ABSTRACT
A requirement of the research project was that each treatment modality had to provide a protocol describing its approach. Eia Asen had already started this process during the pilot phase, and both authors then continued to struggle with several more versions. We found the writing of such a protocol difficult partly because of our distaste for pinning down our practice in what seemed a rigid and prescriptive format—psychotherapy is, after all, an art as well as a set of techniques—but also because the two of us orient ourselves at somewhat different ends of the systemic spectrum. Thus Elsa Jones could be described as being placed somewhere in the "post-Milan" group, strongly influenced by feminist and social constructionist ideas (Jones, 1993), whereas Eia Asen occupies a position that draws on a number of different approaches, from structural to strategic to post-Milan therapies (Asen, 1997). Thus the final working document stated that "each therapist is likely to use most of these techniques during the course of therapy with each couple" but some techniques were very unlikely to be used, at least in their pure form, by both therapists. Additionally, experienced therapists are unlikely to be 14working in a way that reflects a pure model, since, after a significant period as a practitioner, one's style becomes personal and influenced by a continuous learning process from colleagues, clients, and one's own life.
