Solution Focused Therapy Techniques for the Hour

Cam is fictional. Outpatient hour. No current suicidal intent. You picked one row. You did not run all six. The longer miracle question sequence is the first row, not a seventh technique.

Then keep the client line and the task with the same technique.

It’s 2:50. Cam has described the coat and the kettle. You have six moves. You pick one.

Solution focused therapy techniques are those six moves: the miracle question, scaling, exceptions, coping questions, a compliment, and a between-session task. Say the script on the row you picked. Write their words. Assign only the observation they already named.

Adapt every line to the person in front of you, your formulation, and your protocol. A composite exchange is a rehearsal, not a recording of a client, and it does not replace supervision or your crisis procedure.

When to use solution focused therapy techniques

Solution focused interventions are the six rows, not a theory you recite before you speak. Pull one. If the row does not fit the last sentence, switch once. Do not work down the set because it is printed in that order.

Technique	Use it when	Stop when
Miracle question	They can stay with tomorrow morning, and you still need one sign a camera could catch	They pass, or a future picture lands as pressure
Scaling	You already have their sign, and you need a number they own	You are about to treat the number as a symptom score
Exceptions	You need a recent stretch when the problem was smaller or later	They say there is no such time, and a second ask would be an argument
Coping questions	A future picture would feel false, or the week is already too much for a wish	You are about to praise them out of the hard week
Compliments	They have already done one thing that fits what they want, and they have not told you to stop naming it	Risk is unasked, or the notice would erase the week
Between-session tasks	You have one observation, or one action they already said would help	You are about to invent a task they did not name

de Shazer, in a July 2002 note, wrote that technique is the foundation of doing SFBT, and that without techniques he would not know what to do. He also wrote that knowing the wording freed him to watch and listen, because he could not think and listen at the same time (de Shazer, July 2002). Rehearse the row before the hour. If you are still writing the sentence at 2:50, you will miss the pass, the flinch, or the limit.

The 2025 Solution Focused Brief Therapy Association treatment manual reports Franklin and colleagues’ 2024 finding that the most efficacious results were achieved when clinicians used techniques across categories, and did not use more than eight techniques (SFBTA treatment manual, 3rd ed., 2025). Treat that as the manual’s report of that finding, not as a reason to run this set as a package. One row is enough for the hour.

Miracle question

The miracle question row is the short script, not the full sequence. Use that page for the setup, the follow-ups, and the note line. Use this row when you need the move and the observation in the same breath.

The 2025 manual describes the sequence as an invitation to a detailed, client-generated description of what will be different when what they want is happening more often. It records three checks on a useful picture, from practice since the 1980s: the presence of desirable behaviors rather than the absence of problems; a beginning step rather than a final result; and a realistic description of what others will notice as well as what the client will notice. Cam’s “not a new morning, just the coat on the hook” meets the first two. If they add “my partner would see the coat still there,” that meets the third, and any limit (“do not ask them”) belongs in the note with the sign.

A feeling word fails the first check. “I’d feel lighter” is not a sign. Ask once what a camera would catch in the first ten minutes. If the second answer is still a feeling, stop. A third demand is an argument.

Do not paste the picture into the goal field. The picture was a question, not a contract. If you want a goal, that is a different conversation, and it belongs on a plan you build with them.

Scaling

Scaling, in the manual’s account, is a way to help someone express a complex impression as a number. You define the poles. In the common form after a future picture, 0 is when the problem was at its worst and 10 is the picture they just described. The number is theirs. You do not assign it, and you do not treat it as a PHQ-9, a GAD-7, or any other score you own.

Cam’s 5 is anchored to the coat and the kettle, not to a symptom list. The follow-up the manual illustrates is “What tells you that?” Clients often answer with a stretch that already happened. Write that stretch. Do not ask what a 10 would require unless they ask to stay with the number.

The manual also describes motivation and confidence scales, with 0 as none and 10 as almost anything, or every confidence. Those are different questions. Do not stack a confidence scale on top of the miracle scale in the same hour unless the first number has already done its job and they want to stay with numbers. A second scale is a switch, not a habit.

If they say “do not ask me for a 10,” stop. The limit is data. Write it.

Exceptions

The manual’s basic account of exceptions is plain: no problem happens all the time. Exceptions are times when the problem could have happened but did not, or was less severe, and those times can be used to build what they want. Later in the same manual, exceptions are also called past successes, and the useful ones are the ones tied to what they want different, not a random good hour.

Listen for the hint. The word “Tuesday” is often buried under “it never happens.” You repeat the stretch, you ask what was different in those ten minutes, and you connect it to the sign. You do not open a search for every better hour in the month.

If they say there is no such time, accept it. A second ask teaches them that “no” was the wrong answer. Switch to a coping question, or stay with this week. Do not explain why an exception would have helped.

Coping questions

The manual reserves coping conversations for a week that is already too much: a recent crisis, a significant loss, an overwhelming stretch in which they feel incompetent. You still acknowledge the loss. You also ask, in the wording the manual records: “With all that’s been going on in your life, what have you found that’s been useful, even a little bit?” The line on the row is that question, shortened for the hour. It is not a softer miracle question.

Cam’s kettle is the small thing. Your job is to keep it small. The manual then describes a coping scale, 0 as not coping at all and 10 as coping as well as they can imagine anyone coping in this situation, and a look at what would be different one or two numbers up. Use that scale only if they can stay with a number. If the number would feel like a grade on a bad week, skip it. The kettle is enough.

Do not turn the answer into praise. “You are so resilient” takes the kettle away from them and hands it back as your verdict. Name what they kept doing. Ask what you must not add. Then stop.

Compliments

Compliments, in the manual, started as the first part of a session-ending message: what the therapist thought the client was already doing that was good for them. The same manual names three kinds. A direct compliment is you stating something positive. An indirect compliment is a question that already assumes something positive, such as what another person would have noticed. A self-compliment is them stating something positive, which you can invite them to expand if they want to.

Cam refused the clap. That refusal tells you which kind you may use. A direct compliment that ignores “do not clap” is you performing warmth over their limit. Shrink it to a name: the kettle happened, you will not applaud it, you will not build a project on it. If they then name the limit again, the limit is the note.

Skip the move when risk is unasked. A person who says you would be better off without them is not waiting for a compliment. Ask the direct question your protocol requires. Regard, warmth, and a neat notice do not replace it.

The manual also says not every clinician takes a break to build an end-of-session message. Some fold the notice, the affirmation of what the person wants, and the suggestion into the hour itself. Either way, the notice has to fit what they already said. A compliment you imported from a different case is your hypothesis.

Between-session tasks

The manual describes two suggestions at the end of a session. An observational suggestion asks them to look for something in their life that is likely to help the progress they want. A behavioral suggestion asks them to do something, usually something they already said would be useful. Both are built from the hour, not from a menu you brought in.

The formula first session task, as the manual records it from the 1982 Milwaukee case, was an observation assignment: between this meeting and the next, notice what happens that you want to continue to have happen. The manual cites de Shazer (1985) as stating that 89 percent of those new clients reported at their second sessions that something worthwhile had happened between the two sessions, and nearly two-thirds said that things were better for them. Treat that as the manual’s citation of a clinic account, not as a result you can quote to a payer, and not as a reason to assign the task when they have already refused an observation.

Cam’s bus walk is the observational form. “Do not lengthen it” is the limit, and the limit ships with the task. If you assign a longer walk, you have left their frame. If you assign the coat after they told you not to add it, you have left it twice.

A behavioral task is rarer in this hour. Use it only when they have already named the action. “I could text my sister that I got on the bus” is theirs. “Text your sister every morning” is yours. Write the first. Do not upgrade it.

What to write after the hour

One sentence. The move you used. Their sign or their number. What you did not assign.

A usable line: “Scaling, client at 5. Anchors: coat on the hook until the kettle clicks, coat on before the kettle is filled. Holding it: filling the kettle. Did not assign a 10. Did not assign the coat.”

An unusable line: “Used solution focused therapy techniques, client engaged, will continue.” That sentence could sit on any chart. It will not help you next week.

Solution focused therapy techniques in the note are the named move plus their words. You do not need a theory paragraph. If a trainee is in the room, the same three lines are the supervision clip: the script you said, the limit they set, and whether you kept it.

Paste that sentence into the chart. The session note workflow is built for that paste, not for a transcript of the picture.

When the next hour needs a different move

SFBT techniques in the sense of a question you can say, with a follow-up and a note line, live on the solution focused therapy questions page. Use that set when you need the wording and you do not yet need a task. Use the rows above when the task is the point.

For prompts across opening, processing, and close, use the therapy questions guide. That library is how you choose a question form. These six moves are one family inside the hour, not a replacement for the rest of it.

If a course outline lists SFBT therapy techniques as hours, a certificate, and a fee, that outline will not put the script in your mouth. The row will. Rehearse the one you are likely to need. Leave the other five on the desk.

Download the question cards

You already have the six filled rows and the blank fields. Those solution focused therapy techniques are enough for the hour. The desk cards add a chooser and a one-line note stem on each move. Print the one you will use. Say the script. Write their words. Copy the stem. Do not run the file as a sequence, and do not send it home unless the hour produced one sign worth noticing.

References

• de Shazer, S. (2002, July). Question and response on technique. Solution Focused Brief Therapy Association. https://www.sfbta.org/techniques_q-a.pdf
• Solution Focused Brief Therapy Association Research Committee. (2025). Solution Focused Therapy Treatment Manual for Working with Individuals (3rd ed.). Solution Focused Brief Therapy Association. https://www.sfbta.org/Solution%20Focused%20Therapy%20Treatment%20Manual%20for%20Working%20with%20Individuals%20-3rd%20Edition-%20final.pdf