The linchpin is the therapist who decides to take the risk and do something different. The linchpins are those practitioners we all know who are indispensable. Those who countless families rely on for steady help and support in trying times. Those who contribute freely and enthusiastically to the people they serve and to their colleagues, while not expecting favors in return.
Examples of linchpins who have changed the face of their professions include Dr. Patch Adams who humanized the medical profession, Dr. Stanley Greenspan who showed us how to develop relationships with hard to reach children, and Dr. Jean Ayres who helped us understand children with sensory processing disorders.
Read more about the definition of a linchpin therapist here.
I don’t consider myself a linchpin therapist, yet. I am writing this list for myself, as I do strive to one day be indispensable. I am sure you do too. So I am sharing the 14 characteristics that make up the linchpin. Embrace them and become indispensable.
1. Set your own agenda: Our agendas as therapy providers are often set by those who pay us – insurance companies and other managed care organizations. They want to see various reports that contain lingo, and they are obsessed with numbers and stats. We must abide by their rules in order to get paid, but the agenda on treatment methods and priorities should be set by you, the therapist, in conjunction with your client – not by some number loving bureaucrat.
2. Create your own map: Being a follower is easy and safe. Follow a map and you won’t get lost. But neither will you be a leader, an innovator, or a linchpin. In other words, you will be dispensable. Creating your own map reverses all that. It’s risky and doesn’t provide you with the comfort following the old map does, but it allows you to break new ground and become indispensable. Try a new treatment approach. Do different activities with your clients. Stand out.
3. Make art: Not oil on canvas. Seth defines art as the product that emerges when we do our best work. It contains three elements: 1) It is made by a human being. 2) It has an impact and changes someone else. 3) It is a gift. You might sell the painting, but the idea and the impact it has are gifts inherent in the art. You, as a therapist, have to create art by embracing these three elements. Be human. Be impactful. Charge for your services, but give the free gift of humanity and impact.
4. Give gifts, lots of gifts: Not those fancy boxes wrapped in fancy paper and tied with fancy ribbon. Nor keychains with your service’s logo on it. Those are things, not gifts. Gifts are those ideas or “art” that leaves us inspired and impacted, those things that we reflexively tell our friends and family about. Like those YouTube clips or free eBooks we must forward to our entire address books without expecting anything in return. As a therapist you can give gifts every single day. Saw an article that might help a client or parent? Print it out and hand it to him. Have an idea? Write an article and get it published for all to benefit. Blogs are free. Give the World Wide Web a gift by writing one. By the way, a sincere “How are you,” counts too.
5. Ship! We all have great ideas. But as long as it’s not shared with the rest of the world it’s just that, an idea. You want to be a linchpin? Ship your ideas. You’re driving to work and you have a great treatment idea? Write it down and implement it. You’re jogging and you have an idea for an article? Write it down, set a date, and ship the article by that date. Have an idea for a seminar? Gather a few people and make it happen. Ship often, and ship on time.
I am writing this list for myself, as I do strive to one day be indispensable. I am sure you do too. So I am sharing the 14 characteristics that make up the linchpin. Embrace them and become indispensable.
6. Quiet the lizard brain: The lizard brain is that little loud voice in our heads that screams, “Run!” whenever we have a new idea or are thinking of taking a risk and doing something different. It is that antenna we have in our brains to detect danger, and it alarms us whenever it detects that we are moving away from our comfort zones. Anyone who has managed to quiet the lizard brain has used different techniques, so it’s impossible to give a sure-fire method for quieting it. Know this, though, with the lizard brain in charge, you will always remain comfortable and safe. Oh, and in case you haven’t figured it out by now, comfortable and safe is not what will make you unique and indispensable. You must find a way to squash the lizard brain and quiet its destructive voice.
7. Ignore the Resistance: Similar to the lizard brain is the Resistance, which is the collective voice we are constantly afraid will mock us and laugh at us. It is the shadow of the status quo we fear when we have new ideas. Know this: people are going to laugh at you regardless of whether you are innovative or not. If you stick to the status quo and the resistance, you are going to be laughed at, and if you decide to be a linchpin you are going to be laughed at. You might as well help you clients and be innovative by bringing out your map and implementing your agenda.
8. Break the rules: Not the law, the rules. Abide by the laws and code of ethics, but those rigid rules that block out any form of creativity or ingenuity from your interactions with your clients or from your hours out of the clinic must be broken if you are to become a linchpin. The rules don’t support art. The rules don’t support gifts. The rules are in place to make us ordinary parts of a well oiled machine, providing ordinary care, for ordinary compensation. Break the rules to provide extraordinary care for extraordinary compensation.
9. Connect: Many in the health professions believe in creating and maintaining a distance between practitioner and client. Yet, this separation assures that you have minimal impact on your clients and their progress. Consider the placebo effect, many who are given sugar pills actually think they were given real medication and become better. Imagine the impact you can have by really connecting with a client and providing them with a sense of security and care? If you are already treating the child, connect. Connect with their parents. Empathize with their concerns. Put in some emotional labor.
10. Be human: Humans make mistakes. Humans fail. Humans are imperfect. Embrace being human. This will allow your true self to come out. It will give you permission to be honest and to admit your mistakes. It will allow you to present yourself as a fallible human being to your clients, to the children you treat, and to their parents. Speaking of children, being human is especially important when working with youngsters. They have enough authority in their lives. Be human. Get down to their level.
11. Be proactive instead of reactive: As therapists and parents, we look for problems and we set out to fix them. We are constantly reactive to what our clients or children present us with. This keeps us circling in a loop of looking –> finding –> treating. Try to be proactive. Introduce a new skill to a child. Voluntarily send home a progress note to the parent. Look for opportunities to spread your knowledge or skills with other parents or practitioners. by blogging, writing an article, or developing a seminar. Don’t wait for opportunity to come knocking on your door; create it.
12. Don’t scratch your itch: When we itch we scratch. It’s reflexive. The linchpin becomes friends with the itch, examines it, and learns from it. The itch is a metaphor for any discomfort you may be experiencing in your work or in your journey toward becoming a linchpin. For example, when we see a child having a hard time with a skill, we are very quick to jump in and intervene. We like feeling effective and useful. While some children need intervention, for many our over involvement deprives them from learning on their own and learning from their mistakes. Likewise, don’t scratch when the itch tells you to retreat and not take a risk. Be with it, explore it, and learn from it.
13. Be a meaningful specific: Generalists are great, but they are not linchpins. Think about every therapist that inspires you, and you are very likely to find them to be specialists in specific niches. Linchpins are indispensable. This means you must become really great at something specific. You have to become known for something and deliver the goods. I have become more convinced about developing a specialty by Dr. Susan Giurleo over at Biz Savvy Therapist than ever before. It is not only effective from a marketing perspective, but also from a personal and professional development perspective.
14. Fail! Yes, fail. There is no other way to be a linchpin. Seth writes how for every great idea he ships (and he ships many) he has 99 others that fall flat and end up going nowhere. It’s hard to know which ideas will make it and which ones wont. The only way to know is by shipping without predicting or expecting failure or success. Afterward you can go ahead and assess why your idea or intervention was successful or why it failed. There is no greater teacher than failure. Class is in session. Failure is an option, fear is not. So fail and fail often.
You don’t have to embrace it all today. Choose one characteristic and implement it. It might feel uncomfortable, but don’t scratch the itch.
Be a linchpin. Be indispensable.
So, which one are you going to try today?
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This is great stuff.
Your patients are lucky to have you, doc. Thanks for sharing.
Seth, thanks so much for stopping by and commenting. I’ve been following your work for some time now. I recently read Poke the Box, and that is my mission. I do not want to become an inert cog.
Thanks again for all the gifts you impart to us daily.