Referring with Confidence: A Guide for Assistants, GPs & Advisors

Discretion begins before the first session.

To refer someone to therapy is never a simple handoff. It’s a quiet decision made on someone else’s behalf, often under subtle pressure, and usually without applause. For assistants, private physicians, legal advisors, or family office leads, the act of connecting a client to therapeutic support can carry weight far beyond the task itself.

Because when someone lives a life that is highly visible, high-functioning, or tightly managed – be it a public figure, a CEO, a client under stress or scrutiny – the referral isn’t just about finding someone qualified. It’s about ensuring the person on the receiving end understands what isn’t being said. It’s about trust, yours and theirs, and it starts long before the first conversation.

The first thing to know is that discreet therapy doesn’t begin at the first session. It begins at the point of contact. Often, when referrers are researching options, the loudest websites win. There’s a polished biography, a list of qualifications, a smiling photo, and sometimes even a client quote or two. But true discretion in therapy isn’t loud. It doesn’t look slick. It’s not always visible at all.

Instead, it tends to feel different. The writing is slower, softer. The communication is direct. The therapist replies personally, not via an admin team. There is no booking portal with calendars and drop-downs. No layers of automation that make it feel like a service rather than a relationship.

Ask yourself this: When you send an enquiry, who receives it?Does it go directly to the therapist or to a shared inbox? Is the reply quiet, considered, and relational? Or templated and efficient?

For high-profile clients, these details aren’t small. They are often the reason therapy is accepted… or avoided.

Many clients in these positions don’t need a diagnostic expert or a performance coach. What they need is a place that doesn’t ask them to tell their story all over again. A place where they don’t have to be impressive or convincing. A place where they can show up unsure, contradictory, tired or not ready to speak at all.

The most effective therapeutic spaces for high-trust clients tend to be deliberately understated. They’re not built for mass engagement. They’re not designed to scale. They exist to offer something rare: the containment of a private, human relationship in a professional frame.

As a referrer, you may already be doing more emotional labour than your role technically requires. You’re holding the client’s confidence, perhaps even their emotional state. You’re anticipating the kind of space they need and what kind they’ll actually accept. You’re often doing all of this without a roadmap.

So here is something simple to hold onto: a good referral protects the client’s privacy before the therapist ever meets them.

That means:

• Not sharing more than is necessary

• Choosing someone who won’t ask you for a summary of the client’s life

• Avoiding therapists who need to be “brought up to speed” in ways that expose more than the client has consented to share

It also means choosing someone who knows how to hold complexity. Someone who won’t be unsettled by hesitancy, or the need for control, or the silence that sometimes comes in place of a story.

There’s also the matter of tone. Not marketing tone, but therapeutic tone. The therapist’s presence in writing, their manner in scheduling, their boundaries in communication. These speak volumes before a word is ever spoken in session.

The right therapist for a high-profile client doesn’t overreach. They don’t chase, they don’t generalise, and they don’t assume that being chosen is a signal of readiness. They understand that therapy begins slowly. That trust isn’t given, it’s allowed over time. That sometimes the first session isn’t about beginning the work, but about seeing whether there’s a space safe enough to try.

And so, if you're tasked with making the connection or if you’re the person a client trusts to find something safe, remember: the best therapists for this kind of work won’t dazzle. They’ll invite. They’ll leave space. They’ll ask little.

And when your client arrives, they’ll be met not by a process, not by a plan, but by a human being who knows how to listen without requiring more than the client is ready to give.

That’s what it means to refer with confidence.Not just to place someone, but to begin a process of trust that protects both of you. Quietly. From the first step.

A gentle reminder that these are not articles. They are reflections, written with care and best read the same way.