The Business of Psychology

Hosted by Dr Rosie Gilderthorp

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Aug 2026

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Are you a mental health professional with a feeling in the pit of your stomach that the system is BROKEN? Did you start your training full of ideas about changing the landscape of mental health for the better but now you find you are so busy seeing people in crisis that you don't have time to do any of it? Do you KNOW that we need to get out of our therapy rooms and start reaching people in other ways? Do you KNOW that the key to better mental health is prevention not crisis management? If you do then join me for a mix practical skills, strategies and inspirational interviews with psychologists and therapists just like you who are using their skills to do BIG things way beyond the therapy room. Prepare to get your "trainee spirit" back.

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August 28, 202613 min

Fear of Judgement - Colleagues, Clients and the Internet

Fear of Judgement - Colleagues, Clients and the Internet Welcome to the Business of Psychology Podcast, and welcome back to our miniseries on the beliefs that can make it really difficult for us to get started in independent practice or to grow our practice if we already have one. In this series, I'm reflecting on the beliefs that I hear most commonly from my coaching clients and the ones that have been pinging around in my head for years as well, and thinking about where they come from, but also what we can do to try and move through when we want to act against some of these beliefs and how uncomfortable that that can make us. Full show notes for this episode available at The Business of Psychology Links: Episode 182: Neurodivergence: Having the big conversations and living your values with Dr Naomi Fisher Episode 68: How to launch an online course as a psychologist with Dr Marianne Trent Substack: substack.com/@drrosie Rosie on Instagram: @rosiegilderthorp @drrosiegilderthorp The Magnetic Profile In my new mini course, The Magnetic Profile, I walk you through one specific business task. Over five short lessons, we use my Values, Voice, Impact framework to help you choose who your profile is for, say what they most need to hear, and plug it all into a simple template that you can use on directory sites, your website, and as a business asset that I'm going to show you how to repurpose in 100 different ways to help the right clients to find you. Most importantly, you'll come out of the course with a finished profile and proof that you can do this business thing in a way that feels ethical and manageable. You can find all the details here: https://psychologybusinessschool.mykajabi.com/the-magnetic-profile Fear of Judgement The thing that I want to talk about today is the fear of judgment. This sounds different in different people's heads, but I hear a lot of, "Oh, I'm really scared about what my ex-colleagues are going to think," or "Will people think I've sold out? Will people accuse me of being a charlatan, or not good enough, or not experienced enough to offer this thing?" And that really drives a lot of people's reluctance to be visible, especially online. And as you'll know if you've listened to previous series’ of The Business of Psychology, I've recorded episodes recently with people like Naomi Fisher and Marianne Trent, where we've talked about this because it's a very big deal in our community; this is not in people's heads. I think psychology and psychotherapy can both be quite judgmental professional communities, and the way that we're interacting online at the moment is often not very compassionate and very judgmental. So this fear doesn't come from nowhere. Even the stuff we talked about in the first episode of this miniseries about the belief that ‘I'm not good at business’, and how often that can come from this massive pit of shame that people feel about needing money and needing to be paid for their work, and choosing that narrative as a way of keeping themselves safe from being seen as somebody that is money motivated, all of that actually comes from this feeling of being judged by our peers. I'm not going to get into too much the reality of that and the reason that happens, because I know we've talked about that a lot in other episodes. But what I want to bring to your attention is the impact that might be having on the way that you're running your business, because sometimes it's so ingrained within us that it can fly under the radar, and we don't really realize how much our behavior is impacted by this concern about what our peers might be thinking of us. Ultra-Genericism The first thing that I see is ultra-genericism. This might be directory site profiles, website copy, social media content; incredibly generic, vanilla, safe content that doesn't really say anything at all. It's so bland it's pointless, and I always say to my clients, if your voice is not in it, if it isn't something which you're desperate to share with the world, don't share it at all. Because the world is so saturated and full of boring, generic mental health content, there is no point spending your valuable time creating more boring, vanilla mental health content. It's just not going to stand out enough to have any benefit to you or reach any potential clients. But I totally get it. I get why that feels safe, because you can't criticize something that's super generic. That's the first way that I see this showing up, and people really don't realize they're doing that most of the time. It's just what feels natural for them to share. Sharing Photos Or Personal Details. People might avoid sharing any photos or any personal details. I did this. I started my practice and tried to hide behind a brand. I shared a logo, I had a quite good name for the practice, and I hid myself behind all of that because I didn't want anybody to see me at all. It didn't work, spoiler alert! You might find yourself, if this is a big problem for you, over-editing, trying to sound like someone that you're not in everything that you write, everything that you say if you're in a visible setting. If you go to networking, for example, and find yourself talking in a really unnatural way, it may be that this fear of judgment is governing your behavior. Real Risk vs Imagined Risk Something I often talk about with my coaching clients, and this is often most useful in our group coaching sessions, is to assess the real risk versus the imagined risk, because there is real risk, and so we do need to deal with that. We can't just pretend that nobody's ever going to judge you. They probably will, but we need to think about the reality of that and whether that reality matters, and the reality of not doing the things that you're avoiding because of your fear of judgment, and whether that matters. So balancing that up, the consideration of what it's costing you to keep yourself small and invisible and generic, and weighing that against the potential that some colleagues may make judgmental statements. Who Are You Writing For? The other thing I always encourage people to think about when this is a big problem is who they're writing for, and to be really clear on the benefits for the client of everything they're putting out there. This is something that I teach through all of my coaching, that the client's need comes first. So we're not putting out a social media post unless we're really clear on what the benefit is to the potential client. We think about how what I'm saying here is going to leave them feeling? What is it going to give them? If we don't have a strong reason that it's going to be beneficial to the client, whether they come on and pay for our services, or whether they're just passively absorbing this content, we want to always be leaving those people with a benefit. So if we know that, if we're really clear on, "Okay, I'm worried that my colleague might read this and judge me, but I'm also really confident that somebody in this client group reading this is going to get a real benefit from it," very often we can move through the discomfort of what our colleague thinks because we know what we're trying to do for the client, and we're really confident and happy that that is aligned with our values. So it's a good example of how we can use our values like a North Star to guide us through the swamp of a fear of judgment, which never feels nice really. Locus Of Control The other thing I always encourage people to think about is the concept of locus of control, and specifically that you cannot control what your colleagues think or why they're going to think that about you. It's classic, isn't it? People have their own psychological reasons for judging other people. We can't control any of those. And so you can be really careful about what you say, you can be really careful about what you put out there, but the reality is, if you do anything, there are going to be people that don't like you and that judge you for it, especially if you're successful and you get in front of lots of people, then it's absolutely inevitable that you're going to face judgment and that you're going to annoy some people. What you have to be clear on is what makes that worth it for you. There are some battles that I choose not to fight. There are some things that I see happening, and I don't put my head above the parapet and I don't fight for every cause that I believe in because I'm a human being and there's a threshold for what conflict I can take, but there are certain things that I will speak up about and I am willing to be visible talking about even when not everybody will agree with me, and that's a lesson I really had to learn writing my book about being a parent to autistic and ADHD children and putting...

August 21, 202619 min

Procrastination, Overwhelm and the Illusion of “I’ll Start When…”

Procrastination, Overwhelm and the Illusion of "I’ll Start When…" Welcome to The Business of Psychology podcast and our special miniseries on the beliefs that keep people stuck in either a private practice that doesn't really work for them or that stop them getting started in private practice at all. These are mini episodes where I'm sharing the things that I've learned from coaching hundreds of other psychologists and therapists and also going through my own mental struggles with the rollercoaster that is business. Today I want to talk about procrastination and overwhelm, and specifically how frequently I hear people saying that they're just not the kind of person that can overcome their procrastination or overwhelm. Full show notes for this episode available at The Business of Psychology Links: Episode 179: Why every therapist needs to use social media to improve their SEO Substack: substack.com/@drrosie Rosie on Instagram: @rosiegilderthorp @drrosiegilderthorp The Magnetic Profile In my new mini course, The Magnetic Profile, I walk you through one specific business task. Over five short lessons, we use my Values, Voice, Impact framework to help you choose who your profile is for, say what they most need to hear, and plug it all into a simple template that you can use on directory sites, your website, and as a business asset that I'm going to show you how to repurpose in 100 different ways to help the right clients to find you. Most importantly, you'll come out of the course with a finished profile and proof that you can do this business thing in a way that feels ethical and manageable. You can find all the details here: https://psychologybusinessschool.mykajabi.com/the-magnetic-profile Procrastination And Overwhelm I think most psychologists and therapists acknowledge that all human beings use procrastination as a technique sometimes, and that it is part of a normal human experience to get overwhelmed sometimes. But I think a lot of people do have this story about themselves that they are a procrastinator, or they are someone who becomes overwhelmed easily, and as a result, the world of successful business is not available to them. And this really troubles me, and I have to say that something I think is unhelpful about the way that some people's late diagnosis of neurodivergence is framed, is that some people will receive that diagnostic label and then think that writes them off from being able to ever achieve success in business. Or they'll heavily criticize themselves because their assessment has illuminated perhaps things that they're not so brilliant at and they will feel like they're going to have to push a boulder up a hill to be successful in business. When actually, if we think psychologically about what procrastination and overwhelm actually are, then there are so many ways that we can use the strengths that lie behind those tendencies to supercharge our businesses. Some of the most successful clients that I have worked with would identify themselves as procrastinators and people who struggle with overwhelm, because those come from places of deep care and passion for the people that they want to support with their businesses. I think it's really important that, while it's helpful to identify in yourself if you do have tendencies towards procrastination or becoming overwhelmed, we shouldn't allow that kind of story to become a way that we define ourselves that then blocks us from looking for the ways we can play to our strengths to implement good business advice that we might be given. I want to share today, how we can move through the blocking belief that we might have about ourselves, often by accepting a bit of support where we might need it. Something I hear all the time from clients that come to me for coaching is that they've signed up for coaching because they're really annoyed with themselves. They've usually done loads of work, but they feel like they've got about 20 tabs open on their browser and nothing is actually getting completed. They can never tick anything off their list because it's never good enough. Some people will talk about this as procrastination. Other people will talk about the emotional experience. They'll talk about feeling completely overwhelmed. So they open all the tabs, but then they never feel like they engage properly with anything that they start because they become overwhelmed, and they just run away from it. If we think about where this comes from psychologically, you would not feel that way if you didn't care about your potential clients, if you didn't really want this business to be successful. So although this is classic avoidance behavior, there's motivation behind it, and where there's motivation, we can work with that. I never feel despondent if I have a client who is a procrastinator, who's becoming overwhelmed, because it actually tells me that they want to do this, that deep down, this is important to them, or this wouldn't be procrastination, it would just be something that they decided they weren't going to pursue. We know the brain likes to procrastinate because it allows us to avoid the potential for shame, rejection, or failure. An excellent short-term strategy. It gives us the illusion of safety because we get to stay safe in our research mode, which a lot of us really enjoy. But the trouble is procrastination and perfectionism go hand in hand. It is so likely that the reason that you feel like you need to avoid these tasks is that the bar you've set for yourself is super high, that you want this to be the best, the most perfect independent practice that your community has ever seen. That can make every task feel too big to start. It's also true that if you set the bar for yourself that you need to have a complete understanding of something, it can become overwhelming really quickly. This often happens when people talk to me about overwhelm rather than procrastination. Often it's because they're expecting themselves to become a lawyer, because it tends to be that people get really stuck in the overwhelm around the legal aspects of setting up their practice. This can be because they look at the legal templates and think that they need to be able to understand why every comma is in the place that it is. We do provide training with our legal documents because I want you to understand the principles behind them, but the fact is, unless you're going to train in commercial law like Clare Veal from Aubergine Legal, our lovely lawyer, has done, then you're not going to understand every minute detail of your contracts and policies. We can understand the broad brush principles, but we're not lawyers and we don't need to become lawyers. We have our own expertise and that's why we pay Clare Veal to draft those templates for us, because you don't need to become a lawyer. And if you think that you do because you believe everything needs to be perfect and you need to be in full control of every minute detail of your practice, then of course that's going to be overwhelming. A Need To Do Everything At Once The other thing that I think contributes to overwhelm and procrastination is a sense that people need to do everything at once, like getting their practice up and running and fully competent tomorrow. That's not possible. I am a big believer that we can make a lot of progress, my core coaching program is called Start Up in 90 Days, because you absolutely can, over 90 days, get a practice up and running and clients coming in. That is possible. One week is not possible, not to do it to the standard that you're going to want. I think often people have a really unrealistic expectation of themselves, that they're going to be able to learn everything they need to learn and implement it all in a very short period of time. And of course, that is massively overwhelming. Overconsuming Advice The other thing I see is people over-consuming advice. Sometimes people do this with this podcast or with my coaching programs. I'll see in the backend of my coaching website that they've watched every single one of my lessons, and that's a red flag, because if you watch them all in the first week that you're in the coaching platform, that tells me you're taking on board a lot of information, but you're not taking the action. When I coach people, I give very short, 10 or 15 minutes of information, and then I give something practical for you to do to move it forward in your business. The reason I do that is that we are really prone to overwhelming ourselves by thinking about the whole picture. And actually, we tend to get much more success if I give people a template of the business plan that they're going to have fully created by the end of the program, because I do want people to know what we're going to cover and how everything fits together, but then I encourage you to go step by step. Because if you think about the whole big thing, of course that's overwhelming. But if you just take the next step, the next thing we need to do,...

August 14, 202626 min

"I’m Not Good at Business" – The Stories That Keep You Small

“I’m Not Good at Business” - The Stories That Keep You Small In this miniseries I'm going to talk about some of the beliefs that I see most commonly in psychologists and therapists that keep people small, safe, and not really getting the most benefit out of being in independent practice. I'm going to share how if we can become aware of them, there are practical steps we can take that most of the time will get us through the discomfort that comes along with these beliefs. If that can give you a little bit more confidence to step forward in your business, I will be extremely happy. Today we're going to talk about the 'I'm not good at business' story. This is the one I told myself so relentlessly at the beginning of my practice, and I hear in around 50% of calls that I have with coaching clients. We're going to talk about the belief, where it comes up, how it sabotages your attempts to start or grow in independent practice, and look at some ways we can build new evidence to counteract the belief and move through the discomfort that it causes. Full show notes for this episode available at The Business of Psychology Links for Rosie: Substack: substack.com/@drrosie Rosie on Instagram: @rosiegilderthorp @drrosiegilderthorp The Magnetic Profile In my new mini course, The Magnetic Profile, I walk you through one specific business task. Over five short lessons, we use my Values, Voice, Impact framework to help you choose who your profile is for, say what they most need to hear, and plug it all into a simple template that you can use on directory sites, your website, and as a business asset that I'm going to show you how to repurpose in 100 different ways to help the right clients to find you. Most importantly, you'll come out of the course with a finished profile and proof that you can do this business thing in a way that feels ethical and manageable. You can find all the details here: https://psychologybusinessschool.mykajabi.com/the-magnetic-profile The 'I'm not good at business' Belief At the beginning of my practice, I didn't think that I had the kind of personality that would make a good business owner. I'd been told throughout my life that I was quite soft, that I was quite gentle, that people would walk all over me. Elements of that were true. In my personal life, I don't particularly like to be the boss. I don't like telling people what to do. It's certainly true that in a negotiation, I will not do what they do on The Apprentice and be proud of having a laser-focused obsession with profit, and I'm not single-minded. We consume a lot of media about what good business looks like, and it's this very shark-ish, profit-focused, screw you, I'm going to take what I want attitude. I'd grown up watching The Apprentice and Dragon's Den and absorbing those narratives that don't fit my personality at all. So I think I'd bought the idea that if you weren't like that, you weren't good at business. Obviously that is not true at all, because when you get out into the business community and meet people who are really successful, you discover quickly that the people that make it to the top are warm, they are empathic, they're really good at working out what people need from them and finding creative ways to meet that need. There are some exceptions, but in the industries that we're interested in, in mental health or education, or industries adjacent to wellbeing, if you lack that empathy and you lack any compassion, it's very difficult for you to come up with the kind of ideas that are going to take off. I also learned that building relationships and being a trustworthy person to be in a business relationship with is a real accelerant to business growth. That's something, that if you're completely single-minded and out for the profit margin, and have no passion for helping people or your local business community, is incredibly hard to fake. Establishing meaningful relationships where people will give you a leg up, I think would be impossible if you had that kind of personality type. What I discovered quite quickly in my business journey was that leaning into the skills that I have as a psychologist, the fact that I am much more interested in helping people solve their problems than I am making a profit, the fact that I genuinely care about the people that I meet at business networking, and I really get quite invested and excited in their business problems and want to try and help, those were superpowers that made me stand out, that helped me build the relationship network, which accelerated my business to being quite successful reasonably quickly. What I do in coaching is try and encourage other people to really recognise the strengths that you have in your personality, that can be rocket fuel for your business, and to deal with what might be the limitations. I know that because I'm not naturally 100% focused on the profit margin, I won't make a deal with somebody on the spot because I know if I do, it's very likely that I'll undercharge or do something that compromises the health of my business, because I'm excited to work with them, and I'm not very good at doing the mental maths on the spot. I know that about myself, so I changed my sales process so that I'm sending the proposal after the call. I am never talking about the exact solution that I'm going to offer on a call. You'll notice if you ever do a coaching discovery call with me, that most of the time I'll talk about what you think about whether StartUp might be right for you. I might give you my opinion about whether one of my coaching programs is likely to be a good fit, but I won't make the offer and send you through all the details until after our call, because I don't always make brilliant decisions for my business in the heat of the moment. Rather than criticizing myself and saying, "I'm not good at business, so I shouldn't do it," I take an approach where I allow myself to play to my strengths, and then I mitigate the bits that I'm not so good at by getting in support or just switching up my processes so that I have more time for the bits that I know I'm going to struggle with. That's the kind of thing that you can do if this ‘I'm not good at business’ story isn't dominating your psychology. While it's front and center, you don't see any of that. In those early days where I thought I was just bad at business, it felt very existential. It was like, either I make this really successful really quickly, or I've got no business being in business, and I should get out and get back into an employed role, which wasn't even possible for me. I think it's really important to try and move past this belief, otherwise you can make a decision which is based on very black and white thinking, defining yourself either as good or bad at business, when in reality there are so many ways that all different personalities can be good at business if we understand ourselves well and we're willing to structure our work around that. The Culture It's really interesting to consider where this ‘I'm not good at business’ belief that is so pervasive in our community actually comes from, because most people going into independent practice actually don't have any business experience. We by definition don't have evidence for this belief, and yet it is so common. I think the answer is that it's something that's really baked into the culture, in the NHS, but also in our training pathways. There's so many deep reasons that might be baked into our culture, and I think one that needs talking about is the relationship between psychology, psychotherapy, and privilege. I think we have a strange cultural problem with the concept of earning money and a deeply ingrained belief that people that want money are less pure, less compassionate, less caring than people who don't even think about money. I could give you direct quotes of people saying that to me in training, so I don't think it's that much of a stretch. As with almost everything, I think that is uncomfortably linked with the class system that we have here in the UK, and that potentially psychology and psychotherapy came from this kind of upper class tradition where it wasn't polite to talk about money or think about money, but that's because you didn't have to talk or think about money. It's our job to challenge that and to think about whether we really believe in this way of thinking, or whether we want to start thinking a bit differently. If this is the culture that you've been trained in, then the ‘I'm not good at business’ story is actually an affirmative one. It's one that began as positive; people telling themselves, "I'm doing this low-paid work because I'm a good person, because I really care about people, and that means that I must be rejecting all things that are about money and acquisition of money, and business falls under that category.” I think it's a classic example of stories that were once positive for us becoming toxic and holding us back as we develop through our lives and they start to become more problematic. If you are plagued by this, then getting together in your peer supervision group and chatting about it and thinking through where did this story come from for

May 15, 202653 min

Neurodivergence: Having the big conversations and living your values with Dr Naomi Fisher

Neurodivergence: Having the big conversations and living your values with Dr Naomi Fisher Welcome to the Business of Psychology podcast. Today we're joined by a guest I recommend often. When I'm talking to clients and other parents, I very frequently find myself recommending her books and accessible webinars on supporting children who are struggling through alternative education and reducing demand. And when I'm talking to other psychologists and therapists, I use her as an excellent example of somebody who's able to combine two specialisms and pull off a psychology based portfolio career beautifully. Dr Naomi Fisher is a clinical psychologist specialising in autism and trauma. She's an EMDR consultant and trainer, and a prolific author who's cultivated her expertise through research, public sector work, and in her independent practice. Today we're exploring how her experiences doing her PhD in autism and NHS practice has shaped the impactful work that she does today. And we're also going to dive into the politics of neurodiversity and why Naomi is concerned that current social pressures are making it really hard for clinicians to have those nuanced conversations about diagnosis and education, and why she's launched her new podcast, Let's Talk Neurosense alongside Dr Danielle Drinkwater. Full show notes and a transcript of this episode are available at The Business of Psychology Links for Naomi: Website: naomifisher.co.uk Podcast: Let's Talk Neurosense: The Psychology of Neurodiversity Sunstack: Think Again: Making Childhood Fit For Children Links for Rosie: Substack: substack.com/@drrosie Rosie on Instagram: @rosiegilderthorp @drrosiegilderthorp The highlights Naomi tells us about her unusual route into clinical psychology, doing her PhD first 01:57 I ask Naomi about the central question of her PhD 06:38 Naomi talks about what drew her into clinical work 08:45 We discuss the breadth of experience our clinical training gave us 12:07 Naomi describes what she typically does in her practice at the moment 15:54 Naomi talks about her drive get good information out there and the backlash she’s received 20:21 I ask Naomi how she deals with being recognised 26:48 Naomi tells us about her podcast, Let’s Talk Neurosense 37:33 Naomi tells us where we can find her 51:48 Start Up Your Psychology Practice Are you tired of just talking about starting your practice but never quite committing? If you’re ready to stop dancing with burnout and finally go 'all in', my 90-day program, 'Start Up Your Psychology Practice,' was made for you. This is a group coaching experience designed to help you ethically replace your full-time salary in part-time hours. We handle everything: from legal compliance and GDPR to attracting your first consistent stream of self-funding clients. No more piecing it together alone. And here is the best part: sign up before the end of May to get £200 off your investment. Let’s build a practice that gives you the freedom you deserve. Apply today: https://psychologybusinessschool.com/lp/start-up-private-practice-bundle/

May 8, 202649 min

Consultancy and systemic change in private practice with Dr Laura Bennet

Consultancy and systemic change in private practice with Dr Laura Bennet Welcome to the Business of Psychology podcast. Today I'm joined by Dr Laura Bennett, a clinical psychologist with over 20 years of experience supporting children, young people, and their families through some of life's most complex challenges. Since qualifying in 2009, Laura has worked across a range of NHS services, before founding Oasis Psychology in Dorset in 2022. Her practice is a really good example of a specialist service, as Laura specialises in supporting children who are in care, those who have been adopted, and families on the edge of care, focusing deeply on developmental trauma and attachment, and most importantly, supporting the system around the child. Today we are looking at Laura's work beyond the therapy room. Many psychologists and therapists worry that moving into private practice means narrowing their scope to just one-to-one clinical hours. Laura is proving the opposite. She's currently spearheading the Parenting with Trauma Project in collaboration with Dorset Action for Children and Bournemouth University. It's clear from Laura's journey that she's never really stopped at the therapy room and has been working with systems and research and data. So I know that you're going to find her story really interesting, and hopefully inspirational if you are somebody who wants to do a little bit more, or different from therapy in your work. Full show notes and a transcript of this episode are available at The Business of Psychology Links for Laura: LinkedIn: Dr Laura Bennet Oasis Psychology Links for Rosie: Substack: substack.com/@drrosie Rosie on Instagram: @rosiegilderthorp @drrosiegilderthorp The highlights Laura tells us about her transition into private practice after 13 years in the NHS 01:57 Laura talks about what she provides through her private practice, Oasis Psychology 5:21 Laura discusses how she transitioned into a service that’s less focused on one-to-one work, and more about indirect support. 7:04 I ask Laura about her work with Action for Children 21:42 Laura gives us her advice for psychologists and therapists who have an idea for a different type of project, but feel a bit stuck 36:37 Laura tells us the best place to connect with her 47:34 Start Up Your Psychology Practice Are you tired of just talking about starting your practice but never quite committing? If you’re ready to stop dancing with burnout and finally go 'all in', my 90-day program, 'Start Up Your Psychology Practice,' was made for you. This is a group coaching experience designed to help you ethically replace your full-time salary in part-time hours. We handle everything: from legal compliance and GDPR to attracting your first consistent stream of self-funding clients. No more piecing it together alone. And here is the best part: sign up before the end of May to get £200 off your investment. Let’s build a practice that gives you the freedom you deserve. Apply today: https://psychologybusinessschool.com/lp/start-up-private-practice-bundle/

May 1, 202656 min

Smartphone activism as a psychologist in private practice with Dr Erin Carroll

Smartphone activism as a psychologist in private practice with Dr Erin Carroll Welcome to the Business of Psychology podcast. One of the biggest fears I hear from psychologists and therapists leaving the NHS for independent practice is that they'll lose their connection to the bigger picture, to public health, and that they'll spend all their time working in a silo, working one-to-one, and lose their impact on wider society. But today's guest is proof that being in private practice can actually be the perfect springboard for grassroots activism and community leadership. I'm joined by Dr Erin Carroll, a clinical psychologist who has taken her expertise in emotional development out of the consulting room and into the heart of her community. Erin's been a driving force in the Smartphone Free Childhood movement in our combined hometown of Tunbridge Wells, and she's helped to achieve something really remarkable; getting all of the local secondary head teachers to sign a joint letter supporting brick only phone policies for younger students, something that Erin really believes in. So today we're talking about how we as psychologists can use our training to lead cultural change, and why finding a cause that really lights a fire in your belly is the best antidote to that isolation that we can often feel in private practice. Full show notes and a transcript of this episode are available at The Business of Psychology Links: Erin: www.erincarrollpsychologist.co.uk Smartphone Free Childhood Health Professionals for Safer Screens The Amazing Generation by Jonathan Haidt & Catherine Price, illustrated by Cynthia Yuan Cheng Links for Rosie: Substack: substack.com/@drrosie Rosie on Instagram: @rosiegilderthorp @drrosiegilderthorp The highlights Erin tells us about her professional life up to the point that she became involved in Smartphone Free Childhood, and what led you down that path 01:45 Erin talks about the role of screens and emotional regulation 11:56 We discuss online harms and safeguarding concerns 18:49 We look at the addictive aspect of smartphones 27:05 Erin talks about the Smartphone Free Childhood parent Pact, and schools taking action 32:44 I ask Erin about her plans going forward, in her activist role 48:56 Erin tells us how to get in touch with her and connect with the Smartphone Free Childhood community 54:14 Start Up Your Psychology Practice Are you tired of just talking about starting your practice but never quite committing? If you’re ready to stop dancing with burnout and finally go 'all in', my 90-day program, 'Start Up Your Psychology Practice,' was made for you. This is a group coaching experience designed to help you ethically replace your full-time salary in part-time hours. We handle everything: from legal compliance and GDPR to attracting your first consistent stream of self-funding clients. No more piecing it together alone. And here is the best part: sign up before the end of May to get £200 off your investment. Let’s build a practice that gives you the freedom you deserve. Apply today: https://psychologybusinessschool.com/lp/start-up-private-practice-bundle/

April 24, 202616 min

Why every therapist needs to use social media to improve their SEO

Why every therapist needs to use social media to improve their SEO Welcome to the Business of Psychology podcast. Today I am changing my tune! I have decided to go back on some of the advice that I have given over the years about social media and the importance of it to the average private practice. I hope that this will be a really helpful episode for you if you are somebody who is feeling the social media fatigue, doesn't feel naturally like it's a good home for you, and it doesn't form a cornerstone of your marketing strategy, and you've listened to my previous podcast episode and come to the conclusion that this is not the way that you need to be winning clients. I hope this will be a useful episode for you because it still isn't, it still doesn't need to be something that takes up a lot of time in your week, and it shouldn't do if your ideal client personas are not people who are going to search for a therapist on social media, and therapy is the main thing that you are selling in your practice. If that’s the case, then I absolutely stand by my previous advice that social media is not something that should take up lots of your time, week in and week out. But I am going to caveat it slightly, and that's because I have been on some training recently about how social media is an important part of optimizing our websites and our digital presence so that we will continue to be found by people on search engines and through AI recommendations. These things are becoming really important, and it just wouldn't be right of me to not bring this to your attention if it's not something that you've been thinking about yet. Full show notes for this episode are available at The Business of Psychology Links: The Directory Profile Template Business of Psychology Episode 111: How to create a great directory site profile Summer School Lesson 5: Directory sites Links for Rosie: Substack: substack.com/@drrosie Rosie on Instagram: @rosiegilderthorp @drrosiegilderthorp Start Up Your Psychology Practice Are you tired of just talking about starting your practice but never quite committing? If you’re ready to stop dancing with burnout and finally go 'all in', my 90-day program, 'Start Up Your Psychology Practice,' was made for you. This is a group coaching experience designed to help you ethically replace your full-time salary in part-time hours. We handle everything: from legal compliance and GDPR to attracting your first consistent stream of self-funding clients. No more piecing it together alone. And here is the best part: sign up before the end of May to get £200 off your investment. Let’s build a practice that gives you the freedom you deserve. Apply today: Start Up Your Psychology Practice Why every therapist needs to use social media to improve their SEO There have been big changes already, and there are more coming, to the way that search engines like Google and Yahoo and all of them really, recommend websites to people searching. They are now using AI in the way that they search our websites to try and work out who we are and to generate AI advice for people who type in questions to their search bars. You'll have seen this if you are using your smartphone to look for help. You will get a load of normal looking search results, but you'll also get an AI generated answer to your question at the top, which will cite various expert sources to give you an answer to your question. I'm sure you'll have noticed like I have, that most people are not going beyond that AI answer because it is generally quite helpful and now, certainly on mine through Google, it's telling me where it's getting its advice from, and I find it much easier to trust than I used to. I think that's the direction of travel and eventually I think we're going to end up in a world where people just ask a question verbally to their AI, whether it’s Gemini, Chat GPT, Claude, whatever they're using, and they'll just take the answer that it gives rather than bothering to look through a page of search results. So we really need to understand how we make sure that we are the expert source that these AI models are using, because if we're not, then we're going to find that traffic to our websites from search starts to decline, if it hasn't already. The good news, because I know that probably sounds a bit scary, is I actually think it's a good thing for us because now AI is so much cleverer than the previous technology that the search engines were using, it's able to piece together our digital presence from wherever we are to understand who we are and the services we offer in a much deeper and better way. We just need to do a few things to make that really easy for the AI to do, and social media is an important piece of that puzzle, because social media can give you a digital footprint which gives AI a really clear indication of who you are, who you help, and what you stand for, so that it understands better, in combination with your website, who to recommend you to when they're searching for help. So I'll talk you through a little bit about how that works and a few really simple things you can do to start helping the AI bots to understand who you are a little bit better so that you're future proofing your search engine optimization. EEAT: Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness and Trustworthiness The first thing we need to understand is that search engines already look for EEAT when they're deciding who to serve up as a recommendation to somebody who's searching. That acronym stands for Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness and Trustworthiness. These are the four things that an AI is assessing on your digital footprint before it decides whether to serve you up or to serve someone else up as an answer to a question that somebody's asking. AI search tools like Perplexity, Chat GPT, Gemini, Claude, are crawling the web to find answers to questions. And if your social media or your website has a clear niche specific keyword like 'birth trauma psychologist in Plymouth', and you've got high levels of experience, expertise, authoritativeness and trustworthiness, then the AI is more likely to recommend you than somebody generic when a user asks for a therapist for birth trauma in Plymouth, for example. The five things we can do to improve our digital discoverability to AI and demonstrate that we have the EEAT it's looking for: The first thing is to have one bio that you use everywhere that contains a primary keyword that you want to be discoverable for. If you think of your bio as a bit like a sticky label that you might put on the front of an old fashioned filing cabinet; it needs to really clearly tell AI what it is that you have inside your cabinet, and it's really important to get that key word right. That key word might be 'birth trauma psychologist in Plymouth' (it doesn't need to be a single word, it can be a phrase), it could be 'neurodiversity specialist', it could be 'CBT therapist specialising in OCD', but it just needs to be really clear and contain the key words that you would like people searching for to get your name associated with. The second thing you need to do is make sure that the bio you've created is everywhere that you are mentioned. You'll have to create a few versions of it, but they should be as similar to each other as possible. You can have a long version of it for the about page on your website - use that same copy exactly for LinkedIn and Psychology Today. Then you'll need to create a much shorter version of it for social media, but it should have the same keywords in it and be as similar as humanly possible, so that bio that follows you around gives you a really clear digital footprint that the AI can understand. Within that bio you want to show off your experience, expertise, authoritativeness and trustworthiness. And if you are following my framework for crafting a good Psychology Today profile (I'll link to the freebie that I have that's going to support you to do that in the show notes of this episode, as well as the podcast episode on the Business of Psychology) you will be demonstrating the experience, expertise, authoritativeness and trustworthiness that AI is looking for. So make sure that your bio covers those areas and use my framework, because I think that will help you to do that. The next thing that you need to make sure that you're discoverable in this new world is captions that are easy to understand on your social media posts for those bots that are...

April 17, 202635 min

The four financial numbers you need to understand in your practice to do your best work

The four financial numbers you need to understand in your practice to do your best work I want to talk about the 4 financial pillars that you need to be familiar with in your practice, because as this tax year comes to an end and the new one begins, you might be looking at your numbers and thinking how did that happen? Maybe you got a tax bill that's bigger than you were expecting. Maybe you are getting to the end of the year and realising that you didn't make as much money as you wanted to, or maybe it's more positive than that and you've got a bigger tax bill than you were expecting because you made more money than you wanted to. Full show notes for this episode are available at The Business of Psychology Links: Sally Farrant: www.businessgrowthbynumbers.com Links for Rosie: Substack: substack.com/@drrosie Rosie on Instagram: @rosiegilderthorp @drrosiegilderthorp Set Up Your Practice For Success Is a financially rewarding private practice actually possible? My recent survey of former coaching clients found they were taking home between £3k and £8k a month while seeing only 5 to 20 clients a week. That is a full-time wage in far less than full-time NHS hours. I want to show you the roadmap to get there. Join my free masterclass, 'Set Up Your Practice For Success,' on Wednesday, 22nd April . We’ll tackle common mistakes and show you how to avoid the 'admin mountain' so you can focus on the work you love. Secure your spot at the link below. If the time doesn’t work for you, sign up anyway to receive the recording. Set Up Your Practice For Success Masterclass - Wednesday 22nd April - Book your place here. Shownotes Revenue Revenue is the simplest metric in your business. It’s gross income, the money that is coming in with nothing deducted. On its own it’s a vanity metric. I see lots of people sharing their revenue without being honest about the other numbers, and it troubles me, because the revenue in your business can be very high, but the other numbers in the business will change as a reaction to that revenue. It's the other numbers that give us much more crucial information about the health of the business and the lifestyle that it's actually going to give you, and the good that you're able to do for your clients. Revenue is important to know because it gives an estimate of growth and impact. If you are making a lot of revenue, it's likely you’re helping a lot of people and you can track the trajectory of that. Tracking your revenue should include tracking the specific sources of that revenue. Go into a bit of detail, looking at how many therapy sessions, online courses, and supervision sessions you are selling, and breaking it down into individual services that you offer so that you can see how much money you are making for those activities each month. This is helpful because it allows you to predict what might happen in the future if you put effort into increasing revenue in one of those areas. It’s important to know exactly where that income is coming from. If you're very busy, you might not realise that you are doing more supervision than you were last year, and that a bigger proportion of your income is now coming from that. Even if that overall revenue figure hasn't changed much, the place it's coming from might have changed, and for tax reasons it can be significant to understand that. It's up to you how many categories for different types of revenue you want to create. Go with what's useful for you to have a good understanding of your revenue. For associate practices, you might want to break it down by associate so that you know how much money each associate is making you each month. If you have a really large associate practice, that might be cumbersome and you might break it down into your therapy income and associate therapy income. What I would say is that if a service has specific expenses attached to it, then have that as its own line so that when you do your expenses, you can do some spreadsheet wizardry and make those things dependent on each other. For example, if you've got an associate practice and you know that for every £140 an associate makes you, you are going to pay out £90 to them, you can create a formula in your spreadsheet that calculates an expense line to take £90 for every £140 that is listed in the income for an associate. It’s definitely worth separating out your services, at least in that much detail. Revenue tracking and getting granular with it can help you to see which aspects of your business are really healthy and which ones might be declining or struggling. Expenses You need to consider this alongside revenue. You need to know how much money you are spending every month in order to keep your business running in the way that it needs to support your lifestyle, and you have to be honest with yourself about it. People always ask me for an estimate of how much the expenses should be for an independent practice, and I can't give one because it depends on your values, the services you are providing, what that client group needs in terms of support, and what you need in terms of support. This is why I would never share my revenue figures with you because if you saw them, you'd get a false impression, because in order to keep my business going with all the stuff that I have going on in my personal life, I have to pay for a lot of support. You can't look at somebody's revenue figure and have any idea about what their overall take home pay is going to be, because you aren't going to have a realistic impression of their expenses. Don't be impressed by those online gurus who share their revenue figures with you. I think that's irresponsible unless they're also willing to share the expenses and profit. When looking at your expenses, I recommend getting your banking app out and dumping this into a spreadsheet. If you are in Startup or Evolve and Thrive or the network, you'll have access to our Cashflow Forecast spreadsheet. You go through your banking app and literally note down all the expenses over 3 months, accurately transposing them into the spreadsheet. Then go back through the year and see if there are any big expenditures which don't go out every month that you make on an annual basis and pop those in. This is really boring, and if you have a bookkeeper, it may be that they can do this for you, but it's worth doing because once you've got that, you can categorize your expenses and have a look at what expenses are investments in either the quality of your service or in the growth of your service. I invest in stuff like practice management software because that creates a better quality service for me and for my clients, and I invest in advertising spend, and that's because I expect that will enable the business to grow. Those are both investments in quality and growth, so they go in the investment side. You may find that there are some expenses which don't easily fit into a quality or growth category. When we have those expenses we need to consider whether they are adding another kind of value or are they draining the business? Often I'll find that I've got software packages that double up. I could be using one tool to do lots of things, and actually I'm using lots of tools and paying lots of subscriptions. I would highlight that and think about reducing those. It's a really useful exercise because not only are you getting to know this number, which is really important for planning your business going forward, but you're also getting an idea of what you could cut. Things that fall into the investment category are clinical supervision, business coaching, high quality legal templates, practice management software, CPD, training that you're going to be able to use to support your clients better. You're looking for anything that sits on the periphery that you don't use often or you don't use very well, and thinking about whether it might be time to cut that. Once you've done both those exercises and you've put them into your cashflow forecast spreadsheets or a spreadsheet to track your income and expenses, then you see what the gap is between the two. Tax Tax is something which can be confusing. I was told a lot when I started in business that it wasn't confusing, but I think it is confusing, especially considering it's not something that we are taught in school. So, I'll give you a really brief overview of the taxes you need to keep an eye on. You should consult an accountant to get proper advice on your tax situation. If you are in Startup or Evolve and Thrive or the network, we have a class with Mahmood Reza

April 17, 202646 min

How to be a psychologist in the media (amongst other things) with Dr Carolyne Keenan

How to be a psychologist in the media (amongst other things) with Dr Carolyne Keenan Welcome to the Business of Psychology podcast. I'm really pleased to be bringing you an interview with Dr Carolyne Keenan. You might have heard Carolyne's name if you listen to BBC Radio 1. She makes a big impact with her media work. But the reason I'm really interested to talk to Carolyne is that she shows how it's possible to build a portfolio of different activities, all of which use your skills in different and exciting ways, and to find professional fulfillment through that autonomy that we can have in independent practice. I know how many psychologists and therapists tell me that they feel a bit stuck. Like they're stuck in the therapy room and they don't know how, in their independent work, to step outside of that. I think Carolyne and her journey in independent practice is a really great example of how when we have the courage to step outside, we can make a really big impact. Full show notes and a transcript of this episode are available at The Business of Psychology Links for Carolyne: Instagram: @drcarolynekeenan LinkedIn: @drcarolynekeenan Links for Rosie: Substack: substack.com/@drrosie Rosie on Instagram: @rosiegilderthorp @drrosiegilderthorp The highlights Carolyne tells us about how her career in psychology began 01:30 I ask Carolyne how she went from a quite unpleasant experience to finding a passion that let her do a doctorate 10:55 Carolyne talks about how she started stepping out into private psychology 13:14 We discuss the difference of opinions around charging for services and cancellation policies 16:14 Carolyne talk to us about what her private practice looks like today 26:06 We look at the pros and cons of media work 29:15 I ask Carolyne about how she plans her social media content 36:34 Carolyne tells us where to find her online 42:55 Set Up Your Practice For Success You have incredible clinical expertise, but is the 'shame' of the business side holding you back? Staying stuck in a role that’s edging you toward burnout or running a side-hustle that eats your weekends isn't the only way. I’m hosting a free masterclass on Wednesday, 22nd April called 'Set Up Your Practice For Success.' I’ll be sharing my proven 3-part framework: Values, Voice, and Impact. You’ll learn how to design a practice aligned with your life, create systems for an exceptional client experience, and implement a marketing strategy that doesn’t feel 'sleazy.' Join me live for a chance to win a 1:1 strategy session! Register for free at the link below - and yes, there’s a replay for all registrants. Set Up Your Practice For Success Masterclass - Wednesday 22nd April - Book your place here.

April 10, 20263 min

Practice Reboot: The new series of Business of Psychology!

Practice Reboot: The new series of Business of Psychology! Hello and welcome to the Business of Psychology. I am Dr Rosie Gilderthorp, a clinical psychologist and business coach, and we are back for another series where we're going to be diving into all the different ways that private practice can look for psychologists and therapists in 2026. I've got some fascinating interviews from psychologists that are using their skills in different ways, and therapists that are reaching people in all kinds of unique and innovative formats. We are going to be talking about engaging with the media, grassroots activism in our local communities, working with charities, and we're going to be talking about tackling the big questions of neurodiversity movement and neurodivergence in 2026. I have got some really interesting conversations ahead for you, and I really can't wait to get started with the series. This is going to be a brilliant series for you, if you are somebody that has been contemplating stepping into private practice, or if you're somebody who's been in practice for a while and is feeling like things are a little bit stale. It is a brilliant series to help you reconsider your business model and think about the exciting ways that we can bring our knowledge to help more people. So, I'm really chuffed to be bringing you this series and some of the amazing guests that I've got. But there was one thing I wanted to let you know about before the series officially kicks off next week, and that is a free masterclass that I'm running on April the 22nd. It's my Setup for Success Masterclass , where I talk you through my three part framework; values, voice, and impact, for creating a practice that allows you to replace your income ethically in fewer hours. And to create a practice that allows you to live your values. So, I just wanted to flag that up to you. The link is below, and I really hope that some of you will be able to join me there live. But if you can't come live, you can catch up on the recording. So, next week we're kicking off with two episodes. Firstly, there is a fascinating episode with Caroline Keenan on her journey as a media psychologist, amongst all kinds of other things. And there's also a slightly boring episode, but I think you're going to find it helpful, from me about tax and other financial numbers that are particularly important to understand at this time of the year when you might be closing off your tax year, maybe getting some bills that you did or didn't expect. That episode is going to be really valuable for helping you lay the foundation for the exciting work that you're going to do. I will see you next week for the next series of the Business of Psychology. Set Up Your Practice For Success You have incredible clinical expertise, but is the 'shame' of the business side holding you back? Staying stuck in a role that’s edging you toward burnout or running a side-hustle that eats your weekends isn't the only way. I’m hosting a free masterclass on Wednesday, 22nd April called 'Set Up Your Practice For Success.' I’ll be sharing my proven 3-part framework: Values, Voice, and Impact. You’ll learn how to design a practice aligned with your life, create systems for an exceptional client experience, and implement a marketing strategy that doesn’t feel 'sleazy.' Join me live for a chance to win a 1:1 strategy session! Register for free at the link below - and yes, there’s a replay for all registrants. Set Up Your Practice For Success Masterclass - Book your place . Links for Rosie: Substack: substack.com/@drrosie Rosie on Instagram: @rosiegilderthorp @drrosiegilderthorp