When thinking about how to set up your therapy office, one thing to keep in mind is what type of clients you’ll be seeing. Will you be working with kids? Adolescents? Adults? What about couples and families? These are the questions we commonly ask ourselves when deciding what to include within our office space. But what about when you are with more then just individual clients - what about groups?
If you are a counselor who works with groups, like myself, there are three things you may want to consider when setting up your office space: Group Size, Type of Group, and Group Frequency. Let’s start with group size: how many members do your groups usually include? To me this is one of the most important things to consider when setting up your office, mainly because it will determine what type of seating you will have. For example, if your groups tend to be on the smaller size you can probably get away with having two couches and your chair. However, if your group tends to be on the larger size you might want to include chairs or even floor cushion seating. The GREAT thing about floor cushions is you don’t have to have them out all of the time, meaning it will allow you to still create a flexible space. This leads us in to the consideration of group frequency. If you only hold groups once or twice a week, chances are you won’t want your room to be too cluttered with chairs and couches. You’ll want your office to be easily transformed from a group room to a individual counseling office. Again, floor cushions are GREAT for this. Another great thing to have is moveable tables, such as side tables or even lap desks. That way if your group includes activities you don’t have to have your office cluttered with multiple tables or desks. This leads us into the last thing to consider which is the type of groups you run. If your running a parenting group or teen group that requires a lot of activities, table space is key. However if your running a process group, a comfortable space is key.
If your someone who doesn’t run groups at all but are interested in finding a group for clients, feel free to reach out to me via my psychology today profile to find out more about what groups I’ll be offering this summer.
