Most therapists reach this point with a certificate in a folder and a vague sense that they now need supervision. Then the questions start. Which hours count? Does group supervision count? Who rates the recording, and what happens if it doesn't pass? The International Society of Schema Therapy (ISST) publishes all of this, but it's spread over several documents, and I regularly meet people who have lost months to a misunderstanding.
So here is what the requirements say, in plain terms. After that, the part they leave out, which in my experience matters just as much.
What ISST asks for
- Standard level
- At least 20 hours of supervision. Your supervisor also reviews at least two hours of your recorded sessions, from two client sessions, and that review time doesn't count towards the 20 hours. One recorded session is then rated by an independent rater.
- Advanced level
- At least 40 hours of supervision, with four hours of recorded sessions reviewed in total. Two recordings from two different clients are rated by two different independent raters: one showing imagery rescripting, the other mode dialogues in chairs. At least one of the clients has a personality disorder or significant features of one.
Hours only count from the first day of your certification workshop training, and your supervision has to stretch over at least a year. Group supervision counts as well, at a reduced rate that depends on the size of the group: an hour in a group of two counts as 36 minutes, an hour in a group of six as 20. Most people end up with a mix of group and individual time.
Your supervisor has to be ISST-certified. Supervisors in training, which is where I am, can take on up to two certification supervisees, and our supervision of you is itself supervised by a certified supervisor-trainer. It's a fair question to ask anyone before you start counting hours with them.
The recording
This is where most people get stuck. Your session is rated on the Schema Therapist Competency Rating Scale, and you need an average of 4.0 for Standard and 4.5 for Advanced. The item that catches people out is item 11, the use of emotion-focused change techniques, which has to reach 4.0 at either level. Your case conceptualisation is rated too.
I've seen good sessions fail on that one item. The therapist was warm, the psychoeducation was clear, the reparenting was kind, and the experiential work was thin: the imagery ended early, or the chair work never quite started. Raters want to see you take the client into the feeling and stay there with them.
The session has to be complete, uninterrupted and at least 45 minutes long, and each recording can go to an independent rater only once. Start recording months before you think you need to, sort out consent early, and watch the first few with your supervisor as practice rather than as candidates.
“The requirements count your hours and rate your sessions. They don't ask what gets activated in you in the room, and that's often what decides whether the chair work happens at all.”
What happens in you
When the experiential work keeps stalling, the reason is rarely technique. More often it's what the client stirs up in the therapist.
Limited reparenting asks you to care for a client's Vulnerable Child, set limits with their Angry or Impulsive Child, and stay steady when an overcompensating mode comes at you. You do all of that with your own schemas in the room. A client's fear of being left can touch your own. Their contempt can land on the part of you that was once made to feel small. When your own Vulnerable Child is activated, the usual response is to protect it without noticing: you start explaining, you move away from the feeling, you bring the imagery to a close a little too soon.
Your coping modes come along too. A therapist with a strong Compliant Surrender finds it hard to confront a client or hold a limit. One with a Detached Protector runs calm, thoughtful, safe sessions, and scores low on item 11. And a Demanding Parent turns supervision itself into an exam you're failing.
Then there is transference. Clients relate to us the way they once related to the people who hurt them, failed them or rescued them. Some will experience you as the critical parent. Some will idealise you, and then turn. What you feel back, the pull to rescue, irritation, boredom, a heavy sleepiness, wanting to be liked, tells you something about their modes and about yours. It belongs in supervision, and so does projection, theirs and ours.
This is the work I enjoy most as a supervisor. Alongside your cases, conceptualisations and recordings, we look at which of your schemas a client triggers, which mode takes over when you get stuck, and what your own Healthy Adult needs to stay in the room. It isn't therapy. But it is personal, and therapists who allow it usually find the chair work gets easier.
Keep an eye on the deadlines
ISST gives you three years from the end of your workshop training to apply for your first level of certification, and five years from that same date to reach Advanced. If you go over, you'll need to show extra training, supervision or case presentations for each year. It's much easier to spread supervision out from the start than to rush it at the end.
Choosing a supervisor
Certification status comes first. Ask whether their supervision will count for you, and how they'll confirm your hours when you apply.
After that, look at fit. If your caseload includes complex trauma, dissociation or personality disorders, you want someone who works with those clients, because mode work with a highly dissociative client needs a different pace. Ask whether they'll watch your recordings and give feedback against the rating scale; supervision based on memory misses the moments a rater will see. And ask how they work with your own schemas and countertransference. A supervisor who only ever talks about the client will miss half of what keeps you stuck.
Supervision with me
I'm an ISST Accredited Advanced Schema Therapist and a Schema Therapy supervisor in training, and I'm on the BPS Register of Applied Psychology Practice Supervisors. Most of my clinical work is with complex trauma, dissociation and omission trauma, often combining Schema Therapy with EMDR and parts work, and that's where supervision with me is most useful.
Sessions are 50 minutes, online and one to one. I take Schema supervisees once they've completed Part 2 of their training, and as a supervisor in training I have two certification places at most. Mention your certification when you book, and we'll plan hours, recordings and conceptualisations from the first session. Fees and booking are on the Therapists page.
Figures are from the ISST requirements for certification as a schema therapist (individual), version 2.0, for those who started training on or after 1 September 2021, and from the ISST page on supervisor certification. Requirements change, so check the current version on the ISST website and with your training programme before you plan around them.