ABSTRACT
The use of teams in family therapy was one of the fundamental discoveries of the approach. Although teams were used before and co-therapy was common as a practice, it was the Milan school of family therapy that described them as an `indispensable tool' for family therapists. The original authors (Palazzoli et al. 1978) argued that the team structure allowed the therapist to enter the family's reality whilst relying on the team he or she was working with to escape becoming as `stuck' as the family. Further, the team structure, whether the family was interviewed by one or two colleagues, made concrete the view that in each system there would be many interpretations and many perspectives. It was the `job' of the team to represent these interpretations and perspectives.
