What are the best ways to assess a mentee's self-confidence in Motivational Interviewing?
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Motivational interviewing (MI) is a collaborative and client-centered approach to help people change their behavior and achieve their goals. As a mentor or supervisor, you want to support your mentees to develop their MI skills and confidence. But how can you assess their level of self-confidence in MI? Here are some best ways to do that.
One of the core skills of MI is to ask open-ended questions that elicit the client's own reasons and motivations for change. You can use the same skill to assess your mentee's self-confidence in MI. For example, you can ask them: How confident do you feel about using MI with your clients? What are some of the challenges or successes you have experienced with MI? What are some of the areas you want to improve or learn more about MI? These questions can help you gauge your mentee's level of confidence, as well as their strengths and areas of growth.
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Leanne Siri
Growth Advisor | Certified Professional Resume Writer & Branding Expert I HRBP I Content Writer I Creative Writer I TX Businesswoman of the Year I Presidential Business Advisory Council I Citigroup I DELL
Use an assessment for your last 5-10 candidates! This will help you be objective as to their character and behavioral traits. This also will help with effective questions.
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Joey (The Traveling Social Workers)™ Pagano
Transform Mental Health: From Struggle to Journey 🧠 | Follow me for Empathetic Guidance 👐 | Acclaimed #1 Best-Seller & Pulitzer Nominee 📚 | Expert Addiction Interventionist 🛠️ | Innovator in SUD Training 🌱
In my experience as a SUD social worker, assessing a mentee's self-confidence in Motivational Interviewing (MI) is pivotal. I focus on their verbal cues and non-verbal behavior during our sessions. Active listening is key to understanding their self-perception. I often use scaling questions to quantify their confidence, asking them to rate their belief in their abilities. This provides a tangible measure and a starting point for growth. Reflection and affirmation are also crucial, as they help mentees recognize and articulate their strengths and achievements, fostering a deeper sense of self-confidence.
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Another core skill of MI is to use reflection and affirmation to show empathy and support to the client. You can also use these skills to assess your mentee's self-confidence in MI. For example, you can reflect back what you hear from your mentee, such as: It sounds like you are feeling more confident about using MI with your clients. You can also affirm their efforts and achievements, such as: You have done a great job of using MI to help your clients explore their ambivalence. These skills can help you validate your mentee's confidence, as well as encourage and reinforce their MI practice.
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Keith Myers
Clinic Director at Ellie Mental Health | Operations | Former Dean | Counselor Educator | Veteran's Advocate | Author
Sometimes people assume or think that affirmation is simple praise like “Great job!”. However, it’s more specific than that. It’s more like the following: “I really appreciate the way you connected with that project manager and explained things when people were confused about where to go next.” Affirmation gives examples.
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Will Warren, M.S., NCC, LPC
Licensed Professional Counselor | MINT Member | Appreciative Inquiry Facilitator | Trainer & Consultant
In MI we utilize both simple and complex affirmations. Simple affirmations come across as cheerleading statements (e.g., "You're trying so hard to improve your skills! Keep going!') Complex affirmations, on the other hand, reflect sustainable traits and attributes. They point toward core strengths and characteristics (e.g., "You're the type of person that sticks to something when you set your mind to it." or "Even though you've faced challenges you've found ways to stay the course as you develop your MI skills." Complex affirmations usually help individuals view themselves as competent and instill hope, especially when followed up with exploratory open-ended questions to investigate how they have obtained and utilized these strengths.
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A third way to assess your mentee's self-confidence in MI is to observe and review their MI sessions with their clients. You can use a structured tool, such as the Motivational Interviewing Treatment Integrity (MITI) code, to rate your mentee's adherence and competence in MI. The MITI code measures five global dimensions of MI: evocation, collaboration, autonomy-support, direction, and empathy. It also measures four specific behaviors of MI: open questions, reflections, complex reflections, and MI-adherent statements. You can use the MITI code to provide feedback and coaching to your mentee, as well as to track their progress and improvement in MI.
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Will Warren, M.S., NCC, LPC
Licensed Professional Counselor | MINT Member | Appreciative Inquiry Facilitator | Trainer & Consultant
Keep in mind that to effectively use the MITI a person should receive training as it is based on the assessors observation of use of skills. You can find upcoming trainings listed on the Motivational Interviewing Network of Trainers (MINT) website
A fourth way to assess your mentee's self-confidence in MI is to use self-assessment tools that measure their perceived confidence and competence in MI. For example, you can use the Motivational Interviewing Self-Efficacy Scale (MISES), which is a 25-item questionnaire that asks your mentee to rate their confidence in performing various MI skills and tasks. You can also use the Motivational Interviewing Knowledge Test (MIKT), which is a 36-item multiple-choice test that assesses your mentee's knowledge of MI principles and techniques. These tools can help you identify your mentee's strengths and weaknesses in MI, as well as their learning needs and goals.
A fifth way to assess your mentee's self-confidence in MI is to use goal-setting and action-planning strategies to help them enhance their MI skills and confidence. For example, you can use the SMART framework to help your mentee set specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound goals for their MI practice. You can also use the GROW model to help your mentee develop an action plan that includes their goal, reality, options, and way forward. These strategies can help you support your mentee's self-confidence in MI, as well as monitor and evaluate their outcomes and achievements.
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Keith Myers
Clinic Director at Ellie Mental Health | Operations | Former Dean | Counselor Educator | Veteran's Advocate | Author
I like the idea of using SMART goals, because they become more specific and measurable. I also like using the miracle question to get goal-setting kicked off: If you had a magic wand and waved it, suddenly your life becomes as you want it. How would that look different than life as it is now?
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Will Warren, M.S., NCC, LPC
Licensed Professional Counselor | MINT Member | Appreciative Inquiry Facilitator | Trainer & Consultant
This is also a great opportunity to model the evoking and planning tasks of MI, especially if your mentee is ambivalent around using MI due to low self-efficacy
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Will Warren, M.S., NCC, LPC
Licensed Professional Counselor | MINT Member | Appreciative Inquiry Facilitator | Trainer & Consultant
We might keep in mind that learning MI is a change in and of itself and can help us build empathy for those we serve as they attempt to make changes as well can be great opportunities for modeling MI as mentors working with mentees. Also, we should remember that the most important part of MI is the development of the Spirit. While the OARS skills are important, the foundational component that makes MI effective is an empathetic, guiding partnership. This can take time to develop as a helper and is one of the main reasons Bill Miller (co-developer of MI) himself says that on average it takes a person about 10 years of consistent practice to feel like they are really comfortable with using MI.
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