Brief solution focus therapy

1. Brief solution Focus Therapy
(BSFT)
By: Muhammad Musawar Ali
MPHIL, ICAP
Psychmmusawarali@gmail.com1

2. Brief Counseling Approaches
 Brief in regard to treatment.
 Important in an age where people and institutions are demanding quick and
effective mental health service.
2

3. Skills Employed in brief Approaches
 Promote Health services.
 Do more in Less time.
 Manage care setting.
3

4. Brief Counseling Approaches are
Characterized by
 Foci (center of interest)
 Time limited Emphasis.
 Most of Brief counseling are not systematic in nature.
4

5. BRIEF COUNSELING ARE:
Concrete and
Goal oriented
Counselor active
role in bringing
change and to
motivate the client
Identifying
solutions,
resources, rather
than pathology
and dysfunction
5

6. BRIEF SOLUTION FOCUS THERAPY
 1980s by Steve de Shazer & Insoo Kim Berg.
 Influenced by Milton Erickson ( Creator of Brief therapy 1940)
6

7. View Of Human Nature
 Focus on client Strength and health. (Fernando, 2007).
 Its roots are linked with Erickson idea that “ People have within themselves the
resources & abilities to solve their own problems even if they don’t have casual
understanding of them”.
 Erickson also believed that a small change in ones behavior is often all that is
necessary to lead to more profound changes in a problem context.(Lawson, 1994,
p, 244).
7

8. ERICKSON HERITAGE
 Solution focus brief therapy sees people as being constructivists in nature means
that reality is the reflection of observation and experience.
8
Solution Focus Brief Therapy
Assumption
People Really
want to
Change
Change cant
be avoided

9. Role of Counselor
 Counselor Role is to determine how active and committed a client is to the process
of change.
 Counselor also act as facilitator of change to help clients access the resources and
strength they have but they are not aware of or are not utilizing it.
 They encourage challenge and setup expectations for change.
 They do not blame or ask why. They are not particular interested in how a problem
arose.
 Rather they are concerned with the client to arrive at a solution to the problem.
 They allow the client to be expert of his/her life.
9

10. Clients Fall into 3 categories10
Visitors
 Who are not involved in problem
 and are not a part of solution.

11. 11
Complaints
 Who complain about situations but can be
observant and describe problems
 even if they are not invested in resolving them.

12. 12
Customers
 Who are not only able to describe problems and
how they are involved in them
 but are willing to work on finding solution.

13. Goals
 To help the client tap inner resources and to notice exceptions to the time when
they are distressed.
 The goal is then directed toward the solution to situations that already exists in
these expectations.
 Focus on sessions and homework is on positive and possibilities either now or
future.
13

14. Ask questions about. . .
 Client's story
 Client's strengths
 Client's resources
 Client's exceptions
 Relationships
 Self-esteem issues
14

15. How Brief a Therapy?
 Aim for 5 sessions
 45 mins each session
 Rarely beyond 8 sessions
 Sometimes 1 session enough
 Any improvements after 3 sessions?
 Increase gap between sessions as time goes on
15

16. Techniques
 Collaborative process between counselor and client.
 Encouraging the client to examine where is problem.
16

17. Miracle Question
 Which basically focus on hypothetical situation where a problem has appeared.
 i.e.: Lets suppose tonight while you are sleeping a miracle happened that solved all
the problems that brought you here.
 How the future may be
 Helps establish goals
17

18. Scaling
 When the client is asked to use scale from 1- 10 to evaluate how severe a problem
is.
 Scaling help the client to understand both when they are in regard to a problem
 when they need to move in order to realistically achieve their goals.
18

19. Complements
 Written messages designed to praise clients for their strength and build a yes set
within them.
 Beliefs that can resolve difficulties.
 Compliments are usually given right before clients are given tasks or assignments.
19

20. Internal Resources
 Help clients attend to their resources, skills and abilities
 Empowers client in identifying their own strengths
 Skills
 Strengths
 Qualities
 Beliefs
 Capacity
20

21. External Resources
 Supportive relationships
 Friends
 Partners
 Faith
 Workplace
 Unions
 Social services
21

22. Two Final techniques
 Clues: which are intended to alert the client to the idea that some behaviors they
are doing are likely to continuous and they should not worry about them.
 Skeleton keys: which are procedures that have universal application in regard to
unlocking a variety of problems.
22

23. Self-change Model
 Pre-contemplation:
 The client does not recognize that they have a difficulty and will blame others:
“it’s your problem not mine.”
 People may be in this stage because they lack awareness or they may have tried
to change a number of times and become demoralized about their ability to
change.
 Both groups tend to avoid reading, talking or thinking about their problems. They
may characterized as resistant or unmotivated or as not ready for any
intervention.
23

24. Self-change Model
 Contemplation:
 The client starts to recognize that they have a problem and is the stage in which
people are intending to change in the near future.
 They are more aware of the pros of changing but are also acutely aware of the
cons.
 This balance between the costs and benefits of changing can produce profound
ambivalence that can keep people stuck in this stage for long periods of time.
24

25. Self-change Model
 Preparation:
 The stage in which people are intending to take action soon.
 They may have made that initial phone call to therapist and have turned up for
the first session.
 These individuals have a plan of action, such as consulting a counsellor, talking to
their doctor, buying a self-help book or relying on a self-change approach.
25

26. Self-change Model
 Action:
 Clients have committed to a course of action and have taken steps to change
their behavior, modifying thoughts and feelings. They may now have a sense of
timescale, how long the change process may last.
 Maintenance:
 Clients are working at keeping the changes going; it is important not to allow
relapse to take place.
 Relapse:
 Possible and may be of different degrees of severity. Ideally people can move
back into the action phase as soon as possible.
26

27. Strengths
 Emphasis on empowerment of client.
 Approach displays flexibility and excellent research in support of its effectiveness.
 Positive nature to working with variety of clients in various settings including
school children.
 Focus on change and small changes in behavior.
 Can be combined with other approaches such as extentialism.
27

28. Limitations
 No attention to clients history.
 Has lack of focus on insight.
 Approach uses teams at least by some practitioners to make the cost of treatment
high.
28

29. Role Play ……………..
 MR A
 Smoker
 Failure in exam of ACCA
 Session 5th
29

30. References
 Berg, I. K. (1991) Family Preservation: A Brief Therapy Workbook. London: BT Press.
 Berg, I.K. & Miller, S. (1992) Working with the Problem Drinker: A Solution Focused
Approach. New York: Norton.
 de Shazer, S. (1985) Keys to Solution in Brief Therapy. New York: Norton.
 George, E., Iveson, C. & Ratner, H. (1999) Problem to Solution: Brief Therapy with
Individuals and Families. London: BT Press.
 Hawkes, D., Marsh, T. & Wilgosh, R. (1998) Solution-Focused Therapy: A Handbook for
Health Care Professionals. Oxford: Butterworth–Heinemann.
 Hoyt, M. F. (1984) Single session solutions. In Constructive Therapies (ed. M. F. Hoyt).
New York: Guilford.
30

31. Thanks for Patience………. 
31