Counseling theory and practice 2
Creating and facilitating spaces for change
Clients who enter therapy may have exhausted both their internal and external resources. For these clients therapy represents an opportunity to find relief from the places in their life where they feel stuck.
In Creating and Facilitating Spaces for Change the focus is on an in-depth exploration of the theories and skills needed in facilitating movement or change.
This intensive three-day Skills Development course offers a blend of theory and practical techniques designed to facilitate a deeper understanding and manage change within the counseling space.
From navigating the complex interplay between a client's past and present to mastering modern change management frameworks, this course empowers you to bridge developmental gaps and move beyond "stuckness". You will gain specialized tools to:
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Assess Readiness: Master Motivational Interviewing techniques to evaluate a client’s openness to change and skillfully "roll with resistance".
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Deepen Insight: Utilize advanced empathy, process commentary, and Dan Siegel’s integration of internal and external worlds to build a client-centered assessment.
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Explore the relationship between Trauma and change: Understand how cortical modulation impacts problem-solving and learn essential grounding techniques to re-engage the "problem-solving brain".
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Professionalize Your Practice: Develop expert-level case formulations using the "Four P’s" framework and ensure your practice meets South African legal and ethical standards, including POPI Act compliance and the Mental Health Act.
What you can expect from this course:
Theoretical Framework
In this course you will continue to build upon the application of Rogers person centred theories and Egan’s solution focused processes. Drawing from concepts and skills such as Motivational Interviewing and Dan Siegel’s Concept of Presence.
Assessing Readiness for change
You will explore a Framework to Assess if a client is ready to change. You will further be invited to explore if a perceived lack of change is the result of a skills gap on the part of the therapist or an emotional barrier on behalf of the client.
Skills Development
This course will challenge you to deepen your mastery of the skills of Probing, Challenging through Empathy and Rolling with Resistance as you seek to facilitate a deeper understanding for the client. You will be invited to explore your Relationship with Conflict and how it might influence your mastery of these skills.
Creating Plains of Possibility
You will work with overcoming Simplistic Observation Biases. Through exploring Therapeutic Hypothesis Formation and an Ecological Framework, you will be challenged to progress beyond cause and effect reasoning. This will expose you to a deeper consideration of the complex relationships between parts and how understanding the nature of the relationship reveals the function that it serves or the need that it meets.
Problem Solving
When in crises the human brain is rendered incapable of clear and logical thinking. You will be equipped to apply Grounding and Safety Techniques for the brain to achieve Optimal Problem Solving Capability. You will also be equipped with tools to assist the client to find a structured way to consider possibilities.
Motivation for Change
Change is about facilitating client's movement from the What to the Why. Facilitating a movement from the Cognitive to the Affective.
Case Formulation
Case formulation creates a systematic way of making sense of the information in front of you. Applying the four P’s to case formulation provides a lens to gain a "birds-eye" perspective on the narrative of your client in preparation to resourcing your client's move towards change.
Record Keeping
Professionalism is about accountability. You will explore ways to formally track the progress of clients, meet the minimum professional requirements of record keeping and ensure professional accountability.
Ethics
Understanding ethics and applying ethics is very different. It is expected that you will move beyond an understanding of the ethics which govern your profession to an application of these principles in real life case studies. You will explore the legal frameworks that influence and guide ethical decision making in South African Context.
The Facilitator
Anthony Hawthorn
Anthony Hawthorn is a Social Worker (Clinical Social Work) in private practice, Social Work Supervisor and Facilitator, with a postgraduate qualification in Clinical Social Work, Master's in Business Leadership and certification as TRE provider.
With more than 20 years of counselling and facilitation experience, he is passionate about the professional development of students and professionals alike. He has extensive experience in developing and facilitating various counselling courses, having trained mental health professionals, students, medical students, and lay counsellors over the course of his career in counselling and various counselling issues such as counselling courses, trauma work, couples work, counselling individuals who experience an affair, divorce counselling, working with blended families, and dealing with loneliness.
Anthony focuses his practice on clinical services (including counselling and supervision), developmental services (including developing training courses, facilitation, and professional development), and management coaching (both privately and with corporate clients).
How this course will be presented
Online Facilitation
This course is facilitated live, online. You will interact with the facilitator and like- minded professionals online via the Zoom application. Basic use of the Zoom application is free. You will need to ensure that you have access to the internet and data, a working webcam, microphone and speakers. This course is interactive and experiential in nature. It is not a lecture style webinar. The course consists of short sessions which allows you to attend even with a busy schedule. All of the sessions will need to be attended to complete the course.
Dates and Times
Course 1: 4, 6, 11, 13, 18 November 2026
09:00-14:30
Continual Professional Development (CPD)
SACSSP: In process
HPCSA: No CEU's at present
Cost
R 3800.00 pp (Members pay R3200 pp - Save R600)
What to expect upon completion
After you have successfully completed this course, by attending all the online sessions and completing any additional activities, or evaluations; you will receive a certificate of completion. The relevant CPD points/CEUs will also reflect on the certificate (for courses that carry CPD points/CEUs).