Description
Do you want to enhance your ability to make the people you serve feel accepted, understood, and empowered? Motivational Interviewing (MI) is an evidence-based, person-centered approach that helps individuals tap into their own reasons for change, fostering motivation and commitment to personal growth. Rather than imposing solutions, MI guides individuals through their ambivalence, helping them discover what truly matters and how to move forward.
This series of four highly interactive and practice-based workshops offers a comprehensive introduction to MI. Each session provides valuable tools you can immediately apply in your work, but together, they unlock MI’s full potential. Throughout the series, you will engage in real-world exercises, reflective discussions, and skill-building activities that allow you to practice and refine your MI abilities. Whether you are new to MI or looking to strengthen your existing knowledge, this series will equip you with the skills necessary to create more collaborative, empowering, and impactful relationships in your field.
Each workshop will be supported by a blended learning package with filmed lectures, exercises, worksheets and quizzes that in a fun way will help participants enhance their competence.
Session One: The Essence of Helping Relationships – Foundations of Empathy and Client-Centered Support
(2 hours)
This workshop delves into the heart of helping professions, focusing on the importance of meeting clients where they are and using empathy as a key tool for fostering change. Through the core principles of Motivational Interviewing—Acceptance, Empowerment, Compassion, and Collaboration—participants will gain practical insights and tools to build meaningful, trust-based relationships. This session equips professionals to navigate complex client dynamics with empathy, creating a supportive and empowering environment for growth.
Session Two: Acceptance and Empowerment – Building Self-Acceptance and Self-Efficacy through Motivational Interviewing
(2 hours)
This workshop focuses on how to foster client empowerment and self-acceptance using Motivational Interviewing (MI). Participants will learn how to convey acceptance, strengthen clients’ resilience and self-efficacy, and practice complex affirmations that help clients recognize their own strengths and capabilities. Through hands-on exercises, attendees will gain practical tools to support meaningful, strength-based change.
Session Three: Unlocking Motivation with MI – Strengthening Change Talk and Softening Sustain Talk
(2 hours)
This workshop teaches participants how to evoke, recognize and amplify change talk—clients’ own expressions of their motivation for change—while softening sustain talk, which reflects their attachment to the status quo. Through practical strategies and exercises, attendees will learn how to guide clients through ambivalence, reduce resistance, and help them build the momentum needed for lasting change.
Session Four: Creating Collaboration – Turning Struggle into Partnership
(2 hours)
This workshop explores how Motivational Interviewing (MI) can transform difficult interactions with clients into collaborative partnerships. Participants will learn practical strategies to balance power dynamics, respond effectively to dissonance in the working alliance, and reduce stress for both clients and professionals. The session will offer hands-on techniques to foster meaningful cooperation and make client work more constructive and productive.
