The Cycle of Excellence: Using Deliberate Practice to Improve Supervision and Training

A leading, evidence–based approach to dramatically enhancing therapist performance and boosting clinical outcomes 

How do good psychotherapists become great psychotherapists? Practice! From musicians to athletes to physicians, aspiring and established professionals rely on deliberate practice to attain, enhance and fine–tune their performance. Researchers have recently begun to study how psychotherapists can use these same processes to enhance the effectiveness of psychotherapy supervision for career–long professional development. Based on that empirical research, this groundbreaking book brings together contributions from leading supervisors and researchers from around the globe who describe methods supervisors can use to improve the effectiveness of psychotherapy training and supervision. 

All mental health practitioners want to be more effective. Unfortunately, none of the traditional methods supervision, continuing education, the dissemination of evidence–based treatments and outcome feedback have been shown to lead to significant gains in clinical outcomes. The answer, it seems, can be found in the science of expertise, a field of research concerned with understanding how professionals across an array of fields move from average to superior performance. In The Cycle of Excellence, the authors draw upon those findings to identify a universal set of processes and metrics for the development of psychotherapeutic expertise.  

Introduces the concept of deliberate practice a technique adapted from practices used by professional artists and athletes to continually develop and hone their expertise Outlines step–by–step processes shown to dramatically enhance therapists overall performance and to boost clinical outcomes Describes the Expertise–Development Model of Supervision and Consultation for day–to–day skill–building and professional development Provides metrics for tracking performance with feedback–based quantitative performance systems, as well as qualitative methods for routine outcome measurement Features contributions from distinguished clinicians and thought–leaders from around the globe

Virtually every psychotherapist wants to be great at what he or she does, but very few ever achieve the level of expertise to which they aspire. While it comes with no guarantee of greatness, the approach laid out in The Cycle of Excellence has been proven to significantly increase the effectiveness of psychotherapy.  

Tony Rousmaniere, PsyD is on the Clinical Faculty at the University of Washington in Seattle where he also maintains a private practice. 

Rodney K. Goodyear, PhD is a Professor at the University of Redlands as well as Emeritus Professor of Counseling Psychology, University of Southern California.

Scott D. Miller, PhD, is the founder of the International Center for Clinical Excellence.

Bruce E. Wampold, PhD is Professor Emeritus of Counseling Psychology at the University of Wisconsin, Madison and Director of the Research Institute at Modum Bad Psychiatric Center, Norway.