What should a techie look for in a therapist? These 8 qualities.

“What are you feeling?” “Tell your partner what you’re feeling.” It may seem as if therapists get paid for every time they utter this f-word. For many clients, the therapist may as well be speaking a foreign language. And it’s not always easy to identify how you’re feeling, or even the fact that you’re having a feeling, right? But your brain produces them whether you like it or not, and they influence how you feel and how you behave, in a big way. So it helps to get to know them.

To best serve the capable professionals that I encounter in my practice, I aim to adopt a stance of curiosity and humility. Therapists speak the language of emotions all day, while many of us grew up in households where emotions weren’t recognized, much less discussed. Some of us work in environments where emotional literacy is regarded as irrelevant. As a former practicing attorney, I can certainly relate.

I don’t presume to know the technical aspects of an engineer’s work or a designer’s work, but my goal is to understand the mindset. I’ve done my best to ask questions and to learn.

Over time I’ve gathered that by virtue of their work, programmers are required to operate within a highly-structured framework. They’re trained from early on to analyze problems logically. The left brain (which is more linear and literal) is favored over the right brain (which is more intuitive and holistic). Sometimes, this emphasis on logic gets exaggerated in workspaces that fail to acknowledge or value the feelings that influence and motivate human engineers, but that have a very real impact on their productivity and job retention. The same goes for law, business, and science.

How does a therapist adapt, so that a more cognitive, left-brained client can get the most from therapy? How can a therapist become a more effective ambassador to this complex world, with which so few of us are comfortable? The following are qualities that I believe a therapist needs to best serve tech clients:

1. Affirming
With so many tech jobs and so much competition in the workspace, techies can sometimes feel replaceable, and can treat each other as such. This can add to the impersonable feel. Yet how you feel, what you fear, what you hope for, what drives you… these elements are uniquely you. The more you know yourself, the more you can get your needs met. Your therapist should treat you as an individual. Instead of making assumptions based upon categories, they should ask questions. And although there may be things you want to improve upon, you should sense they accept you exactly as you are.

2.  Relatable
Research has shown again and again that the most predictive factor for positive outcomes in therapy is the “alliance” between therapist and client. The therapy room may feel different than other contexts in your life, so your level of comfort is essential. In the first session or two, you’ll likely get a gut sense… How do you feel as you’re sitting in the room with them? Do you trust them? Do they seem to care? Are they relatable? Personable? Warm?

3.  Familiar with your world, or eager to learn about it
You want a therapist who generally knows (or can learn) your world… what your work actually entails. The mental processes that it requires. The personality characteristics of those you work with. The culture and work environment at a small startup, a tech giant, and everything in between.

4.  Patient as you process
Going through lines and lines of code to find the bug can take time. Coming to understand a problem before you start to write the code also takes time. Our emotional landscape can be just as complex, but hazier and less quantifiable than code. It makes sense that anyone would need a few moments to process this nebulous blob from a language we may not be fluent in. Regardless of context, many of us prefer to gather our thoughts before speaking. The therapist should allow for pauses to digest what’s been said.

5.  Comfortable with structure
The therapist should be comfortable with structure. It doesn’t have to be rigid and regimented, but an unfocused, meandering journey just won’t feel right. You should get a clear sense of what to expect from therapy. Therapist and client should agree on goals for therapy, and be able to track progress toward those goals.

6.  Proficient in the language of emotions
While your work product has to be purely logical, some workplace cultures go too far in emphasizing logic. To adapt, many find themselves developing an emotionless and impersonal work persona that can easily bleed into other settings in your life. As a human, emotions are inescapable, and they impact your work, your relationships, your free time, even your sleep. Learning to value and express these emotions will actually reduce the amount that they distract you. Your therapist should be capable of helping you identify and understand what you’re feeling.

7.  Proficient in relationship skills
Does most of your workplace communication occur over email or Slack? Have ticketing systems, shared code repositories, pull requests and collaborative document writing replaced face-to-face contact with your colleagues? Where coworkers email each other across the cubicle wall, something is lost. Not only does promote a feeling of mutual isolation, but it can lead to unnecessary avoidance of personal contact. Face-to-face interactions may seem messy, but they’re ultimately more efficient and valuable. In any relationship (work or otherwise) it’s important to clarify what you mean, to correct misunderstandings, to have healthy conflict where necessary. This grows the relationship, promoting contentment. Your therapist should be proficient in these vital relationship skills, ready to impart them to you.

8.  Succinct and memorable
In my practice, I often hear “tell me what to do.” We all have challenging interactions at work, with significant others, with our parents, etc. Someone’s upset, and they’re expecting a response. In these moments, it’s incredibly helpful to recall something from therapy that’s concrete and actionable. The therapist should be able to get to the point, reducing things to a usable language, giving you memorable tools to apply in real life.

You help the world connect. You bring joy to the masses with gadgets and games, and tools with cool names. You help children learn, businesses prosper, patients heal. I salute you, and as you venture along the path of personal growth, I wish you the very best of luck.

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Andrew Kushnick is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist in San Francisco’s Financial District. As a former practicing attorney, Andrew brings conflict resolution skills and an analytical sense to the therapy room, while offering a gentle and compassionate perspective.