Effort-Focused Interviewing

Abstract

Early 2018 we were reminded of the work of experimental psychologist Carol Dweck. She has shown that praising children for traits and qualities (smart, thoughtful, etc.) or for “working hard” led to very different outcomes when it came to both performance and the level of challenges that children took on after they were praised for one or the other.
The two first authors have tried to learn solution focused brief therapy for over 30 years and have some competence at interviewing about qualities and successes: interviewing “as if the client is smart”. We have not developed our skills in interviewing about efforts though: e.g. “as if the client has worked hard”.
This paper presents a piece of Carol Dweck’s research and its practical application to a case with a socially isolated 11-year old who does not want to see other children. The paper discusses effort-focused questions and discusses when these kinds of questions might be useful

Keywords: Brief therapy, Failure, Effort-focus, Compliments, Praise, Solution
focused brief therapy,

Full text

Journal of Systemic Therapies, Vol. 39, No. 1, 2020, pp. 35–48
35
EFFORT-FOCUSED INTERVIEWING
HARRY J. KORMAN
JOCELYNE M. KORMAN
SIKT Malmö, Sweden
SCOTT D. MILLER
International Center for
Clinical Excellence, Chicago, Illinois
In early 2018, we were reminded of the work of experimental psychologist
Carol Dweck. She has shown that praising children for traits and qualities
(smart, thoughtful, etc.) or for “working hard” led to very different outcomes
when it came to both performance and the level of challenges that children
took on after they were praised for one or the other. The two first authors have
tried to learn solution-focused brief therapy for over 30 years and have some
competence at interviewing about qualities and successes: interviewing “as
if the client is smart.” We have not developed our skills in interviewing about
efforts though: for example, “as if the client has worked hard.” This article
presents a piece of Carol Dweck’s research and its practical application to
a case with a socially isolated 11 year old who does not want to see other
children. The article discusses effort-focused questions and discusses when
these kinds of questions might be useful.
Keywords: brief therapy, failure, effort focus, compliments, praise, solution-
focused brief therapy
Only those who dare to fail greatly, can ever achieve greatly.
John F. Kennedy, Day of Affirmation Address,
University of Cape Town, Cape Town, South Africa, June 6, 1966
Emma (all names have been changed) was 11 years old when her mother brought
her to therapy because of massively increasing difficulties in getting Emma to go
to school. By this time, she had not seen the inside of a classroom for several years.
Staff in school murmured about autism spectrum disorder even though no formal
Address correspondence to Harry Korman, Skabersjövägen 356, 233 92 Svedala, Sweden. E-mail:
harry@sikt.nu
© 2020 JST Institute LLC
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36 Korman et al.
diagnosis was ever made. Emma spent her days in school alone, in a room adjacent
to the classroom. There she could listen to what happened without seeing others
or others seeing her. Despite the isolation—hearing the teacher and lessons only
through a connecting door—she has managed academically.
For the most part, the lack of social interaction was what concerned Emma’s
mother. At one point during the first session, she said, “Emma has no friends.
Even at recess, she doesn’t leave the room.” For her part, Emma complained first
of “panic attacks” and then of “black thoughts.” From there, the first session was a
quite ordinary solution-focused first session, the therapist (Harry Korman) starting
with exploring what Emma and mother were hoping to see happening as a result of
therapy. Emma wanted to stop having “the panic attacks,” and she said she wanted
to “feel happier.” If this happened, she would be able to be in the classroom when
she was in school. Mother hoped that Emma would be happier at home and that she
would express a desire to see other children. She also hoped that Emma would not
cry every morning when she prepared to go to school, and of course, she wanted
Emma to be able to get out of the group-room and into the classroom.
To the standard miracle question,1 Emma and mother answered with richly
detailed descriptions of ordinary daily activities. Emma would wake up looking
forward to going to school and would get out of bed more easily, perhaps even
immediately as her mother woke her. She would feel much happier, talk nicely
to her little sister, eat breakfast without fussing, and get ready for school without
mother and father having to nag about it. For her part, Emma said mom and dad
would be happy and proud if she got out of bed herself and went to school. To
a question about what would surprise mom the most, she answered that mother
would surely faint if she braided her little sister’s hair. Mother nodded at this
in agreement. Mother said that after school, Emma might want to play with
someone or at least talk about wanting to. Emma said emphatically, “I want to
go to school, and I want to be in the classroom with the others, but I like to be
by myself. Do things on my own.” She looked at her mother and added, “even
though people nag me about it.”
The session continued with the miracle scale: “If 0 means when mother made
the appointment to come here, and 10 is how things would be after a miracle hap-
pened, where are you on that scale?” Emma put herself at a 7, mother put Emma at
a 3, and when exploring the differences that put them higher than 0, what seemed
to be an important exception to the picture of a socially isolated girl emerged. (An
exception is a technical term in solution-focused brief therapy. It is shorthand for
1. “Suppose a miracle happened during the night while you were sleeping, and the problem that we
talked about here was solved just like that (snapping fingers). But since you were sleeping when the
miracle happened, you can not know it happened. So after you woke up, how would you discover that
this miracle happened? What would be the first thing you noticed that was different? What would you
do? What would mother notice? How would mother respond to that? etc.”
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Effort-Focused Interviewing 37
when the problem should have happened but did not.) Since about a month, Emma
had started playing on a soccer team coached by her father. “She is good at it,”
said her mother, adding, “and she is no different from any other kid when she is
there.” Quite some time during the first session was spent on trying to flesh out the
details on how Emma got herself to go to practice and matches and generally both
being and feeling quite successful with it. The family also described some other
small changes at home, like the evening routines being somewhat easier. Emma
said that she had no idea how she had made these things happen; they just hap-
pened. When asked how mom and dad had been helpful, she answered, “Mom’s
nagging and pushing.”
Several things could happen that would be signs to Emma and mother that she
was moving higher on the scale. In no particular order:
• She would not cry as she prepared for school in the morning.
• She would play with her little sister.
• She would get up immediately as her mother woke her.
• She would think about going into the classroom.
All and all, a rather ordinary first session of solution-focused brief therapy (de
Shazer 1985, 1988, 1991; de Shazer et al., 1986, 2007).
After the thinking-break, Harry delivered a bevy of compliments. Impressive girl,
smart as a whip, sensitive and thoughtful with a wide register both intellectually and
emotionally. The summary ended with Harry saying, “Parents pushing seems to be
helpful and make a difference. Emma going to soccer and making small changes
at home are certainly signs that you are all doing something right. So continue to
do what you do and pay attention to further signs of progress.”
Emma and her mother came to the second session reporting nothing much had
changed. The small things that were better at home already in the first session had
continued, but at school, which seemed the most important part to both, nothing
had changed. Harry was not very worried though. Sure, it was a serious problem,
and the people in school responded to Emma as if she was a very disturbed child,
but as it often happens in solution-focused practice, Harry could not see that there
was anything seriously wrong with her.2 Of course, he suspected that if she did
not change her behavior in school, if she continued to live up to the expectations
of the worried professionals around her, her future might prove bleak. Harry was
not very worried about her after the second session though. The only concern was
that many clients in solution-focused brief therapy start describing that things are
better already when they come back the second time.
2. Because of the singular focus in solution-focused brief therapy on how clients will know that they
don’t need therapy any longer, and the parts of this that are already happening, there are very often no
signs of pathology, even in cases traditionally seen as very serious.
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38 Korman et al.
SCOTT MILLER’S VISIT
During the week after the second session with Emma, Scott Miller (the third author)
came to visit. Scott and Jocelyne and Harry are colleagues and long-time friends.
Over the last three decades, Scott has taken the habit of checking if Harry and
Jocelyne are home whenever he has a day or two of free time while in Scandina-
via. The conversations are engaging and far-ranging, often extending deep into the
night, long after the more sensible family members and visitors have gone off to
bed. This time was no different.
Of late, Scott has become interested in deliberate practice. Chow and colleagues
(2015) published the first study documenting that therapists with superior outcomes
spent significantly more time working at improving their performance than their
less effective peers. A big part of their success, it turned out, was identifying their
“edge”—those moments when their usually effective way of working breaks down,
fails—and then consciously and deliberately developing and rehearsing alterna-
tives. Said differently: pushing oneself into zones of non-comfort and staying there,
rehearsing alternative ways of interacting.
At some point during the discussion that evening, Scott flipped open his laptop and
showed two videos from YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TTXrV0
_3UjY&t= and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NWv1VdDeoRY&t=). Eleven-
and twelve-year-olds were given a simple puzzle to complete. After completing
the task successfully, the children were praised in one of two ways. Half were
praised with the words: “You did really well. You must be really smart at this,”
and half were praised with the words: “You did really well. You must have tried
really hard at this.”
The impact of the small change in words on subsequent performance was dra-
matic. Given the choice of solving an easy or more challenging puzzle immediately
after the compliments, 92% of those praised for having tried really hard chose the
more difficult task while only 33% of the children praised for being really smart
chose the more challenging one. The children were then given a task that was
impossible to solve. The children praised for efforts worked harder, longer, and
seemed to enjoy it more than the children praised for intelligence, who tended to
become frustrated quickly and give up early. After this artificially induced failure,
the children were given a task with the same degree of difficulty as the first simple
one they had done. The most disturbing finding was that in the final simple task, the
children that had been praised for being really smart dropped their average score by
20%. The children that had been praised for trying really hard raised their average
score by 30%. In short, a 50% difference as a result of changing only three words.
Saying “you must be really smart at this,” versus saying “you must have tried really
hard at this” had a profound impact on whether and how long children persisted
in the face of challenges, as well as on how well they performed subsequently.
The videos showcased the work of Carol Dweck, a psychology professor at
Stanford University, whose research (Dweck 2006; Mueller & Dweck, 1998) has
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Effort-Focused Interviewing 39
shown how the language used to characterize and value performance impacts what
she calls “Mindset.” When intelligence was labeled as static, as the result of im-
mutable factors or traits, a “fixed mindset” resulted. In the cases of solving puzzles,
being told they were smart led children to engage in behaviors aimed at maintain-
ing that view. Thus, the children avoided challenges, gave up quickly when faced
with obstacles, dismissed the relevance and importance of effort, felt threatened
by the success of others, and finally ignored negative feedback. On the other hand,
comments about performance emphasizing effort and learning engendered what
Dweck calls a “growth mindset.” After being praised for their effort, the children
behaved as is if they saw the difficult puzzles as opportunities to learn more and
extend their mastery. They chose more challenging puzzles, worked significantly
longer, extended greater effort, embraced feedback, and were inspired to continue
despite the difficulties.
Scott has used Dweck’s research in his work on deliberate practice. He observed
that whatever the eventual payoff might be, spending lots of time at the edge
of one’s abilities—focused on errors, mistakes, failures—is both exhausting and
hard on the ego. For example, after spending several hours focused on refining a
30-second therapeutic exchange and failing, it is not uncommon for clinicians to
voice doubt about their capacity to improve, or question whether they possess the
requisite talent or abilities. Helping therapists become aware of and challenge their
use of language reflecting and reinforcing a “Fixed Mindset,” and praising effort
and hard work, has gone a long way to keep clinicians engaged in the process.
Harry and Jocelyne had an unexpected reaction to the clips. They said that this
was old news. They said that when they started learning solution-focused brief
therapy in the 1980s at the Brief Family Therapy Center (BFTC), Steve de Shazer,
Insoo Kim Berg, Scott Miller, and Larry Hopwood as their teachers already then
emphasized that “it is better—or more important—or more useful—to give compli-
ments for ‘the hard work’ involved in client’s progress, rather than for the success.”
Harry and Jocelyne said that this teaching at BFTC from the late 1980s had made
a lasting impact on how they have taught solution-focused brief therapy, and Harry
was quite sure that at least some of the people at BFTC were aware of Dweck’s
research (she had started publishing already in 1973).
However, as the three of us were talking about this, Harry and Jocelyne started
asking themselves if their development as clinicians over the past 30 years had
been one of primarily learning and developing expertise in searching for—and
praising—successes. Could it be that they had not put much—or any—effort into
listening and interviewing for efforts? They also started suspecting that they had
developed a tendency to drop failures—descriptions of clients’ attempts and efforts
that had not been successful in at least some way. In the search for exceptions and
reports of improvement since the last session, had they overlooked the fact that
for a failure to happen there had to be some kind of effort or attempt preceding it?
Since the beginning of the MRI (Mental Research Institute, Palo Alto, California),
the attempted solution has been viewed as the most important part of the pattern
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40 Korman et al.
that maintains the problem (Weakland, Fisch, Watzlawick, & Bodin, 1974), when,
in fact, it is always a sign of efforts that can be praised.
When Scott showed the Dweck tapes, Harry thought about Emma. He remem-
bered perceiving her as smart and thoughtful, and he clearly remembered praising
her for that and for succeeding in going to soccer—but had he praised her for the
efforts involved? Had he even looked for efforts, and had he interviewed her about
what she had tried to do to solve her problem?
A question emerged from talking about this: Is it possible that descriptions of
failed attempts can be potentially useful in the absence of exceptions or things
being better?
TRYING SOMETHING
Life is trying things to see if they work.
attributed to Ray Bradbury
Harry then decided that if there had been no progress in the next (third) session, he
would interview Emma about what she had tried. The session started with Emma
and her mother saying that things were not better, so Harry started asking Emma
about efforts. He asked what she had tried, what she had thought of trying, and what
she had tried to try. He asked about what had been difficult and challenging. He
noticed very quickly that interviewing about efforts and attempts is a very different
activity from interviewing about successes, and he found it surprisingly challenging
to develop questions and build further questions on Emma’s answers. It became
clear to him that during the 30 years that he had tried to learn solution-focused brief
therapy, he had become reasonably good at interviewing about successes; those
questions came automatically and without effort. Questions about efforts required
a different way of thinking, were difficult to phrase, and inevitably led to talk about
the challenges, the failures, and problematic things in Emma’s life. While trying
to do this with Emma, Harry found himself asking himself if he was still working
inside of what he has elsewhere defined as being solution-focused brief therapy
(McKergow & Korman 2009).
He found NOTHING. No efforts, no strategies, no planning, and nothing she
had tried. Mother described one small improvement. It was a little bit easier to get
Emma out of bed in the morning. Emma described it as just happening.
In the feedback to Emma and her mother after the break, Harry could only praise
Emma for how much she was thinking about trying. She nodded intensely (maybe
because Harry had just spent an entire hour asking her questions about what she
had thought about trying and what she had tried and what she was perhaps thinking
about trying in the future).
In the fourth session, mother told Harry that Emma had started to get up by her-
self in the morning. Emma now set the alarm clock when she went to bed and got
up when it rang. She was happier at home, smiled more, was more talkative, and
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Effort-Focused Interviewing 41
was kinder to her little sisters. At school, she had tried to attend one lesson in the
classroom. After the lesson started, she slipped into the classroom and sat down at
the back. On a “how difficult was that scale,” Emma put it close to 10. Harry and
Emma talked a long time about how she had made the decision to try, how she got
herself to start moving from the group-room to the classroom, and what she was
thinking while doing it.
On questions about what was difficult (inevitably leading to problem-talk, which
traditionally are refrained from as much as possible in solution focus), she talked
again about the black thoughts in her head that made her unable to move and how
she struggled not to let them paralyze her. Fighting against them (Harry felt some
more unease about this turn of language because he sees himself as quite a rigor-
ous solution-focused therapist, and this comes “dangerously” close to narrative
therapy). “Think them away,” said Emma, “take one step at a time.” She had also
tried to go outside during one of the breaks. They scaled how much effort that had
taken, and Harry asked more questions on what else she had tried—not just what
she had been successful with. At the end of the session, she was praised for how
much she took this seriously and how hard she worked at it.
During the following three sessions, she reported more progress. Mother de-
scribed how things got better and better at home, and Emma talked about going
more and more into the classroom and how she did that. She was also more and
more outside during recess, and she started playing with other children. Mother
reported that Emma had even started talking about taking the bike to go to school.
In the sixth session, mother told Harry that the school had started calling the
parents, requesting that they come to school and help Emma be in the classroom
with the other children and help her go outside with the other children during
recess. Both Emma and mother found this strange and troubling, since Emma was
making progress on her own, and it appeared as if the teachers had not noticed it.
Harry and the family spent some time talking about this and eventually tried to
set up a meeting with the school. Being unable to schedule a meeting, Harry thought
about situations he had been in over the years where important people failed to
notice progress. He told Emma’s mother that he learned from a colleague and a
friend many years ago about the importance of sharing the credit for the change
(Ben Furman, Finnish psychiatrist, personal communication). In order for people
to see change, it helps if they feel that they were responsible in some ways for the
change and get credit or praise for it. Harry told mother about a parental couple
who were on the verge of having their 10- and 12-year-old sons taken into care
by a social worker who had worked with them for 2 years. Despite tremendous
changes and improvements over the preceding 6 months, she was still seeing the
parents as hopelessly incompetent. Harry told the mother of the boys that one thing
that might make the social worker want to listen to what had become better would
be if the mother could thank the social worker for her contribution to the change.
Perhaps if the mother could say something like: “Despite our differences, I want
to thank you. I want to thank you because if you had not put all this pressure on us
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42 Korman et al.
that you have, we would never have been able to make the changes in our family
that we have.” The mother reacted with saying: “You want me to thank that bitch!”
and Harry answered, “Yes.” The woman looked at him thoughtfully for a couple
of seconds and then said: “It’s a damned good idea, but so damned difficult.” The
couple then went home, and the woman practiced on her husband. The upshot is
that when she thanked her social worker the week after, the social worker blushed,
looked down and to the side, and mumbled: “Thank you.” She then lifted her head
and asked, “What changes have you made?”
Harry then recommended that Emma’s mother thank the teachers profusely for
how helpful they had been to Emma. He said that this might make them feel more
implicated, more part of Emma’s improvement, and thus it might be easier for them
to recognize the efforts and changes that Emma was already making.
Two Months Later
Towards the end of summer, about 3 weeks before school started again, Emma’s
mother sent the following e-mail:
Hi Harry,
I hope you are having a great summer. I just want to tell you that Emma has been
amazing. The last week in school before summer she was in the classroom the whole
day and was outside playing with the other children during breaks. Now during the
summer holidays, she has started to see her classmates and once she even had a friend
at home who slept over. She is so proud and content and she is happy to participate in
activities we suggest. She tells us that she still struggles with the black thoughts, but
that it becomes less and less hard work to not get stuck with them and just let them
pass through her head. In through one ear and out the other, she says.
The teachers also stopped pushing. After our last meeting with you I attended
a school meeting and tried what you suggested—to give compliments and thank
the teachers for their hard work and commitment—it was not easy—but I thanked
them for pushing as they had and how they had actively involved Emma in the
process — it was lucky no one asked what I meant by that because I don’t really
know what I would have answered. It was interesting how they reacted. First a
little bit embarrassed, then very interested in the differences we had noticed at
home and what Emma told us about how school was different for her. We told the
teachers that Emma now goes to school with pleasure—instead of as before when
we sometimes had to carry her there.
A while after, one of the teachers called and said that they had discussed Emma in
the team and they wanted to put some extra resources into getting her up to speed with
the other children—and, believe it or not—they wanted to know what Emma and we
thought about it, and they wanted us to talk with her about it first.
We are so happy and grateful for everything and incredibly impressed with our
daughter. We have an appointment scheduled when school has started, and we’ll see
you then.
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Effort-Focused Interviewing 43
E-mail From Mother 10 Days After School Started
and 1 Week Before the Return Visit
Hi Harry,
The vacations continued as they began, and it’s getting better and better. Emma
participates in everything at home, is a bit rebellious sometimes, but it is possible to
reason with her in a sensible manner as we never could before. It’s like she’s matured
in an amazing way.
She has friends now. She takes initiatives and contacts them and they often contact
her. She has slept over a couple of times with friends. She gets up in the mornings by
herself and goes to school happily. She says that it is easy, does not take any effort at all
any longer, and that she is not at all afraid of going to school anymore. This is the first
time ever that she says this. Cooperation with the school has become completely differ-
ent. They now tell us how well it is going and that they are so happy for Emma’s sake.
We have discussed here, Stefan and I and Emma. We have decided that we want
to continue surfing on the success and cancel the visit with you in 10 days—it does
not feel like it is needed—and we hope we can get in touch again if the need arises.
Warm regards
GOING VIRAL
Solution-focused brief therapy (SFBT) is Harry’s and Jocelyne’s preferred approach.
One of the central tenets in the philosophy of SFBT is that when what we do does
not work, we should do something different. In the case of Emma, interviewing
about what she had tried, what she had thought of trying, and what she was thinking
of trying offered an option because the traditional SFBT methods had not made
any significant difference. The changes then happening with Emma prompted more
interest in questions around efforts, attempts, and challenges.
Consequently, since spring 2018 effort-focused questions have infected Joc-
elyne’s and Harry’s practice, inserting themselves into previously unnoticed op-
portunities. Where before the absence of progress or exceptions would have led
to returning to a best-hopes and miracle picture or moving to coping-questions,
Harry and Jocelyne now find themselves exploring numerous possibilities among
the many attempts and tries that their clients have invariably engaged in. The
absence of progress or exceptions have become an invitation to explore what the
client tried, and failures have become interesting since—as we said earlier—one
cannot fail unless one has tried.
There are other areas where these questions have inserted themselves. When
things are better, we (Harry and Jocelyne) have tended to explore the “qualities”
and “traits” that have been useful to progress. It is still important to search what
people have succeeded with, but we listen much more for the efforts it took to do
the actions that made a difference, and for instance asking what the most difficult
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44 Korman et al.
was, and what the most challenging was—thus leading the conversation towards
efforts through talking about difficulties and challenges. We spend less time on
creating the details of what was better, and more time on the efforts that were
involved in making progress.
On an even more general level, already in first sessions, we find ourselves seek-
ing descriptions of how clients actively deal with the challenges of life. It is, of
course, evident that if the therapist wants to praise efforts and attempts credibly,
the therapist needs to know what the person did or tried to do, thought of trying,
and or felt like trying, and or is thinking of trying in the future.
We also started experimenting with beginning the second sessions with the ques-
tion: “So, what have you tried since we met last?” (If the client looks confused by
this question, we then add: “to make things better.”)
We also think that questions about what someone has tried are less pushy than
questions about progress. Instead of asking: “So how will your mother notice when
you deal better with . . . ,” we might ask: “So how would your mother notice any
effort you put in trying to deal better with . . . ?”
A TENTATIVE OUTLINE FOR SYSTEMATIZING
EFFORT-FOCUSED QUESTIONS
Almost every question can be asked with a focus on the past, the present, and/or
the future. These different alternatives are not about being competent in grammar.
They are about being attentive to where the client is focused. Does it seem more
useful to talk about what has happened, is happening, or will happen in the future?
(What is most challenging now? What has been the most challenging part of what
you went through? What will be the most challenging tomorrow or next week?)
Many of them can usefully be asked inviting the perspective of others—for example,
“How will mother notice when you’re trying even if you don’t tell her about it?”
What Can We Focus on and Listen for
If We Want to Search for Efforts?
• Challenges
• Attempts to solve the “problem”
• The hard work required in developing skills
• What the client has tried or has attempted to try.
With Emma, Harry asked:
• If you decided to continue trying to enter the classroom in the future, despite
being afraid/having black thoughts, etc., what would be helpful? What would
you try then? How would you go about it?
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Effort-Focused Interviewing 45
• What would mom see that made her think you were trying? How would she
react to that?
Challenges
Challenge is a useful word because it automatically assumes taking action.
• What has been—is—will be—the biggest challenge?
• How hard was it/will it be?
• What did you try to do to deal with that challenge?
• If I asked your partner, what would he say you did?
Skills: Developing a Skill Takes Hard Work
• What skills would you need to develop to become better at this or that (e.g.,
handle your temper, stay in bed all night, stay in the classroom)?
• What do you think you could try that would help you develop that skill?
• How would your mother notice that you started working on developing that
skill?
Trying
• How confident are you that you will try? (Try—not succeed)
• What will tell your mom that you’re there—perhaps already before you do
it?
• Suppose you decided to (continue to) try and get into the classroom despite
being scared/having a cloud of black thoughts, etc.; what would be helpful?
• What would you do?
• How would you go about it?
• What would mother see on you that made her think that you are trying?
• How would she react to that?
Some Potentially Useful Scales
(Challenges, Efforts, Attempts, and Strategies)
• How challenging is that? (“that” referring to something the client wants
to do)
• How hard was it/will it be? (“it” refers to whatever the client tried—in Emma’s
case, it was about her moving from the room adjacent to the classroom into
the classroom)
• How difficult is/was/will that be? With 10 the hardest you can imagine and 0
the easiest
• How confident are you that you will try?
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46 Korman et al.
A very interesting idea and example of a slightly different use of a question
on a progress scale came from one of our colleagues in Great Britain after being
inspired by a draft of this article.
One other note on questions I’ve been testing out is around scaling. So I’ve been
asking the typical miracle/preferred future scale, and once I have the number (say a
3), I’ve been asking what is it about the efforts they’re making that keeps them up at
that 3 instead of a 0? This has been leading to answers around achievements as well
as efforts made—not necessarily linked to success, but more about things like being
able to persist, things they’re “kind of trying” and I work hard & do everything I can.
Then I can expand upon these efforts and explore them further to amplify them. (Greg
Oberbeck, personal communication, February 20, 2020)
Are Effort-Questions Different From Coping-Questions?
The difference we see is that with the traditional solution-focused coping-questions,
we listen for what people were successful with despite the hardship, and with effort-
focused questions, we listen for what people have tried regardless of whether they
were successful with it.
• What did you try to do to handle this impossible situation?
• What did you try to try?
• What did you do to keep trying?
• What were you thinking that helped you persist trying?
• How have you managed not to give up entirely?
• What has your partner/mother/son/etc. noticed that you have tried?
WHERE MIGHT WE BE HEADING?
Harry and Jocelyne Speculating
The clinical impression this far is that effort-focused interviewing is a useful ad-
dendum to solution-focused brief therapy and something we can try when what
we do does not seem to make a difference. It is also a focus we can use when we
feel that we need to slow down, for example, when the client has great difficulties
describing what life will look like when things are better or cannot describe small
signs of progress.
We think that interviewing about efforts could be a useful addendum to many
other therapy models, so we hope that non–solution-focused practitioners will
pick up Dweck’s ideas and experiments and put some effort into trying to apply
them in their work.
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Effort-Focused Interviewing 47
Scott Speculating
Most of us feel like we are working hard, trying to make things better both for our-
selves and for the people around us. We are all trying that. Whether true or not, in
an objective sense, having that acknowledged—as Dweck’s research shows—helps
keep us engaged and influences, and to some extent even predicts, what we will do
in the future. Dweck’s experiments show that IF we praise efforts instead of traits,
the children will select harder tasks and continue to try even in the face of obstacles
and tasks that are in fact beyond their abilities at the moment, which is, of course,
better than what happens when we praise qualities (e.g., being smart)—leading to
a tendency to give up early.
Perhaps we are moving towards a “model” where neither the solution nor the
problem matters. What matters is that the therapist helps the person feel engaged
in his or her life, and effort-focused interviewing might be helpful in this direction.
The Three of Us Concluding
We do not know if effort-focused interviewing is better or even a useful addendum
to solution-focused brief therapy or any other therapy model. We do not know if
applying Dweck’s research to therapy helps prepare and equip people to deal with
the challenges of life. Intuitively, it seems to be more useful to have a “growth”
rather than “fixed mindset,” and there are some indications that we as therapists
might be able to influence that. We know that Dweck’s research has added something
to our practice that we believe is useful, and we think it has helped us enlarge our
repertoire. However, we want to remain very tentative about the potential useful-
ness of these ideas—thus, the emphasis on believe.
Emma should have the last words:
You have to go so far you don’t dare anymore.
And then a bit farther.
Emma
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