Academy of Solution Focused Training

The Solution Focused Brief Therapy approach is a goal-directed, future-oriented, competency-based approach that draws its origin from the brilliant work of Milton Erickson as well as the team from the Mental Research Institute in Palo Alto, California. Erickson was known for his innovative and unconventional approaches to helping people. He had no theory of pathology and was interested in what helped people to change. He believed in the innate abilities of each person to draw from their vast experiences of their own life to bring about the desired changes they invisioned. He was known for his hypnotic techniques that helped people to access their resources and competencies. Erickson was struck with polio at the age of 17 and was paralyzed from the neck down. Due to his keen powers of observation and visualization, he was able to teach himself to walk and talk again. Steve de Shazer, Kim Insoo Berg and their colleagues at the Brief Therapy Center in Wilwaukee, Wisconsin were heavily influenced by Erickson’s work as well as being fascinated by what worked in the therapy room and spent more than 25 years working inductively with clients. Through this extensive work with hundreds of clients, Steve and Insoo developed what is known as Solution Focused Brief Therapy.

The solution focused approach highlights the client’skills, strengths and positive qualities and helps them adopt an alternative perspective on their future. Using this approach to engage clients in a more realistic and optimistic perspective, one can make them aware of their successes, both past and present. Clients are thus better able to invisage and enact their aspirations for the future.

This model of counseling and consultation began in the therapy room and has been expanded to various settings, including schools, private practices, corporate settings, life coaching, rehabilitation centres, psychiatric hospitals, residential treatment centres, and child protective agencies. It has also been used successfully with a variety of presenting problems, including client with alcohol and/or substance abuse, survivors of sexual abuse, family conflict, interpersonal problems, and psychiatric issues.

The solution focused approach is fast gaining popularity in North America, Central America, Caribbean, Africa, Europe, Australia, UK and Asia.