Sex Coaching & Therapy, Part 3: Working Together
This is the 3rd installment of our four-part series where we’re comparing the role of a sex coaches with those of other helping professionals, such as psychotherapists, sex therapists, and marriage and family therapists.
In this article, we look at why it makes sense to work together and how to build our professional referral network.
The Value of Knowing Your Limitations
Since all of these different professions have different training, different approaches, and different focuses, it’s only logical that practitioners of each discipline would be best suited to certain types of clients or treating/helping with certain kinds of issues. It’s true that there are many people who are cross-trained, but the reality is that most are not.
Therefore, when a client walks into our sex coaching practice who needs to work through things like deep emotional trauma, or childhood attachment issues, or a betrayal in their marriage, we are likely not the right fit for that client at this time. While they may also be struggling with something of a sexual nature, and we can work with that, we need to refer out to another professional to help with the other problem(s).
It is unethical to work outside the bounds of your training.
Likewise, many psychotherapists and marriage and family therapists only receive a tiny amount of training in issues pertaining to sexuality and are therefore often not competent or confident working with clients on these issues. Ideally, they would then refer out to either a sex therapist or a sex coach.
The Importance of Building a Professional Referral Network
This is where building your professional referral network comes in.
It’s important to let the other professionals in your area know that you exist and what you are qualified to help with. Here are some ideas for how to go about building that awareness and, subsequently, your network:
- Make connections on LinkedIn
- Give presentations to therapist networking groups or local chapters of their organizations (APA, AAMFT, ACA, etc.)
- Write blog posts, guest posts, and articles targeting those professional populations
- Attend networking events and give out your card and share your elevator speech
- Put together a brochure and mail it to all the therapists in your area
- Make phone calls to therapists after mailing the brochure and ask to schedule a time to meet
- Ask your friends and contacts for introductions
- Send follow-up notes to any professional you do meet or interact with, maintain your connection with them
- Send free bits of value to these connections (such as links to pertinent articles or blog posts, or a free ebook you’ve written that has relevance for them)
Just like a prospective client list, you do need to keep up with and frequently work your professional referral network to stay top of mind. When you initially communicate with prospective referral sources, be sure to ask if you can refer clients to them, as well as asking them to consider referring clients to you.
The Magic of Working Together
Once you have therapists willing to refer clients to you and accept referrals from you, then you can start learning to work together for the good of your shared clients.
When you can work in concert with a therapist, the progress your client makes can be astounding! Their improvements can often occur much more rapidly than if they work with just one type of professional at a time.
We all bring value to the table. It’s important to find ways to let go of any sense of competition or negativity toward other helping professionals. Instead, harness the magic that happens when you can work together with practitioners of diverse modalities!
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