My name is Katie Vernoy and I’m a licensed therapist, coach, consultant, and speaker. I’ve navigated the same ups and downs that you have. I’ve run my own businesses, designed innovative programs, built and managed large, thriving teams, and stepped into leadership as a State Board member for my professional organization. I know how isolating it can feel as a leader and an entrepreneur. I know how hard it can be to weather seasonal fluctuations or changes in your market. I know that self-doubt or burnout can stop you in your tracks. And I also know how amazing it is to be able to pursue your life’s mission and be your own boss.
Who I Work With
Being a business owner is hard. Especially when you’re obsessed with making the world a better place.
You know who you are. You’ve had success and know you should be grateful. But you’re exhausted and unfulfilled.
Your bigger dreams keep calling to you and pulling you away from peaceful complacency.
Your passion for life and the world keep flaring up and spurring you on toward this mission that won’t rest easy in your heart.
You are a visionary and a leader. Maybe those words don’t sit quite right for you… yet… but I’m not going to let you continue to deny it. You have a bigger purpose that you need to grow into. In order to do that, you have to fully embrace your own personal brand of leadership. Step into it and evolve – so you can make a bigger impact.
My Story
From an early age, I felt compelled to move into leadership whenever there was an opportunity. I was also called to help others, meaning I was an ambitious helper. That’s not an easy path. I’m sure you relate. Helpers are supposed to be humble and give out of the goodness of their hearts. I felt all of those things, but I also wanted to excel. I was willing to step up and manage others. I was willing to claim my successes and shout out loud when my teams won awards. I put my voice out there when others were not able to speak. I threw myself into the fray, time and again, because my passion and vision were bigger than I could contain.
There was success in that willingness to do things differently. My first management position was for a struggling mental health program that was getting ready to close its doors. I worked with my new team and we created innovative clinical programs that won awards. We were able to engage our clients and increase attendance (and clinician productivity), billing more than had ever been billed before. We became super-efficient, adding administrative team members and putting systems in place that streamlined a complex bureaucratic process. I loved managing this team, leading them to success and increased work satisfaction while preserving services in a community that really needed them.
As I continued my journey in management, I learned how differently each team must be run. I became well-versed on the hiring process, learning the unique challenges of managing helping professionals. I trained countless service providers, supervisors, and managers, providing mentorship and guidance at every career stage. I moved into the role of director, managing a large team and a multimillion dollar budget.
And then I burned out.
I knew I needed something different, but found that I would get tired just reading the job descriptions in employment ads. I was still called to help and lead others, but I needed to figure out what that meant.
I began working for myself and have now crafted a career that I truly love. I consult with professionals who are called to help others, providing strategy, accountability, and practical support for them to succeed. I maintain a private practice, providing therapy to those who have complex pasts and know they are capable of so much more. I speak on Embracing Leadership and overcoming Sacrificial Helping Syndrome (that pesky tendency many of us have – to give more than we have). I have a podcast, The Modern Therapist’s Survival Guide, and have co-founded a movement to reimagine therapy, providing workshops and conferences for therapists. I am a Board Member at Large for the California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists, which gives me a platform to support and advocate for California MFTs. I have found a way to step into my own leadership and I love supporting others to do the same.
Jessica Tappana, MSW, LCSW
When I reached out to begin coaching with Katie, I had two businesses that I loved and I knew were related. But it felt like I was struggling to see the “big picture.” I also really struggled to see myself as a leader and to own that leadership role. I knew I needed help to step back and find the bigger picture, figure out how all of the pieces of my life fit together professionally and create a clear vision for confidently moving forward.
Since working with Katie, I’ve begun to own my role as a leader. We completely revamped my hiring process, and beyond that, I got the practical help I needed to interact more effectively with my team. Then, Katie helped me step back and see the big picture. She helped me define my mission as a mental health professional and identify how each of my businesses supports that larger mission. I’m finding it easier to make business decisions now that I’m really clear on my vision and I feel good about making choices that fit my personal values even if they’re a little different than what other business owners might do.
Katie is encouraging, empathetic and a problem solver. She seeks first to clearly understand your problem and then helps you solve those problems. She knows systems that have worked for other therapist business owners, but she doesn’t give them to you in a cookie cutter way. Instead, she helps you figure out exactly what works for your business. It truly feels like she’s invested in your success.
I feel like the sky’s the limit now, but I don’t feel the pressure to just move on the next big thing only because it’s expected. Instead, I am looking at moving forward in a really purposeful way that supports my bigger vision. I’m excited to keep working with Katie and more clearly define those next steps.
Katie is amazing. I wasn’t sure what to expect when I first decided to invest in coaching with her, but it’s been 100% worth it.
Megan Costello, LMFT
I hired a coach to help me reprioritize and coach me through making changes in my practice that put me back in charge. In my email to Katie I told her I felt like I was strapped to a rocket with my business and I wanted off! I think I was just feeling so totally exhausted and cynical. I started dreading my phone dinging because I knew it would be a client. I found myself inwardly rolling my eyes at my client’s pain. And I was short tempered at home – it was impacting my marriage. I missed my friends who I was never seeing. And I think I realized that even though I upgraded in terms of income when I left my agency job, I continued to work 50 hours a week. And that lifestyle of working so many hours was a big part of the problem. It’s just not healthy in our field to work like that. Some of the changes we made were to my rate, my cancellation policies, my intake and on boarding process, how I collected fees and how I handle admin tasks. It wasn’t easy. I had to do mindset work and make changes that, at first, felt really scary. It helped me to have someone who held me accountable but also reassured me in my anxiety. I don’t want to be an infomercial for Katie but after our work together I took 2 international vacations, saw my revenue increase 10% over the year and reduced my overall number of sessions.
Dana Vince at Healing Hearts Counseling Knoxville, Tennessee
What was once a solo practice grew into a thriving group practice and I needed to work on putting more efficient processes in place and make sure my business is running the best that it could be. Katie reassured me that I already had strong systems in place, she gave me suggestions of where I could be doing things better and how to clean things up and make them run more productively and efficiently. Katie was very warm and easy to talk to while at the same time knowledgeable and able to provide great tools and suggestions. I am very grateful for Katie’s kindness, reassurance, and business planning.
Lisa Bowker
I greatly appreciated your insights and support in creating a vision for the next steps in my private practice. I love the action plan you sent! I left our session feeling focused and excited about digging into the next phase of my practice. Best of all, I felt more lighthearted.
Shira Myrow
I sought out Katie’s services to help me focus my networking and marketing efforts, and integrate several arenas I had been working in—into a coherent professional narrative.
I feel like my efforts have gathered momentum and focus and am much more excited about developing my career. Areas that I had initially felt
resistance to (like networking for example) no longer have the charge they used to.
Katie is highly intelligent, warm, approachable, and collaborative. She is also incredibly insightful and has a unique way of synthesizing complex ideas into clear and actionable steps.
Katie has invited me to think a lot more expansively about my career. I am exploring developing a book, more public speaking work and moving into video content.
Kirstee Frazier
I originally sought out Katie through Linkedin due to her background in both counseling and recruitment. I was unhappy in my current career but couldn’t pinpoint where I wanted to go from there. I originally reached out to gain more info on her own path and career as I was interested in a similar path. After speaking with Katie, I was able to pinpoint what about my current job was making me unhappy. Katie had me answer a few questions prior to our appointment, which allowed her to dig deeper during our conversation. She was able to open my eyes more to what I wanted in a career while also assuring me that my needs/wants were practical. She has the perfect mix of counseling background with business knowledge to provide great advice and, in my personal case, identify solutions to my career difficulties. With Katie’s advice in mind, I went about searching for a new job that fit what I was looking for, which I was able to clarify in our meeting. I ended up landing a job that is a perfect fit and I’m very grateful for all of Katie’s help. I’m very appreciate of the time that Katie took in helping me, especially since my problem was more personal/career related than business. She was very receptive to me reaching out and I’m thankful that I was able to talk to her when I did.
Hope Goss, LMFT
Katie is wonderful. I highly recommend her. She has the ability to assist me in focusing my attention on the essential things that I need to do to enable my practice and myself to flourish. She is extremely capable, and a warm and supportive person. If you are thinking about engaging her services, do yourself a favor and go ahead. You won’t regret it.
Cori Rosenthal
I was fortunate enough to find Katie immediately following passing my licensing exam. I wanted someone who could help me organize my time, hold me accountable and build my private practice. Katie is smart, knowledgeable, experienced and enjoyable to work with. I met my private practice goals for that first year and have the accountability and inspiration from my regular meetings with Katie to continue to grow.
Scott and Nina Sawyer
My husband and I met with Katie as we are in the process of growing our Counseling and Life Coaching practice. We were looking for affirmation that we were doing things right, and we wanted to see where we could improve regarding our brand, website, and vision. We immediately felt that Katie understood us and cared about our practice. She was able to help us to feel more confident in the direction and vision of our practice. She also gave us tailored and creative suggestions of how to improve our website, organizational systems, and maximize our time. After working together, we felt like we experienced immediate clarity on some big issues that were looming over our heads which helped us to move forward quickly and with confidence – allowing us to spend more time focusing on our clients and our family. We would recommend business coaching with Katie. She’s warm, knowledgeable, focused, and passionate about her work.
Janice G. Walters
Working with Katie gave me the purpose and peace of mind that I was lacking in my business. As my graphic design business grew, I realized that I needed help with the operations functions of my day – understanding my work flow, developing my work process and isolating areas for growth. Katie helped me identify and articulate the goals and strengths of my business, and was especially adept at finding solutions. Katie is an exceptional listener and a creative thinker, and knows precisely how to distill issues down to their essential importance. Working with Katie has given me the confidence and freedom to approach each day well-equipped to prioritize my tasks and to understand how I can be the most productive through myriad challenges. Katie’s follow-up materials and professionalism along with an ability to parse out details provide winning solutions every time.
Albert Knapp, Psy.D
I had a need to fill therapist positions and knew I did not have the time to yield the applicants. I wanted only the strongest applications brought to my attention. I was impressed that I had 8 candidates forwarded to me for review, which gave a good pool to invite for interview. I was then able to hire two highly qualified individuals! With the additional team members, AKA is able to service about 40 more children for therapy! I would say that Katie’s work was efficient and spot on; worth every penny!
Douglas Evans, Executive Director
Center for Health Sex
I recently hired Evolve to Thrive to assist me in planning my staffing needs and clarifying roles of my team members to help us move into our next phase of growth. I was extremely please with Ms. Vernoy’s professionalism, knowledge and thoroughness at every step of the way. Katie provided some much needed strategic thinking around the org chart and coming up with a way to help move me out of the day to day operations. This created a real shift in how I see things moving forward and I appreciate Katie’s clarity, as I look to replace my current duties and move on to new heights. During all of our meetings and phone calls, Katie was always on point, responsive, a great listener and also knew when to take control to move me towards my stated goals and needs. Evolve to Thrive also found ways to increase support and infrastructure without increasing costs by clarifying team member roles.
Thanks for all your help, ideas and documents! I really appreciate the high quality level of what you provided.
Rachel Cord, M.S., MFTI
Katie has been an invaluable part of me getting my footing as a mental health professional. Working with her has given me a whole new level of motivation, confidence, and understanding of building a brand and practice for myself in the community. I always look forward to our meetings, knowing that I will not only have a blast talking to her, but I’ll walk away with so many new positive ideas and goals for myself and my practice. I am so glad that I met Katie and have been able to supplement my clinical support from my supervisor with her vast expertise and support in the areas of marketing, networking, and business and career planning. I have definitely already seen positive outcomes just from 5 months of consulting with Katie. I highly recommend it for anyone looking to gain clarity and direction in their career!
Rachel Cord, M.S., MFTI
JB
Wealth Management Advisor
I have been in the finance industry for 8+ years. By nature, I am very analytical and goal-oriented. The problem with these attributes is that I spend entirely too much time analyzing my business to find areas where I could be generating more revenue and increasing my time management efficiency. About a year ago I came to a point in my career where I needed someone who could help lead me down a path of efficiency, as well as someone that I could actively brainstorm with. I retained Katie at the beginning of Q4 2013. I had two goals: 1. I wanted to generate an additional $10,000 per month in revenue during that quarter, and 2. I wanted to establish a repeatable system to drive new business development, while at the same time providing a more robust client experience. Right away Katie was able to help me transform my thoughts into actionable ideas and she made it clear at the onset that she would hold me accountable to ensure that my goals were met.
To say my goals for that quarter were met would be an understatement! I more than tripled my quarterly revenue goal, while at the same time increasing my business pipeline 50% and implementing repeatable, high touch, client experience. I have continued to retain Katie, and in almost a year since we started meeting on a monthly basis I have increased revenue 50% year over year. Her consultative, detailed approach has been a blessing for my business and I would recommend her to anyone who is looking to be more efficient and who wants to take their business to the next level.
Samantha Bossu, Founder & President, Decora
Katie Vernoy continues to be a pleasant surprise to me in the business coaching world. My company is in a niche industry and a regular coaching model doesn’t fit with our goals and systems. She has custom tailored her expertise and guidance to work with me on organizing, establishing and attaining our growth goals. For the past two years, I have been the sole employee, CEO, sales, marketing, etc. for my company and as I continued to grow and hire on more help it was difficult for me to transition out of the micro-managing mindset and into an ownership and delegation position. She not only provides input, but solid, tangable systems that are applicable to any size business. I highly recommend her to anyone looking for business consulting services.
Danielle Matthew, LMFT
The Empowerment Space
Katie is a treasure to work with. She is smart, hardworking, and thoughtful. When Katie takes on a project she puts her entire energy into it. She wants to help make others successful. I have been very lucky to work with Katie to have someone with such devotion and faith in what you do.
Jill Ruby-Wahba
Katie has been instrumental in helping me transition from working as a clinician in an agency into my private practice. She is energetic, motivating and creative, and at the same time, she’s patient, grounded and logical. Katie has been able to engage with my creative exploration process, and has exceptional skill in being able to pinpoint topics with sensitivity and purpose, which has helped me feel centered in defining my professional practice. Thanks!!
Lauren Spiglanin
Katie has been my business coach for four months, and I plan to continue working with her. I meet with Katie once a month for 1 hour each visit, and I work on projects/assignments between each meeting. Katie is an amazing coach! I highly recommend her services. Instead of telling me what to do, Katie listens and then expertly guides me to finding solutions to the challenges I’m facing with my business and personal effectiveness. With Katie’s guidance I’ve learned to work “on” my business and not “in” my business. She’s taught me valuable time management skills, and I am now able to focus most of my attention on business system development. Katie has helped me make important positive changes in my life over these past few months.
Lauren Spiglanin
Erika M.
Within two weeks of looking for jobs and interviewing, I was offered a position at the agency of my choice. I wanted to thank Katie Vernoy SO MUCH for all her help, insight, and attention. Our meetings together and her consultation packet were so incredibly helpful. I had never been so confident going into my interviews as I was this time around!
Gary Reeves, CEO
In just a few short meetings with myself and my office manager, I have gained huge insights in how to better communicate with him. His productivity and sales are up 200% because now I know what he needs to succeed. I strongly recommend any small “entrepreneur” led company to work with her for a month. The rewards are big.
Monica M. Willson
I was absolutely blown away by the great feedback that you gave me from our mock interview and your edits on my resume. It has been rare in my experience to receive useful critical feedback in a warm and engaging way. Eventually, I’d love to focus on learning to teach and instruct in the skillful and accessible way you do.
I’m so thankful for the time that you gave me. I know that what I was given will continue to inform how I present myself professionally.
It turns out that I was offered a position with the site I was interviewing with that same afternoon. I had to turn it down due to their inability to provide me with supervision hours, but I will keep in touch with them for future reference.
If it’s okay with you, I’d like to refer my friends and tell my Clinical Practicum Director at Fuller about your services.
Thanks again,
Z. Reedom
I wanted to give you an update. I have accepted a position as a Clinician with South Coast Community Services in Rancho Cucamonga! The company offers a great salary and benefits. Also, my new resume helped me to get invited to Didi Hirsch’s Talent Engagement Roundtable (a place where I had trouble getting into).
Thank you so much for helping me fine tune my resume. It has made a difference in my search for the perfect career opportunity. I am now receiving phone calls/emails from prospective employers; which has not happened in 2 years. I will definitely recommend your services to others.
Teddy, Therapist
Teddy, Therapist at BLVD Treatment Centers, Hollywood
I originally met Katie at a jobs fair where I found her command of knowledge about the mental health industry to be truly uncommon. I think there’s something to be said for working with a career consultant who is specific to the industry you’re interested in. I had previously met with a generic career counselor and that mostly involved many of my inquiries being met with “Let’s look it up together!” Over the course of a handful of sessions, Katie helped me refine my search, which led to the job I currently hold and love. I am infinitely grateful to Katie!