a couple other ones they have on their website just a link. 'cause they don't wanna host the videos, they don't want to have to deal with accommodations or accreditation.
Leo Debroeck: It's, it is just a link. Sends it straight to their course on our website, not our, all of our courses, just their course.
James Marland: And are they accredited or is it your site is
Leo Debroeck: accredited? Yeah, that's where it gets tricky. So we're accredited as a provider, so when we review it, we, I. Sometimes do certain video editing and accommodation standards to make it accredited.
Leo Debroeck: For example, if you taught it live and you recorded it, and now you wanna sell that recording, we have to cut out all the breaks. 'cause that mm-hmm. We can't be accredited and have a 15 minute break, right, where they just stare at a video screen. Right. So we have to cut stuff out to stay accredited. So it's us that are accredited but we host the course, which then after our edits meets those same standards.
Leo Debroeck: Interesting.
James Marland: Cool. I like it. And that, I suppose the applications, it's all on the webpage, right?
Leo Debroeck: Oh, yeah. How to do that? Yeah. On the top banner you hit apply now and it'll be right there. It's it's, it's easy though, and it's something that will make your practice, especially if you have therapists that work for you and you know that they've got no shows or you know that they're.
Leo Debroeck: Slowly building up their clientele and doing intakes. Make them make a course while they've got downtime. It doesn't take long to make a two hour
James Marland: course. It really doesn't. Yeah. They've already done a dissertation or something, you know? Right. They've already got this massive research project that they could do, even if they're new.
James Marland: Yeah. It's, it's, they have something and, and it's probably valuable, like. Like most, most man, most therapists I talk to e even their like Facebook posts could be a course sometimes. You know, they're just like, these are like the three things I did today that made my life better. And I'm like, what? That's amazing.
James Marland: And it's just, you know, that it's just like one of the most, I think it's an undertapped. That knowledge is under tapped. Like it's just not, it's because it's always behind the chair, right? Mm-hmm. It's always mm-hmm. One-to-one. And how do you take that and make it one to many you know, online courses, CEUs.
James Marland: Mm-hmm. Book, you know, your books. That's another way to take it from one to many. Is just something that should be explored. 'cause you're not gonna, you're not gonna be behind the chair forever. Right. So, what are you gonna do? What do you, like, how do you prepare for your future today? Yeah, the passive income stuff.
James Marland: Mm-hmm. So, so we've talked about the, the awards, we've talked about, CEUs. Was there anything else that you wanted to talk about or bring up? About, about your webpage or what you're
Leo Debroeck: doing? I just wanna say one other thing, which is that we're always looking for donors and we're always looking for volunteers because it's free to apply.
Leo Debroeck: So, I mean, why not? You know, there's no, there's no cost to you. The application isn't long. Mm-hmm. You know, if you, you miss something, we'll just reply back in an email that said, Hey, what about this? So it, what harm does it. Is there in just applying for counselor's Choice Award for your private practice or group practice because it's, it's, if you're doing everything right, we really do want to recognize you for that.
Leo Debroeck: It's, it is a big deal and it shouldn't just be seen as, oh, I'm at the bar. 'cause if you really would help your clients, people need to know it and they need to use that as a model to help themselves. 'cause there are, there are a lot of people that struggle with These these business sides of things or what to do with their wait lists, et cetera.
James Marland: No, that, that's great. Does, it doesn't hurt to apply. It's, it's free to apply and you know, that the recognitions and the testimonials are, are something that we all need. I think. Like it's, it's something that is great. Um mm-hmm. Before we go, I wanted to you do you have a story about why you're, you don't wait for somebody?
Leo Debroeck: I have many stories for that, but
James Marland: because that, that came up a couple times and it's it sounds personal and sort of like, like it's, it's, we, we have mantras we live by because of reasons, you know? Mm-hmm. So what was your reason to live by this?
Leo Debroeck: So that's So I grew up in Everett, north of Seattle.
Leo Debroeck: If you've ever heard of a Boeing plane it's a good probability that was built or designed there Northrop Grham, things like that. So it's, it's, it's a lot of work to be wor for 120,000 people to work at just a couple of Boeing factories. So it's a lot of blue collar work and. One of the areas that I, I grew up and lived in, it really felt normal for there to always say, oh yeah, we should, we should do these things.
Leo Debroeck: And one of the things was there, we should have therapists and counselors just in schools because there's a lot of kids that need therapy that don't have a way to have their parents get, take them to a therapy office and. I just heard that so long in my life for such a long time. I'm like, well, Somebody needs to do that.
Leo Debroeck: And hearing that over and over again, that, oh, we really gotta do this. And they would post jobs. It's not like they weren't trying, but no one would do it. 'cause like they, they'd pay peanuts. Right. Because that's all that they had. And it's a untried program. And I, I got went to grad school. I was.
Leo Debroeck: Finally got this job and I'm like, well, it's time. And I went, I moved back across state to my hometown and I started that job and it was fantastic. And it was and has been kind of this, that amazing journey that to finally be able to be that somebody and why stop there, right? There's so many other things to, to be done.
James Marland: Wow. Alright. Thank you. Yeah. Sorry for springing that on you at the end as we're wrapping up. But I, it just, I just kept coming back to that, like, you, you know, waiting for somebody just how personal it is to you and you've, like, you, you've made it your mantra and it, it sounds like it keeps, you know, you're growing, you know, you're, you keep doing things and challenging yourself and it has worked, you know, it's done well for you.
James Marland: So thank you for that. So, before, before we end, what's one thing you want people to remember? If they could only remember one thing mm-hmm. You know, what's that one thing you want them to take with you?
Leo Debroeck: I want to take with them that there is I want them to take with them that there is more than one way to be able to scale your practice.
Leo Debroeck: And there might be ways you're not thinking about. Those other ways are producing products, therapy tools, continuing education courses as well as getting recognized for your hard work through Counselor's Choice Award, that there's more than one way to scale a practice. It's not a straight line.
James Marland: Great. The one thing I'm gonna take away is people always say that they don't, they don't have enough time to do these things. You've said, why don't you just do it during your no shows? Yeah. I'm like, brilliant. You got 30 minutes, 45 minutes, set up a sprint for yourself, turn off the phone and just yeah, put the phone away.
James Marland: Stop, stop feeding yourself with worthless information and crack away at something important for, for 30, 40 minutes. And if you have a couple no shows a week, you got an extra two hours a week to to figure stuff out. So Yeah. Unless you don't get no shows, then you're gonna have to figure out something else.
James Marland: But I bet everybody gets no shows every once in a while, so. Awesome. So, Leo, thanks for, thanks for coming on the show. I really enjoyed what you were talking and sharing and your heart, and your mission, and your passion. Can you share again, you know, where can people find you and what, what are some of your offers?
Leo Debroeck: Thank you so much, Remi. So, counselor's Choice Award is the name. You just Google that. It'll pop right up. Counselor choice award.com. And the other, other area for that is that different kind of. Honorees that we have are everything from authors and producers of, of children therapy books to tools that you might need if you're trying to scale your practice and continuing education courses that are accredited and free because we think that they are some courses that every therapist should be aware of and know how to, how to use.
Leo Debroeck: And I really, really am honored to be on here. I I really enjoy some of the. The material that you present and the way that you present it, James, it's, it's hard to learn something and enjoy it in the same time.
James Marland: Well, good. Well, thanks Leo. I, I appreciate it. And that's Leo at the counselor's choice award.com.
James Marland: He's the author of Seven seven, I
Leo Debroeck: think. So maybe on the Glos Count
James Marland: Sevens book, the most recent, the the Trust Hotel. Thanks for, thanks everybody for joining us. I really do appreciate the audience. If you wanna give us a like or share, that would be amazing. And remember to take those small steps every day that lead to big growth.
James Marland: We'll see you next time.
James Marland: Thank you for listening to the scaling therapy practice I hope you enjoyed the show I want to remind you that the content shared today is for general information and entertainment purposes only It shouldn't be considered as legal or tax advice If you need a professional advice in those areas please consult with a licensed attorney or accountant but thank you so much for listening The scaling therapy practice is part of the psych craft network
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