My Qualifications, Professional Experience & Practice

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Qualifications:  

Diploma Coaching (IPHM  2022) 

M. A. Psychoanalytic Observational Studies (Tavistock Centre, / Univ. E. London), (2005) 

Diploma Counselling (1995)  

Certificate in Counselling Theory & Practice (1994) 

Diploma Management Studies (1993)  

Diploma Social Work/CQSW (1987)  

BSc. Psychology (1979)

Registrations: 

British Association for Counselling & Psychotherapy, Member (MBACP)    

Compliance: In my work I comply with the Code of Ethical Practice of BACP (contained in: Ethical Framework for the Counselling Professions).   

I hold Professional Liability Insurance ( Oxygen).

I have an arrangement for Professional Consultation. 

I maintain my awareness of professional issues and developments and am committed to undertaking Continuing Professional Development. 

General Data Processing Regulations (GDPR) : Record keeping and data processing procedures are compliant with GDPR (2018). 

Disclosure & Barring Service Enhanced Certificate: to May, yearly (renews annually) 

Alan has an integrative approach to assessment, formulation and to choosing an appropriate therapeutic intervention, tailored to client needs, facilitating their voice and choice. This is drawn from a range of clinical and theoretical trainings and practice experiences. These include the following distinctive modes of thinking and practice :   

• systemic family therapeutic framework, helps understand context, influences, communicating,  power differences and patterns in relationships and ways of relating ; 
• psychodynamic therapy framework,  helps understand development in relating to self and others, our 'hidden' aspects, conscious use of understanding the emotional feelings in our encounters ; mentalization, helps our awareness of our inner self, of others, and how we express our 'self;' attachment & developmental theories, show a balance of resilience grown in early life challenges and difficulties 
• brief modes of therapy (solution-focused, psychodynamic), relationship-based, helps focus language & task awareness, discerning unconscious anxiety sources, recognizing the sensitive balance to be sought in noticing conscious and unconscious communications and their value and careful use ; and 
• awareness of trauma and psychosomatic links as sources of stress patterns or unrecognized habits ; 
• emotional literacy & safe emotional expression as foundations for emotional wellbeing ; 
• therapeutic community practices, emphasizing our (sometimes unconsciously) expressing different aspects of our 'self' to and with other people, supportive ways of relating enhancing our growth and development, through a 'self-in-relationship' way of discovering ourselves; 
• group analytic perspective which supports the increased awareness of the functioning of each individual as a group-member with a group identity of which we may not be fully consciously aware;   
• creative visualization & subconscious communications  internally & externally for access to inner resources and re-framing perspectives, boosting our intentions;
•  transformational hypnosis, engaging your pre-conscious in supporting your willpower;    
• observational, self-reflexive and reflective thinking modes of therapeutic  practitioner conduct.  

 Supervision of Professional Practice received from experienced practitioners from a range of Psychotherapeutic Disciplines: 

Psychoanalytic Couple Psychotherapist ( 1 year ; during doctoral studies)

Consultant Psychotherapist in Psychiatry (2 years)

Psychoanalytic Child & Adolescent Psychotherapist (1 year)

Counsellor-Consultant  Inner Child Work, (3 years)   

Systemic Family Therapist ( 2 years)

Gestalt Group Therapist & Therapeutic Community Leader ( 2 years).

Research / Dissertation: M.A.Dissertation “Brief psycho-dynamically informed counselling in families: some thoughts on communication in work with anxious boys by a male counsellor” lodged in Tavistock Centre Library 

 Alan qualified as a social worker in 1987, and as a counsellor in 1995. He has specialised in work with children, young people, parents / carers and families. He has over 27 years experience of working in multi-disciplinary practitioner teams in The NHS, Child & Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS). After twenty years in a local service he gained further experience in locum posts in five other NHS Trusts, specialising in assessment, therapeutic intervention and consultations, for referred clients of 5 to 19 years. 

In previous roles Alan gained experience in a range of local authority services for children, young people and families including: child and family support, safeguarding, youth justice, and involved with fostering, kinship, special guardianship and adoption, open residential care of children, and co-lead the therapeutic groupwork program in a therapeutic community secure unit for adolescents. As an Approved Social Worker (Mental Health Act 1983) he conducted mental health assessments of adults, liaised with professionals and arranged mental health unit admissions. 

Alan has worked in CAMHS supporting parents, carers or guardians and young people with a wide range of conditions, presentations or disorders, including : - 

• behavioural (including oppositional, conduct, defiance),   
• emotional (including anxiety, panic, trauma, loss or bereavement, low or variable mood),   
• neuro-diverse or attentional difficulties,   
• deliberate self-harming,   
• appetite / eating difficulties,    
• complex psycho-social presentations and multiple diagnoses, with   
• backgrounds of abuse, neglect,   
• developmental or relational trauma or discrete trauma events,    
• presentations secondary to health conditions or  
• bodily symptoms arising from stress, 
• medically unexplained conditions or Non-Epileptic (Psychogenic) Seizures. 

 As Principal Social Worker, Alan initiated and led for over twelve years, a new development of direct work in a CAMH Service in the: 

• Brief Psychodynamically-informed Therapeutic Family Counselling Service, based in systemic and psycho-dynamic models, providing a family and young client-centred clinical service, successfully effecting positive changes in up to six sessions. 

 Alan has provided: assessment and therapeutic interventions for children, young people & families; consultation to colleagues of other disciplines including professional support to-

• clinic-based group-work programs supporting young people in tackling their deliberate self-harm,   
• a support group for parents of children with Tourette's Syndrome, 
• practitioners in social care, mental health or counselling on safeguarding,
• therapeutic understanding for goal directed, client-centred work, 
• therapeutic communication with children, young people, parents, families and couples. 

 Practice Values – Alan brings a compassionate and non-judgmental approach to understanding his clients' and family's experiences from a developmental perspective, both of their difficulties and life challenges, and to his commitment supporting efforts to achieve their chosen goals for improvement. 

Similarly, in supportive consultative conversations with carers, be they extended family in kinship care or guardians holding Special Guardianship Orders, or professionals in fostering or residential care, Alan holds an empathic, open-minded attitude combined with a belief that in general each one of us is doing the best we can.