Hello, everyone. Welcome back to another episode of The Testing Psychologist podcast. Hey, I hope you’re all doing well. I haven’t done a solo episode in quite some time. I’ve been very fortunate to have a number of expert interviews to conduct over the past several months and have had the [00:01:00] great fortune to talk with any number of fantastic psychologists and neuropsychologists, and hopefully deliver some pretty helpful content to y’all over the past several months.
But today is a solo episode and a little bit of a different episode. Today, I’m talking about new directions for the podcast and my plans for the next several months, hopefully, years. To get into that, I think that the context is important.
Like a lot of us, I have been forced into more contemplation over the last 2 to 3 months as we’ve been quarantined. Granted there have been any number of problems to solve, hurdles to jump over, stressors, and so forth, but I have somehow through all of that [00:02:00] had a sense of calm and a little more space to reflect and think on what things have looked like career-wise with my practice and with the podcast.
And that’s what I’m coming to y’all with today because, after all of that reflecting and thinking, I realized that I would like to take this podcast in a little bit of a different direction. And that’s what I’m going to talk with you about. So this will be a relatively short episode, but an important one. For the longtime listeners, I hope that you’ll stick with me, and for new listeners, I hope this sounds exciting for you and that you’d like to stick around.
So this podcast has been a huge part of my life going on for four years now. When I [00:03:00] first started the podcast, I really had no idea if people would care about assessment-related content, and if this is even a viable hobby to continue to pursue. All I knew was that there was a big lack of resources for building a testing practice.
I started my practice in 2009, and that really predated most of the private practice coaching that’s out there now. There are any number of Facebook groups and coaches who specialize in mental health practices, and thank goodness for them, but they were not around back then as far as I knew. And so, when I built my own practice, I feel like I was just winging it using advice from grad school professors, people I knew over the years, a friend’s dad who was a psychologist, but really just flying by the seat of my pants. I made a lot of [00:04:00] mistakes along the way, still making mistakes here and there, but I think fewer mistakes and really just learning about by doing.
So when I started this podcast, my intent was to help solve that problem for other psychologists, that problem of not having clear information for how to start a practice or grow a testing practice, not knowing how to cut through all of the information that is out there, not knowing how to prioritize, where to spend your time, where to spend your money.
So that’s what I was hoping to do. I just feel so fortunate that it looks like there was a market for that. The early episodes really centered around business content. If you go back all the way to the beginning, there was a lot more business content back then. And there’s really no way that I could have imagined where the podcasts would end up after [00:05:00] now over 120 episodes.
I’ve had the incredible privilege of talking with some of the best psychologists and neuropsychologists around, and I’ve had the great fortune to connect with literally thousands of clinicians around the world via the Facebook group and other connections that I made by virtue of the podcast. So, it has been truly an incredible journey.
Part of that though, is that the podcast has, I think really taken on a life of its own. And for a long time, I was quite willing to ride that wave. And what I mean by that is that I shifted for the most part from providing business coaching via the podcast to doing primarily expert interviews with other psychologists and [00:06:00] neuropsychologists on specific topic areas.
Now, it seems clear that people greatly value clinical interviews. And I think that’s a big part of going in that direction is I saw the downloads increased as the interviews went up, and feedback from the Facebook group and elsewhere really made it clear that people really value clinical information. That said, I have personally recognized that I’d really like to get back to the roots, so to speak, and deliver more business content.
At the heart of this podcast, like I said, it really started as a means of delivering business coaching to other testing psychologists who needed it. And I love that. I love teaching. I love presenting this content. I love [00:07:00] researching this content. I love streamlining the business, making things more efficient, making things more profitable. And that has really been my focus over the last several years. And I’d like to get back to that.
The whole reason that I started the podcast, in the beginning, was that I had no resources or guide. And I know there’s a lot out there now. Things have changed. The Facebook group in and of itself has become pretty incredible. There are so many knowledgeable clinicians on there with both business and clinical advice that I’m struck every day by how much good information is shared in there.
So I know there are resources out there, but for me personally, what I love to do is coach testing psychologists, and support testing psychologists as they are starting their practices, growing their practices, refining their [00:08:00] practices. That’s what I want to do.
As the podcast moves forward, you’ll see a little bit of a change in format and a change in content. So, what that means is, starting very soon, I will be dropping two episodes each week. Mondays will now be reserved for clinical episodes or interviews where we tackle the specific topic that’s clinically relevant in the vein of ADHD, forensic evaluations, learning disorders, autism, any number of topics. There are so many out there. So clinical interviews will remain on Mondays.
On Thursdays now each week, there’ll be a business-themed episode. I’ve [00:09:00] been really excited mapping out a content calendar for the business episodes over the next several months. I hope that you will get a lot out of it. I’ve really tried to tailor the content such that it speaks to those who are in the beginning stages of practice, middle stages of practice, those who are looking to take their practices to the next level and really grow or expand or hire or do additional streams of income. So like I said, my hope is that you’ll like it. That’s always the hope.
So this will be starting soon. You can be on the lookout for new content. And that way, as our group has grown and as the listenership has grown, hopefully, there’ll be something for everyone. I think there’s a demand and there’s a need for both of these content areas.
[00:10:00] Part of that too, as we move forward is, introducing in the clinical episodes, a little bit more… Let’s see, what would I call it? Well, just a couple of different things. I’m going to try to have a quarterly masterclass with another psychologist where we do a live case consultation talking through data and diagnostic considerations. So, I’m going to try out that idea. I hope that you might give me some feedback on there.And very topical to where we’re at as a country right now, I’ve been spending time over the last few months really trying to contact guests who can speak to cultural competence in assessment and all of the [00:11:00] nuances involved with that. So certainly look for more of those episodes coming up.
And as part of my own commitment to doing the work on racism and cultural competence in assessment, clinical episodes will now just naturally have cultural competence as part of the discussion. So that will show up, not just in singular episodes dedicated to the topic of cultural competence, but it’ll also show up throughout the “regular interviews” where we’re not specifically focusing on cultural competence.
So there’s a lot in the works. This has been exciting to think through. Like I said, I’m very excited about all of these changes and perhaps most excited, like I said about getting back to the roots of more business-themed content. So [00:12:00] be on the lookout for those. That will be starting up relatively soon.
And as always, please give me any feedback that you might have on your mind. This is all just an experiment, right? I’m trying to balance what’s good for me with what’s good for the audience. We’ll see how that goes. I hope that we’ve developed enough of a relationship over the last few years that you’d feel okay reaching out and letting me know what’s working and what’s not working.
So, that’s it. I hope that you all are all doing well relatively and just surviving and hanging in there through the last few months that we’ve had. It’s really been a crazy few months, but I hope that some good is coming out of it as well for each of you.
[00:13:00] All right, y’all, thanks for hanging with me. Thanks for being there. Thanks for listening. Just as a reminder, it’s a huge favor if you can take a minute to rate and possibly review the podcast. That’s pretty easy in whatever podcast platform you might be using and it really helps expand the reach of the podcast and reach more psychologists who might want helpful info in building their businesses and their clinical skills. So that’d be a huge favor. Thank you to anyone who’s already rated and thank you preemptively to anyone who is willing to provide a rating.And I’ll also remind everyone that the podcast is available for CE credits. Nearly all of the clinical episodes and some of the business episodes are available for CEs. You can go [00:14:00] to athealth.com, search for The Testing Psychologist, and check out some CE courses that are mapped directly from the podcast episodes. So if you’re listening, it’s easy to jump over there and take the quiz. And they also have written transcripts if you prefer that means of consuming the info, and get some CE credits. You can use the code TTP10 to get a discount on all of the CE credits that you purchase. They’re not just The Testing Psychologist episodes.
So thanks, everyone. I hope that you are all hanging in there. I’ll look forward to moving forward on this journey with all of you. Take care. I’ll talk to you next time.