About
I have organised this professional biography into stages of my life, linked to where I was working. Each stage begins with the new ideas that I developed at the time or the innovations I was responsible for creating.
Use the sidebar on the left to jump between sections. Click Read More on any idea or experience block to see the full text.
Idea 1
In all psychological, therapeutic work, the most important part is the unconscious communication between patient and clinician. These processes have been described as transference, counter-transference, projective identification and so on. My discovery is that the…
In all psychological, therapeutic work, the most important part is the unconscious communication between patient and clinician.
These processes have been described as transference, counter-transference, projective identification and so on. My discovery is that the general case of this unconscious to unconscious communication always challenges
the boundaries set up at the start of the therapeutic engagement. Thus the clinician usually only realises that there has been a pressure to cross a boundary because it has actually happened. This is often the signal for the clinician to make sense of the event and turn it into a symbol for something that can be spoken about to the client/patient. Thus something unconscious is made conscious.This realisation led me to develop a model for therapeutic work that is based in an ethical approach that is different to the simple ‘right and wrong’ assumptions of current complaints procedures.
In other words, there is a direct link between this conception of therapeutic work and a principle that is build into my model for the way an organisation must function: The Healthy Organisation Model.
You can read more about Boundaries and the Healthy Organisation Model by clicking on the buttons below
Idea 2
The containment provided by a secure building is artificial and the only security it offers is for the public, not the young person Security for the young person derives from that sense of containment in…
This led to the concept of a secure therapeutic environment in which walls were replaced by relationships. And it worked.
Idea 3
The learning of the student is the responsibility of the teacher, not the learner. The best teachers prepare their lesson and then locate themselves alongside the students during the delivery so that they can understand…
The learning of the student is the responsibility of the teacher, not the learner.
The best teachers prepare their lesson and then locate themselves alongside the students during the delivery so that they can understand how the student is engaging with and understanding the material.
Idea 4
Healthy organisations pass authority (to make decisions) downwards and receive anxiety upwards in the knowledge that all work has an unconscious impact on the worker that manifests as anxiety but can be turned into information…
Healthy organisations pass authority (to make decisions) downwards and receive anxiety upwards in the knowledge that all work has an unconscious impact on the worker that manifests as anxiety but can be turned into information through the process of a benign enquiry.
This works
because:
Idea 5
Following on from the case of Mary Bell, a child who killed other children (ref) an inspired Social Services Inspectorate came to the view that there are likely to be a significant number of children who commit violent crimes but might benefit from a therapeutic regime which would be highly preferable to being committed to…
Following on from the case of Mary Bell, a child who killed other children (ref) an inspired Social Services Inspectorate came to the view that there are likely to be a significant number of children who commit violent crimes but might benefit from a therapeutic regime which would be highly preferable to being committed to the prison system where the recidivism rate was known to be very high. They purchased a site in Brentwood, Essex which had been designed as an approved school, and made it more secure.
Then it was handed over to a group of professionals from Teaching, nursing and residential social work, all of whom were at ‘charge nurse’ level.
Idea 6
Often the different jobs of the different members of staff, although clear in terms of job description, aren’t lodged in a shared conception of the structure that links everyone to the main task.
Innovation 2
This is my version of the ideas I was taught during my training a the Tavistock, especially influenced by Elliott Jaques, Isabel Menzies Lyth, Eric Miller and the founders of the ‘Tavistock Consultancy approach, based…
This is my version of the ideas I was taught during my training a the Tavistock, especially influenced by Elliott Jaques, Isabel Menzies Lyth, Eric Miller and the founders of the ‘Tavistock Consultancy approach, based in a combination of psychoanalytic and systems theories. It developed from my lived experience of the work and my discovery of the need always to start an understanding of anything at the beginning (see under the ‘Expert Witness’ section). You will find a paper about this model here x and a lecture here x
Innovation 3
A combination of training and consultation that can be delivered in different forms, although the best is through a series of 10 weekly meetings, each divided into two sections by a break of a minimum…
A combination of training and consultation that can be delivered in different forms, although the best is through a series of 10 weekly meetings, each divided into two sections by a break of a minimum of 20 minutes. The section before the break is a lecture
As a result of very helpful advice from two senior colleagues, Kabir Padamsee (Consultant Psychiatrist) and the Consultant Clinical Psychologist Tony Collins, I applied for and was accepted on the Advanced Course in Consultancy and Training in Mental Health (Tavistock Clinic) (1981-1983). It was this experience that taught me first about projective identification as I…
As a result of very helpful advice from two senior colleagues, Kabir Padamsee (Consultant Psychiatrist) and the Consultant Clinical Psychologist Tony Collins, I applied for and was accepted on the Advanced Course in Consultancy and Training in Mental Health (Tavistock Clinic) (1981-1983). It was this experience that taught me first about projective identification as I described in my book.
My first attempt at consultation led me to discover a very important principle that I have applied ever since: to work you need authority. This is provided through some sort of contract but essentially it requires the backing of the person who will decide about buying your services. This led to a protocol that I developed later at the Tavistock Clinic, which is always to seek to meet with the ultimate boss and explain that the consequences of a consultation will be a changed attitude on behalf of those receiving the consultation which management will need to understand. Because of this, our advice would be that they should be the first to receive the consultation and only after that should it be addressed towards the original applicants.
Although I found the training at the Tavi very stimulating and wonderfully helpful, over the years I have found myself developing other ideas about both the scientific basis for organisational consultation and the means of delivery. I shall be writing about these differences on other pages of this website later. This section is supposed to be about innovations.
It wasn’t long before I realised that many of the staff of organisations to which I consulted could not really use the consultation. It seemed clear to me that this was because there was no shared idea of what makes a human being and particularly how the conscious mind of human beings is created. I discovered that I was spending more time at the beginning of consultations teaching the clients about a psychoanalytic way to understand human beings, so it occurred to me that a more useful intervention might be to build in a teaching part into a consultation.
I developed a model for combining teaching and consultation.
of the change from being in the role of the tutor to being in the role of consultant for the second part of any consultation event. In other words what I was offering was an intervention, usually weekly, usually lasting 10 weeks, divided into 2 sessions on each occasion; the first being the teaching, the second an open group discussion that had no agenda and allowed me to understand what might be going on in the team or organisation to whom I was consulting.
I called this “what makes the work so difficult?” And began to use it in almost all of the work that I was doing which was essentially care work provided in a range of environments. Meanwhile I had started training to be a psychoanalyst with the British psychoanalytical Society and one of my fellow students, Marilyn Lawrence, was interested in my model for consultation and thought that it might be possible to set something up in the adult Department of the Tavistock clinic.
Idea 1
In all psychological, therapeutic work, the most important part is the unconscious communication between patient and clinician. These processes have been described as transference, counter-transference, projective identification and so on. My discovery is that the general…
In all psychological, therapeutic work, the most important part is the unconscious communication between patient and clinician.
the boundaries set up at the start of the therapeutic engagement. Thus the clinician usually only realises that there has been a pressure to cross a boundary because it has actually happened. This is often the signal for the clinician to make sense of the event and turn it into a symbol for something that can be spoken about to the client/patient. Thus something unconscious is made conscious.This realisation led me to develop a model for therapeutic work that is based in an ethical approach that is different to the simple ‘right and wrong’ assumptions of current complaints procedures.
In other words, there is a direct link between this conception of therapeutic work and a principle that is build into my model for the way an organisation must function: The Healthy Organisation Model.
You can read more about Boundaries and the Healthy Organisation Model by clicking on the buttons below
Idea 2
The containment provided by a secure building is artificial and the only security it offers is for the public, not the young person Security for the young person derives from that sense of containment in…
This led to the concept of a secure therapeutic environment in which walls were replaced by relationships. And it worked.
Idea 3
The learning of the student is the responsibility of the teacher, not the learner. The best teachers prepare their lesson and then locate themselves alongside the students during the delivery so that they can understand…
The learning of the student is the responsibility of the teacher, not the learner.
The best teachers prepare their lesson and then locate themselves alongside the students during the delivery so that they can understand how the student is engaging with and understanding the material.
Idea 4
Healthy organisations pass authority (to make decisions) downwards and receive anxiety upwards in the knowledge that all work has an unconscious impact on the worker that manifests as anxiety but can be turned into information…
Healthy organisations pass authority (to make decisions) downwards and receive anxiety upwards in the knowledge that all work has an unconscious impact on the worker that manifests as anxiety but can be turned into information through the process of a benign enquiry.
This works
because:
Idea 5
Innovation 1
The security that initially came from the buildings and locked doors became a dynamic sense of security based upon staff offering and young people gradually accepting a sensitive, emotionally-based relationship informed by psychoanalytic understanding of…
The security that initially came from the buildings and locked doors became a dynamic sense of security based upon staff offering and young people gradually accepting a sensitive, emotionally-based relationship informed by psychoanalytic understanding of the conscious and unconscious process that are constantly at play both between and within people.
This was based upon the staff group holding and sharing a deep understanding of all the ideas described above. For example, once you understand how important boundaries are, you feel confident about taking very seriously the smallest assault on them; not to seek to punish the young person but to seek to understand what is really going on at a deeper level.
At the start of the ‘experiment’, violent confrontation was common place at the end it was very rare.
Following on from the case of Mary Bell, a child who killed other children (ref) an inspired Social Services Inspectorate came to the view that there are likely to be a significant number of children who commit violent crimes but might benefit from a therapeutic regime which would be highly preferable to being committed to…
Following on from the case of Mary Bell, a child who killed other children (ref) an inspired Social Services Inspectorate came to the view that there are likely to be a significant number of children who commit violent crimes but might benefit from a therapeutic regime which would be highly preferable to being committed to the prison system where the recidivism rate was known to be very high. They purchased a site in Brentwood, Essex which had been designed as an approved school, and made it more secure.
Then it was handed over to a group of professionals from Teaching, nursing and residential social work, all of whom were at ‘charge nurse’ level.
A brief but formative period working within a voluntary sector organisation, where the tension between charitable mission and professional standards created fertile ground for thinking about institutional identity.
Assessment work in a local authority context highlighted how bureaucratic processes can either support or undermine the psychological understanding of families in difficulty.
Idea 1
Teaching psychoanalytic ideas requires more than transmission of knowledge. The teacher must contain the anxiety aroused by contact with unconscious material, modelling the stance that students must learn to adopt with their own patients.
Many years at the Tavistock provided the setting in which my clinical and organisational ideas were tested, taught, and refined. The institution itself became a case study in the tensions between tradition and innovation.Teaching, supervising, and consulting within this environment shaped my understanding of how psychoanalytic ideas travel between clinical rooms, classrooms, and boardrooms.
Many years at the Tavistock provided the setting in which my clinical and organisational ideas were tested, taught, and refined. The institution itself became a case study in the tensions between tradition and innovation.
Teaching, supervising, and consulting within this environment shaped my understanding of how psychoanalytic ideas travel between clinical rooms, classrooms, and boardrooms.
Idea 1
In all psychological, therapeutic work, the most important part is the unconscious communication between patient and clinician.
Idea 2
1. The containment provided by a secure building is artificial and the only security it offers is for the public, not the young person.
Idea 3
Teaching requires the capacity to hold anxiety while enabling others to discover their own thinking rather than simply absorbing received ideas.
Idea 4
Every organisation has a visible hierarchy of authority and an invisible hierarchy of anxiety. Understanding both is essential for effective leadership.
Innovation 1
A model of care built on relationships rather than walls, designed to enable development rather than simply contain risk.
Building a private practice and consultancy allowed me to bring together decades of clinical, teaching, and organisational experience. Philip Stokoe & Associates provides a setting in which ideas about the healthy organisation can be applied in practice.This period has been one of consolidation and public engagement — writing, lecturing, and developing the Healthy Organisation Model…
Building a private practice and consultancy allowed me to bring together decades of clinical, teaching, and organisational experience. Philip Stokoe & Associates provides a setting in which ideas about the healthy organisation can be applied in practice.
This period has been one of consolidation and public engagement — writing, lecturing, and developing the Healthy Organisation Model as a framework others can use.
A comprehensive list of published papers, books, and articles is being assembled for this section. Key publications include work on boundaries in psychoanalytic therapy, the Healthy Organisation Model, and the nature of unconscious beliefs.
Work continues on developing the Healthy Organisation Model, expanding the library of lectures and brief videos, and building connections between clinical practice, organisational consultancy, and public discourse.
Innovation 1
A framework for understanding and improving organisational health, drawing on psychoanalytic concepts of containment, boundaries, and the capacity to think under pressure.
Across a career spanning clinical work, teaching, organisational consultancy, and expert witness practice, the thread connecting all activities has been a commitment to understanding how the mind works — individually and collectively — and to creating settings in which that understanding can flourish.
