How moving away from intervention-based supervision can help build clinical confidence and flexibility

Interview with Elizabeth Irias, LMFT

  • Course Description

    Clinical supervisees are hungry to learn technical interventions to aid their clients, and supervisors often focus on techniques when helping supervisees build fidelity within a theoretical approach. But what happens when specific therapeutic techniques aren’t landing… what then? This course discusses how supervisors can focus on therapeutic principles and processes of change instead of nitty-gritty specific interventions, allowing supervisees to learn how to select techniques ‘in the moment’ based on relevant principles. In doing so, trainees are given the opportunity to step away from the anxiety-inducing ‘choose the right intervention’ game, into a more flexible approach grounded in clinical responsiveness and therapeutic principles. This course explores how supervisors can better support their supervision caseload in more easily recognizing transtheoretical principles in order to broaden and strengthen their clinical skills.

  • Learning Objectives

    Upon completing this course, participants will be able to: * List at least three questions they can ask supervisees to help develop principle-based clinical thinking; Describe how supervisors and supervisees can tell when a technique may have been inadvertently disconnected from its underlying principle; Explain the clinical benefits of principle-based therapeutic care


    Target Audience and Instructional Level
    This course is intended for psychologists, therapists, social workers, clinical counselors, and addiction counselors. Instructional level: Intermediate

  • How To Take This Course

    In order to receive a certificate of completion reflecting the associated CE credit hour, you must:
    #1: Have an active paid Clearly Clinical membership
    #2: Listen to the corresponding course podcast
    #3: Achieve a passing grade on the post-presentation test (the test has up to ten questions and you must earn a score of at least 80%; you are able to re-test)
    #4: Complete the requested course evaluation.

    Course elements (including the course audio, post-test, and requested course evaluation) can be completed on a computer or mobile device via your Clearly Clinical account.

  • Course Format

    This high-quality and interesting course contains a one-hour, non-interactive audio podcast presentation which is available for free via all major public podcast providers. You can also listen to and download the file via our course player.

  • Commercial Support

    There is no known commercial support or conflict of interest for this CE program, presenter, sponsor, instructor, or content. The instructor references their own trainings and resources as a potential option for further learning.

  • Certificate Access Details

    Once you've completed the course, your certificate will automatically populate in the 'Certificate' section of your account; it will also be emailed to you. Access to completion certificate will expire 365 days after issuance. Course certificates will be on file for ten (10) years from date of course completion.

  • Accommodations

    If you have special needs or need an accommodation, please email us at info@clearlyclinical.com and we will do our best to assist you.

Interviewer and Interviewee

Dr. Julia Mackaronis, Licensed Clinical Psychologist

Supervision Trainer

Julia Mackaronis is a licensed clinical psychologist who lives on the Washington coast. She is the lead mental health provider for the Roger Saux Health Center of the Quinault Indian Nation. She also enjoys freelance consultation, supervision, and writing.

Julia completed her Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology from the University of Utah in 2014, and her fellowship in Interprofessional Couple and Family Health at the VA Puget Health Care System – Seattle Division in 2015. Supervision has been central to her work since being a peer supervisor of other students in graduate school over a decade ago.

Julia identifies as a generalist, although specific areas of expertise include working with couples, trauma, sexuality, and members of the queer community. She works by integrating behavioral, acceptance, attachment, and interpersonal processes. Julia is passionate about the craft of psychotherapy; please email her at julia@praxispsychotherapy.com or visit her at LinkedIn.

Elizabeth 'Beth' Irias, MS, LMFT

Interviewer & Clearly Clinical Founder

Elizabeth 'Beth' Irias (she/her) is a licensed Marriage & Family Therapist and the Founder and President of Clearly Clinical. She has specializations in Clinical Documentation, Best Practice, and Utilization Review, and works closely with clinical teams across the US as a trainer and national conference presenter; Beth was formerly an adjunct professor at Pepperdine University in the Graduate Psychology and Education department. Licensed in California and Oregon, she provides therapy via her private practice to young adult and adult clients, members of the LGBTQ population, and those with addictive disorders. She has two young children, a super cool spouse who helps out with Clearly Clinical's tech, and a rescue dog.

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