"Chariot of Fire," by Reggie McGee, inspires the theme of the list. Reggie is an artist in residence at Birch Tree Communities. For more information about the art of Birch Tree, visit the website here.

Heroicagencies Listserv

We invite you to join the heroicagencies listserv, a 24-hour, email-based list consisting of an international group of over 800 (and growing) therapists, counselors, case managers, supervisors, students, and agency managers interested in learning more about and implementing client-directed, outcome-informed (CDOI) work. What is CDOI? Read more...

History

The list started in 2001, when Jacqueline Sparks and Barry Duncan brainstormed ways to create a worldwide network that could support the mission of transforming mental health business-as-usual. Beginning with a handful of early pioneers, the list has grown and now stretches into all parts of the world. Members have 24/7 access to helpful ideas about how to get started with CDOI, how to introduce CDOI into different settings, and how to use the latest support tools and research. It has always been Jacqueline and Barry’s belief that there is strength in numbers. List members support each other and learn from each other; a network can create change that would be impossible for an individual alone.

Vision

We envision a future where clients’ heroic stories overshadow descriptions of illness and client-directed partnerships revolutionize "mental health" as we know it.

Mission

The mission of this list is to provide a forum of support for those who are attempting to challenge mental health business-as-usual by privileging clients’ resources, ideas, values, and theories, as well as their perceptions of the process and outcome of therapy. This list fosters a community of heroic agencies that are on a quest to replace the diminishing practices of the medical model with practices guided by client-rated outcomes. We see outcome-informed work as a way to undermine mental health status quo and as a vehicle for real change.

Functions

• Provide support to colleagues around the world who are in various stages of implementing CDOI work.
• Provide support for clinicians and agencies seeking to collect and utilize data using Partners for Change Outcome Management System.
• Provide guided discussions about CDOI to help people learn at their own pace.

Testimonial

Hear how one practitioner uses the ListServ for supervision:

A word about the word "Heroic:" Barry first coined the word "heroic" as a metaphor in appreciation of forty years of research demonstrating that the client accounts for most of the variance of change. The metaphor sought to challenge the epic story of the heroic therapist high atop a white stallion of expert status and theoretical purity brandishing a sword of evidenced based practice charging to rescue the hapless client from the psychic or biochemical dragons. Eventually the metaphor expanded to include "heroic agencies." Heroic agencies are those that are connected to the expertise or heroism of our clients. When our services are provided without intimate connection to those receiving them, when cases are presented without clients’ voices, when the DSM is read without eye contact with the person being described, the client is depersonalized-becomes a cardboard cutout-and is only the object of our professional whims. With this metaphor, we seek to inspire front line workers and administrators to begin a quest to influence their agencies to enter full partnerships with clients at every level in every way-to change the very culture of mental health, to make the client no longer the missing link, but rather a valued partner in not only the way services are delivered, but how they are funded as well. Agencies that take on this quest are indeed courageous and making a bold contribution-absolutely heroic-in the face of much opposition and obstacle.

If you have any problem with this form click here to send an email to the list moderator, Jaqueline Sparks, Ph.D.