Workshop and Skills Groups
How to use workshop groups for trainings, skills groups, coaching groups, and other group services that are not billed as psychotherapy.
Use a workshop group when several participants attend a group-format service that is not billed as psychotherapy.
Examples include:
- therapy business workshops
- relationship skills workshops
- parent education groups
- professional trainings
- coaching or wellness groups
- other group services where invoices and attendance matter, but diagnosis, treatment plans, insurance claims, and superbills do not apply by default
Workshop groups are separate from therapy groups and clinical consultation groups.
How workshop groups differ from therapy groups
A therapy group is for psychotherapy. It can use clinical workflows such as diagnoses, treatment plans, insurance-ready services, claims, and superbills when the practice supports those workflows.
A workshop group is for a group-format service that should still support scheduling, attendance, billing, payments, messages, and notes, but should not treat participants as clients receiving psychotherapy for that group.
Workshop members use the Group participant contact type. This keeps the workshop separate from clients receiving therapy, consultation clients, and clinical consultees.
Workshop groups hide psychotherapy-specific workflows by default:
- diagnoses
- treatment plans
- insurance claims
- superbills
- therapy intake prompts
Use invoices and receipts for workshop group billing.
If participants need an agreement, handout, reading material, registration form, payment authorization, or other information before the workshop, send it with Share Documents & Forms. Workshop participants do not need a psychotherapy intake packet by default.
How workshop groups differ from consultation groups
Clinical consultation groups are for professional consultation, such as clinicians receiving group consultation or supervision.
Workshop groups are broader. They can include clinicians, but the group does not have to be consultation. For example, a therapist-facing business workshop may include therapists in the audience without being a consultation group.
Use the name that matches the service:
- "Clinical consultation group" for professional consultation or supervision
- "Workshop / skills group" for trainings, skills groups, coaching groups, or other group services not billed as psychotherapy
Create a workshop group
To create one:
- Open Contacts.
- Choose New client or case.
- Select Workshop / skills group.
- Add the group participants.
- Name the group.
- Choose a default service if you want appointments to prefill it.
- Review and create the group.
After creation, manage participants, billing contacts, services, appointments, messages, and notes from the case.
Services
Workshop groups can use services in the Other category. This is the supported default service type for workshops, trainings, coaching groups, and skills groups that are not insurance-reimbursable.
If the work is professional consultation or supervision, use a clinical consultation group instead. If the work is psychotherapy, use a therapy group instead.
Scheduling and attendance
Schedule workshop group appointments from the calendar or from the group case.
Attendance is participant-level. One participant can miss a workshop session without canceling the whole group appointment.
Billing and payments
Workshop groups use invoices and receipts by default.
Depending on the arrangement, the group may use:
- one billing contact for the group
- separate billing contacts for each participant
- participant self-payment
- a sponsoring organization or administrative contact, if configured as a billing contact
Do not use superbills by default for workshop groups. These groups are not modeled as psychotherapy reimbursement workflows.
Documents and forms
Workshop groups can use shared documents and forms for non-clinical materials, including:
- participation agreements
- workshop policies
- reading materials or handouts
- registration questions
- payment authorizations
- attendance or preparation information
The Forms action on the contact list opens the share flow for workshop groups. It is intentionally separate from therapy intake. Use release or financial forms where appropriate, and avoid therapy intake questionnaires, clinical assessments, and consultation agreements unless you have created a workshop-specific version.
Notes
Use group notes or session notes for the workshop.
Useful sections may include:
- topic or module
- attendance notes
- group themes
- resources shared
- participant-specific follow-up items, if needed
- administrative notes
Avoid diagnosis, treatment-plan, and psychotherapy-progress-note language unless the group is actually a therapy group.