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Conversations with the Inspiring Sybil Cummin

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Today we’d like to introduce you to Sybil Cummin.

Sybil, let’s start with your story. We’d love to hear how you got started and how the journey has been so far.
I had recently had my first child and went back to an agency that I did not feel fully supported me and that did not match my value system or allow for authenticity. I gave my two weeks notice (I had not even told my husband my plan) and decided that I would start my own practice. I did little to no research on how to start a successful business, rented an office space and opened Arvada Therapy Solutions, working with children, teens, and families.

I had no business knowledge or skills that I knew of, so really focused on my strengths to build my practice. I am an extreme extrovert (which I now know is kind of strange as a therapist) and so started talking to people and letting them know who I was passionate to work with and my practice started to build. I was as full as I wanted to be in about 10 months and became overwhelmed with knowing where to send people if they were not a good fit for me or if I did not have any availability. I realized that I was significantly lacking a strong network of other therapists, so my goal was to again get out into the community and meet as many other therapists as I could.

At first, I actually had somewhat of an icy response with only 4 replies from the 25 therapists I had contacted, even after I had let them know that I had clients to refer. After the initial disappointment, I decided that finding those who matched my belief of abundance (I did not know this term at the time) and my value of collaboration was more important than the number of therapists that I know. I now have a huge network of therapists and love to help connect other people together.

Over the past eight years, I have made many mistakes as well as many successful ventures and enjoy sharing my experience, the good, the bad, and the ugly with others. In 2016, I started offering workshops and coaching to therapists trying to start or grow their businesses. My belief is that to have a successful practice, everything you do needs to be authentic to you. This includes the clientele you choose to work with, to how you market yourself, to how you dress. We all have strengths that are unique and it is so important to honor those and use them to succeed.

Another aspect that has continued my success is to be open to new ideas and projects. This keeps me excited and passionate about my work and prevents burnout. Adding business coaching to my child and family therapy caseload was one way to do this. Another way that I have added some diversity to my work is to become an approved clinical supervisor, add interns and contractors to my practice and now have begun training other professionals in working with one of my specialties, victims, and survivors of domestic violence. I had become increasingly frustrated by the lack of knowledge and education about this particular issue, so instead of whining and complaining about it (which I’m sure I did some of as well), I decided to close this gap and begin training others. I am now offering a variety of training opportunities, a training website (www.beyondpowerandcontrol.com) and am in the final stages of completing my first book.

Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
I have never really thought about whether the road was smooth or not. I have made many mistakes from accepting clients that I knew were not a good fit for me to spending money on a marketing scheme that did not work. All of them frustrating, but help me grow and learn.

One of the barriers that was initially difficult for me was not feeling like I could attend conferences or networking events because when I was not seeing clients, I had my son (now I have two boys) with me. I didn’t want to find childcare to go to a networking happy hour, because I wanted to be with my boys, not to mention that childcare is expensive. After some initial frustration, I decided to set up some of my own, child-friendly networking opportunities for therapists who also happen to be parents to young children. This was extremely successful because there were so many other therapists who were also moms and feeling the exact same way.

My advice to others is to be creative and find ways to fill the gaps that are missing for you.

What should we know about Arvada Therapy Solutions? What do you do best? What sets you apart from the competition?
I work with children, teens, adults, and families. I specialize in working with families that have experienced some form of trauma, including child abuse and neglect and sexual abuse, and the majority of my adult clients are victims and survivors of domestic violence.

I think what I am most proud of is that I have been termed a “squeaky wheel” by many other professionals in the community. It may be that they do not always mean this in a positive way, however, I wear it as a badge of honor. I stand up for under-served members in my community and am not afraid to call out what we can be doing better. I do this in many ways from adding interns to my practice to offer a significantly reduced fee for members in the community, to teaching other clinicians how to work ethically with specific clientele to standing up for my clients within the legal system.

Another thing that I am proud of and believe others would say about me in the community is my true belief in the theory of abundance and collaboration. I am happy to consult with others about cases, their business goals or concerns, etc. I have been asked why I share my “secrets” with everyone about how I have succeeded. This question baffles me. By helping someone else succeed does not hurt my success, so what is the problem?

Do you have a lesson or advice you’d like to share with young women just starting out?
Be authentic to yourself. And watch out for the comparison bug. If you create an authentic business for you based on your values, then it is what is right for you.

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