In our rapidly changing world, it is important for businesses of all types to be constantly adapting to their shifting environments. The events of the last year have made this clearer than ever before, as COVID-19 has forced businesses to fundamentally change how they operate and use technology.
In the realm of mental health work, this has mainly manifested in the move to telehealth instead of in-person counseling; however, it has also changed how counseling centers operate behind the scenes and interact with their clients. One of the newest members of the Training Institute’s Board of Trustees, Scott Cooper, is hoping to build on such changes to further bring TI into the modern age. By using lessons he’s learned through many years of working in the world of business, Mr. Cooper aims to improve the way the Institute uses technology to increase its effectiveness and impact on the community it serves.
Mr. Cooper has worked for decades in the business sector managing the digital presence of several large companies and believes TI can use many of the methods he has used to improve how it uses technology. “Many of the tactics are the same,” he stated. While the Training Institute may not be a large corporation aiming to maximize profits, like any good business it is trying to cater to its clients. To this end, Mr. Cooper added, “You deliver a great product, easily, to a targeted set of constituents. That’s the same thing we’re trying to do.”
Like with these other companies, Mr. Cooper knows that there is no single change to how TI uses technology that will accomplish these goals. “Is it the website or the social media, or the front office or the back office, or the way we deliver help to patients? It’s yes. It’s all of those things…They’re all just tools,” he stressed. “Ultimately what we’re trying to do is good for these patients and students.”
An important first step Mr. Cooper believes TI can take to help both of these groups is to centralize the Institute’s back-office management. In particular, he aims to streamline and modernize how TI schedules appointments with its therapists by moving it completely online. This change would benefit both therapists and clients by allowing clients to schedule and reschedule their appointments more straightforwardly, making it easier for therapists to maintain more even workloads throughout the week. Mr. Cooper notes that this type of scheduling is already commonplace for many people when it comes to anything from haircuts to dentist appointments. He believes this will make this move relatively seamless for all parties involved and make scheduling an easier process in the long run.
Another area that Mr. Cooper aims to prioritize is the ease in which the Training Institute can be found and interacted with online. Perhaps most important in this regard is optimizing how TI’s website can be found on search engines through the use of many tactics including the use of more targeted keywords. This is of particular importance not just for TI, but also for those it is trying to help. “A lot of the time when people need to find us, they’re in distress… They probably don’t go Google ‘The Training Institute for Mental Health,’” Mr. Cooper explained, “[You] should have as little friction in it as possible.”
Once people do find the Institute, they should also find its website to be as easy to navigate and interact with as possible. Although almost every institution has a well-functioning website in today’s day in age, “A really good website is different than an average website,” Mr. Cooper said. “It can change how clients view and interact with an institution. In the case of TI, this would only help to improve its public image and allow it to help its clients even more.” While refining TI’s website and back-office are two important first steps in improving how TI uses technology, Mr. Cooper emphasizes that these must be seen as just a part of a unified and ongoing process. The ultimate goal in these efforts is to make the lives of everyone involved with TI easier by using technology more effectively. “We do a good thing. We could do more of it. And maybe in doing more, reimagine what we could be,” he said.
In summation, if TI can improve how it uses technology and turn it into a strength, it could open up entirely new possibilities for its future that may now seem out of reach. Whether this be the possibility of adding additional locations, a larger geographic reach through a more effective use of telehealth, or any number of yet-to-be-seen possibilities, Mr. Cooper wants to position TI so that it is always ready to adapt to our rapidly changing world. In doing so, he hopes to help TI be more effective in doing the great work it has always done.