Motivational Interviewing Role Play: What It Actually Sounds Like in Real Sessions

What does Motivational Interviewing actually sound like in a real conversation?

In this episode of MI For Change, Dr. Monica Gilbert walks you through a live role play using motivational interviewing techniques—followed by a step-by-step breakdown of exactly what was done and why it works.

This is where theory meets practice.

In this episode, you’ll learn:

• How to create psychological safety at the start of a conversation
• The power of open-ended questions to reduce defensiveness
• How to use simple, complex, and double-sided reflections effectively
• How to navigate resistance without confrontation
• What change talk actually sounds like in real time
• How to shift from defensiveness → collaboration → openness

You’ll hear how a resistant therapist moves from:

“I don’t need to be here…”
➡️ to
“Maybe this is something I could look at.”

This episode is a must-listen for therapists, BCBAs, psychologists, leaders, and anyone who wants to improve real-life conversations—not just understand theory.

Because knowing MI is one thing…
But hearing it in action changes everything.

Learn more about Motivational Interviewing and explore on-demand courses at www.drmonicagilbert.com

Join the MI Academy for practical training and resources — and enjoy an exclusive 15% off with code MIFORCHANGE at checkout.

📲 Connect with me on Instagram: @drmonicagilbert

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:06

Hello everyone, and welcome back for another episode of MI for Change, where we talk about the conversations that actually move people forward using motivational interviewing in real life, real sessions, and real leadership. And today I have something very special for you guys. I have a role play. A lot of you have been asking about hey, what does this look like in real life? So today I have our student analyst from Crystal Minds You Beginning who volunteered. Hi, Melissa. Hello. So I have your consent to do this role play with you, right? Yes. All right, perfect. So Melissa and I are going to do a consultation role play. She is going to play a therapist that was referred to come to me. And I'm going to be asking her a couple of questions using motivational interviewing strategies. At the end of our short conversation, we'll go over some of the strategies that I use. For those of you who are at the other side of this that you're listening in or even looking at this uh podcast, you can take notes and then you can match it with what I will be going over. All right, so let's start. Hello, Melissa. Thank you for coming. Hello. I want our communication to be transparent and I want you to feel safe being honest with me. Do you feel comfortable communicating openly about what's going on? So I can be honest? Absolutely.

SPEAKER_02 1:35

What would you like to share with me? Honestly, I don't think I should even be here. There's no reason for us to be having this meeting if you want me to be completely honest. That's all right. Then why are you here? Because the team thought it would be a good idea for me to come and speak with someone about some things that are going on in my interactions with clients.

SPEAKER_01 1:57

Okay, so there have been some concerns raised about your sessions and your interactions with clients. Well, that's what they're saying. I guess it's not to the company standards. And you're coming to see me because you want to continue working at this company, but maybe you're not quite sure what this conversation is supposed to do or how it can help. I just don't see anything wrong with what I'm doing. From your perspective, the way you're working with clients seems appropriate. It seems okay. And it's confusing to hear that others think something needs to change. Exactly. I've been doing this for years. The clients seem fine to me. You've had experience doing this work, and it sounds like you feel confident in your approach. Right. Sometimes I feel like people just overanalyze things. Overanalyze things. Well, it can feel frustrating when it seems like people are picking apart something that you feel has been working. Yeah, that's pretty much it. At the same time, you did decide to come and have this conversation with me today. Well, yeah, I mean, I don't want there to be any problems at work either. On one hand, you feel like this approach or your approach is working. And on the other hand, you don't want ongoing concerns or problems with the team. Yeah, I guess that's fair. What do you think the team might be noticing that led them to suggest this meeting? I don't know. Maybe they think I'm being too direct with clients sometimes.

SPEAKER_02 3:31

They may be experiencing your style as being too direct. Maybe.

SPEAKER_01 3:37

What do you make of that?

SPEAKER_02 3:39

I mean, if that's really affecting things, I guess it's something I could look at.

SPEAKER_01 3:43

You'd be willing to explore if it's actually impacting your work with your clients and the team. Yeah, I guess I could look at it. That sounds like a good place for us to start together. So let's talk about it a little bit more. All right. Thank you so much, Melissa, for doing this role play with me. So in the beginning of the conversation, we try to, well, I try to establish some psychological safety. So this is anchored in the spirit of motivational interviewing. So when we think about following your pace, the partnership, the acceptance, and just really having a conversation. Um, one example of this is when I said, I want our communication to be transparent and I want you to feel safe. I want you to feel safe in being honest. And then I followed up with a question. I said, Do you feel comfortable communicating openly about this? And that's such a powerful way to start the conversation. So the techniques used here is creating that psychological safety, encouraging that autonomy since I asked that question at the end, and then inviting honesty. So that looks like a collaborative and acceptanceful approach. Uh, the next strategy that I also use were the open-ended questions. So remember, we use open-ended questions in order to get more elaboration in order to build that initial report with the client or with the therapist. So here we're using the open-ended questions to invite. And one some of the open-ended questions that I asked was, what would you like to share with me? So I left it on her end. Even though I'm the she was referred to me to have this conversation, I wanted to see what she wanted to share. The other question that I thought was really powerful is when she said, Well, you know, I was sent here to do this. And and, you know, to be honest with you, I don't really know why. And then I asked her, and and this open-ended question also was used to evoke. So I wanted to evoke that information from her. Obviously, I know why she's coming in. I already know she knows, but I wanted to come from her. So I asked, Why are you here? So, why are you here? So I wanted to hear from her sense and her point of view. Another open-ended question was what do you think the team might be noticing that led them to suggest this meeting? So, what are some concerns that the team is noticing and what do you make of it? So, again, these are very powerful questions, open-ended questions, because they're used to evoke the information from the person. And I want her to come up with her own reasons for attending this meeting, since that is going to encourage ownership of the conversation, is going to avoid blaming language. And it really begins with evoking that intrinsic motivation from that other person. The flip side, or how we usually see it, is we start opening up the conversation with something like, well, the team has said or has stated that they have some concerns about your behavior, and then we go on and talk about it, right? So that would be the opposite approach. Another uh principle of MI that I also use were simple reflections. So she mentioned some things that I wanted to highlight it. Now we have to keep in mind, and I didn't do this in this role play because this is a more MI advanced technique, that when we are putting our attention on certain words, they will grow. So whatever we put our attention on, if we're putting our attention on sustained talk, she's going to engage in more sustained phrases, sustained talk phrases. But when we put our attention on the change talk, she will then speak about more change talk statements. So here, when I use the simple reflections, it was really in a way to understand and reduce that defensiveness. Obviously, she is being recommended to me because of something quote unquote bad that has been going on. So I want to reduce that defensiveness. I want the walls to come down so that she can be honest and we can have really a collaborative conversation. So the therapist said something like, I just don't see anything wrong with what I'm doing. And then I reflected back and I said, From your perspective, the way you're working with your clients seems appropriate. So again, if we are going to, if we're using reflections to soften sustained talk or to get more change talk, we may not reflect this statement. But in this part of our conversation, and because it was the first conversation, I wanted to just reflect on what she was saying. A complex reflection that I use here, and complex reflections, a quick reminder, these are reflections that go beyond repeating the words. So I said something like, it can feel frustrating when it seems like people are picking apart something that you feel has been working. So that was one of the um complex reflections. I also use a double side reflection. And remember, the double side reflection is used to address ambivalence. So you want to put both hands of the coin. So I said something like, on one hand, you feel like your approach is working. And on the other hand, you don't want ongoing concerns or problems with the team. And you want to end it with that evocation towards that change talk. So on one part of it, I highlighted that she feels like her approach is working. And on the other hand, she also wants to have a good relationship and doesn't want any concerns or problems with the team. So in this, I unite them and I tell her, hey, these can you can feel both things at the same time. And that allows her to get out of that defensive note mode and go into more of this ambivalence, which will then get her closer to that change. I also did some eliciting change talk. So what do you make of that? Which led her to say something like, Well, I guess it's something I could look at. Again, these are all statements of change talk and also rolling with resistance. So I didn't confront or argue with her. I said, that's all right. Then why are you here? And this again was accepting her resistance, avoiding the confrontation, and redirecting the conversation towards motivation. How did you feel, Melissa, with the conversation we were having?

SPEAKER_02 10:15

I feel like like the role of the um the supervisor was like really like trying to get them to open up in a way that like made them want to like listen to you. Like, and it was like more like, okay, I'm gonna be open to like your idea or like how else I should be like working.

SPEAKER_01 10:34

Yeah. So you're saying that you felt more comfortable. It was more of a collaboration. It wasn't really like, oh gosh, I'm in trouble. I'm and you know, that that kind of like anxiety that gets built up from it. And then towards the end of the conversation, it's not like she was like, Yeah, I know that I'm doing horrible and I need to change. It's not like that was a change talk, which is what we wanted, but it wasn't what we got. But at least she was willing to explore the impact of this with her clients, right? So, so she said, um, she says something like, You'd be willing, well, no, that was me. I said, You'd be willing to explore if it's actually impacting your clients. And she said um that yes. And then I mentioned, well, that's a good place to start and work on this together. So, again, an invitation towards having a more collaborative conversation about this topic. So this is a role play. Um, obviously, it was a bit scripted, but and and conversations are going to be different. But if you again start off with a spirit of motivational interviewing, which is really having that partnership with that other person and not coming in as a hierarchy, asking more open-ended questions and closed-ended questions, um, realizing that at the end of the day, the supervise you will change if they want to change and not really because you are making them change, and always trying to align to the values. Her values is that she wants to do good with her clients. Um, she's open to changing if that means that it's going to help her with the clients. And she also wants to stay in the company. On the company side of it, I want the same exact things. So it's just aligning those values together and then, you know, having this collaborative conversation so we can make it work. I hope that you guys um found value in this. Thank you so much, Melissa, for helping me with this role play.

SPEAKER_00 12:22

And hopefully, we can do many more.

SPEAKER_01 12:32

Thank you for joining me on today's episode of MI for Change. If you're ready to keep growing your motivational interviewing skills, I'd love to invite you to explore my MI Academy, where you'll find a full library of on demand courses designed to help you put MI into practice with confidence. You can learn more at www.drmonicagilbert.com. Until next time.