
Instructor: Liz Brenner, LICSW
Date and Time: February 19, 2021 - 9:00 am to 4:45 pm
Credits: 6 CEs
Location: Live on Zoom
Co-sponsored by NEAFAST
Date and Time: February 19, 2021 - 9:00 am to 4:45 pm
Credits: 6 CEs
Location: Live on Zoom
Co-sponsored by NEAFAST
Description:
This workshop will provide support and guidance for clinicians who are working via telehealth. Most of us pivoted quickly to working on screens with little to no training, planning or interest. Missing the nonverbal and peripheral communication that we are used to changes our work in significant ways. This is partly why telehealth can be less satisfying and more exhausting, even as there are advantages. Also effecting our work are the added stressors on clinicians and clients due to the pandemic. Most of a year in, we have learned the hard way that there is much to appreciate, accommodate, resist, and reflect upon. We will have an opportunity to learn together and support one another as we move forward.
We will focus on what is lost in the absence of physical presence. Without three-dimensional vision and sharing the same physical space, we miss nonverbal and peripheral participation that helps us deeply know and connect with our clients. Physical presence enhances our ability to establish trust, gain commitment, confirm understanding and consensus, intuit emotional states and intervene in subtle ways. Liz will propose specific practices that make up for what is missing to maintain the depth of our ability to connect, maintain alliances and intervene therapeutically on the screen.
Sharing lessons from her own experience as well as those of colleagues and supervisees, Liz will discuss working well on telehealth from a lens that includes the ephemeral and the practical. The workshop will consider the many effects of the pandemic on our work. We will have time to reflect and learn from each other’s experiences of what’s working, what’s challenging and what creative solutions are evolving in work with individuals, couples, families and groups.
In depth discussions of the following topics in large and small groups will support abilities to do effective and satisfying work on the screen. You will leave the workshop with several practical tools to enhance the practice of telehealth.
We will focus on what is lost in the absence of physical presence. Without three-dimensional vision and sharing the same physical space, we miss nonverbal and peripheral participation that helps us deeply know and connect with our clients. Physical presence enhances our ability to establish trust, gain commitment, confirm understanding and consensus, intuit emotional states and intervene in subtle ways. Liz will propose specific practices that make up for what is missing to maintain the depth of our ability to connect, maintain alliances and intervene therapeutically on the screen.
Sharing lessons from her own experience as well as those of colleagues and supervisees, Liz will discuss working well on telehealth from a lens that includes the ephemeral and the practical. The workshop will consider the many effects of the pandemic on our work. We will have time to reflect and learn from each other’s experiences of what’s working, what’s challenging and what creative solutions are evolving in work with individuals, couples, families and groups.
In depth discussions of the following topics in large and small groups will support abilities to do effective and satisfying work on the screen. You will leave the workshop with several practical tools to enhance the practice of telehealth.
- Taking Care of Ourselves in the Land of Telehealth
- Making Sure The Therapeutic Alliance Is Solid in An Ongoing Way
- Increasing Use of Transparency
- Slow Downing (Even More) to Go Fast
- Using Practical Interventions Including:
- Making More Explicit Agreements to Support the Work
- Obtaining Feedback About How The Therapy is Going More Frequently
- Reframing to Engender Hope, Minimize Blame and Light a Path Forward in Challenging Times
- Managing Transitions In and Out of the Session and the Space Between Meetings
- Increasing Structure as Needed
- Addressing the Issue of Covid Safety and Focusing on Clients Taking Care of Themselves
- Working with Issues of Anxiety, Grief and Justice: Ours, Theirs and the Intersections Thereof
- Unearthing Lightness and Intimacy in the Darkness of Our Shared Milieu
- Closing thoughts
Instructor

Liz Brenner, LICSW, is the course director and primary instructor for the Intensive Certificate Program in Family Systems Therapy. Her clinical work and teaching integrate family systems, interpersonal neurobiology, attachment, mindfulness, trauma and recovery orientations. Her work in child psychiatric inpatient, home based, residential and outpatient settings inform her passion for working competently and compassionately with couples and families. She is a Level 2 LifeForce Yoga and EMDR practitioner and a Certified Level 3 IFS practitioner. Liz sees adolescents and adults in individual, couple and family therapy. When not serving via teleheath during the pandemic, her office is in Watertown MA. Liz also provides individual and group supervision, agency consultation and training. She has provided training for DCF and DMH staff in a variety of settings.
Learning Objectives
- Participants will be able to list several practical interventions to create and maintain a strong therapeutic alliance on the screen.
- Participants will be able to identify two agreements that they can use with clients to facilitate clarity of roles and enhance communication in telehealth sessions.
- Participants will be able to describe challenges related to transitions in and out of telehealth sessions and define one strategy to minimize those difficulties.
- Participants will assess their telehealth practices with regard to missing nonverbal and peripheral communication and list two strategies they will use to bring that information into the clinical work.
Workshop Outline
9 am to 10:30 am:
10:45 am to 12:30 pm
1:30 pm to 2:45 pm
3 pm to 4:15 pm
- Taking Care of Ourselves in the Land of Telehealth
- Therapeutic Alliance, Transparency, Slowing Down to Go Fast
10:45 am to 12:30 pm
- Using Practical Interventions & Small Group Break Outs
1:30 pm to 2:45 pm
- More Practical Interventions
3 pm to 4:15 pm
- Covid Safety, Clients Self Care, Anxiety, Grief and Justice
- Unearthing Lightness and Intimacy in the Darkness of Our Shared Milieu
- Complete online workshop evaluation
- Closing thoughts and questions
Target Audience
This learning event is designed for helping professionals including, but not limited to, social workers, psychologists, mental health counselors, marriage & family therapists, and nurses. We design the learning methodology to further develop beginning, intermediate, and advanced helping professionals by supporting improvement of skills for direct practice, supervision, and management positions. People who attend from professions other than those we are able to provide CEs for may request a Certificate of Attendance.
Location
Live on Zoom
Cost
Individual Registration: $140, $130 early registration, received by 1.31.21.
Group Registration: $130 per person for groups of two or more, $125 per person early registration for groups of two or more, received by 1.31.21. Groups must register and pay together to receive the discount.
Members of NEAFAST, Black Therapists Rock, National Association of Black Counselors and all BIPOC clinicians may access an equity rate of $120. Please contact us for discount codes. No application is required.
Group Registration: $130 per person for groups of two or more, $125 per person early registration for groups of two or more, received by 1.31.21. Groups must register and pay together to receive the discount.
Members of NEAFAST, Black Therapists Rock, National Association of Black Counselors and all BIPOC clinicians may access an equity rate of $120. Please contact us for discount codes. No application is required.
Registration
Please note the online system allows you to register: using your Paypal account, using Paypal as a conduit to your credit card or provides instructions to mail a check. Please complete the online registration form even if you will be mailing a check for payment. Your space is not secure until payment is received.
Workshop CEs

Participants MUST attend 100% of the program to earn the 6 contact hours approved. Certificates will be given at the end of the event after you are fully paid and have completed the evaluation form. Details for approved professions: 6 CEs have been approved for licensed Social Work, Marriage and Family Therapy, Psychology and Nursing professionals by Commonwealth Educational Seminars.
Licensed Mental Health Counselors can earn 6 contact hours as Therapy Training Boston has been approved by NBCC as an Approved Continuing Education Provider, ACEP No. 6707. Programs that do not qualify for NBCC credit are clearly identified. Therapy Training Boston is solely responsible for all aspects of the programs. 6 CEs have been approved for Certified IFS practitioners.
For more detailed information about CEs, read this.
Licensed Mental Health Counselors can earn 6 contact hours as Therapy Training Boston has been approved by NBCC as an Approved Continuing Education Provider, ACEP No. 6707. Programs that do not qualify for NBCC credit are clearly identified. Therapy Training Boston is solely responsible for all aspects of the programs. 6 CEs have been approved for Certified IFS practitioners.
For more detailed information about CEs, read this.
Cancellations and Refunds
Workshops and courses may be cancelled by Therapy Training Boston if minimum enrollment requirements are not met. In this case, full fees will be refunded or applied to future programs. Otherwise, no refunds are provided for registrants.