On-Demand CE Training
ODL 362: Building Confidence and Skill in Working with Challenging Clients
Please make sure to check with your own state board to ensure the transferability of CE credit for an asynchronous course. Some state boards may place restrictions regarding the modality of training required for ethics credits to be awarded. If this training indicates ethics credits are available, please verify that your state allows them to be earned through an on-demand course format.
6 CREDIT HOURS APPROVED FOR:
Social Workers
ASWB ACE – 6 Clinical CE Credits
New York State Education Department’s State Board for Social Work – 6 Contact Hours
Psychologists
APA – 6 CE Credits
Counselors
NBCC ACEP – 6 Contact Hours
New York State Education Department’s State Board for Mental Health Practitioners – 6 Contact Hours
Addiction Professionals
NAADAC – 6 Contact Hours
Nurses
California Board of Registered Nursing – 6 Contact Hours
New York State Education Department’s State Board for Mental Health Practitioners – 6 Contact Hours
Case Managers
CCMC – 6 Contact Hours
Created On: 10/14/25
Target Audience:
This course is targeted for social workers, psychologists, counselors, nurses and case managers.
Counseling Skill Groups:
4. Counseling Services
8. Legal, Ethical and Professional Development
Overview:
Clinicians cannot escape eventually working in challenging client situations or with challenging clients. Personality disorders, substance use, suicidality, and boundary issues can be common sources of stress and uncertainty for some clinicians. This workshop will introduce key factors that can make cases and clients challenging and introduce learners to strategies to manage themselves in the face of client resistance and other difficulties. Explore the use of Motivational Interviewing skills to “roll with resistance,” the power of validation and empathy, and how clinicians demonstrating mastery of their own internal experience with challenging clients is pivotal to building confidence and success. The reality of imposter syndrome will be shared to encourage learners to adopt more balanced viewpoints of their skills, contributions, and work.
Course Objectives:
By the end of the session, the participant will be able to:
- Explain behavioral patterns and core characteristics of challenging clients and identify two specific interventions to use with clients who are unresponsive, disengaged, emotionally labile, or easily angered.
- Appraise one’s own style of managing clients who are silent, manipulative, resistant, and demanding and identify two areas of clinical reflection and growth.
- Describe at least three common unhelpful clinical responses to challenging clients that are not person-centered.
- Evaluate and implement three strategies such as Motivational Interviewing and culturally-informed tenets that are useful in working with clients who have personality disorders, are suicidal, or have substance abuse issues.
- Identify at least two professional areas of countertransference and list one method of addressing countertransference with challenging clients.
- Discover new confidence by identifying two skills in managing imposter syndrome and appropriately handling challenging clients and situations.
Presenter:
Diane Bigler, LCSW, LSCSW, owner of Diane Bigler Therapy Services, Inc.
Diane Bigler is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker in Missouri and Kansas. She has over 20 years of experience in the social services field. Diane has held positions as a therapist (in-home and outpatient), private practice owner, trainer/facilitator, clinical supervisor, and professor of social work. She also has experience in corporate wellness training and coaching. Diane is most passionate about providing quality educational training to professionals. She enjoys spoiling her four dachshunds and anything 80s-related.