How can a CCAR coach foster engagement with clients who are skeptical about recovery programs?

• A. Use MI to explore ambivalence, validate concerns, co-create small achievable steps, and connect to meaningful personal goals and supports.
• B. Dismiss concerns and insist on the program.
• C. Ignore ambivalence and push for commitment.
• D. Only provide information about MOUD.

Answer: (A)

Engaging skeptical clients hinges on a collaborative, client-centered approach that helps them explore what recovery could mean in the context of their own life. Motivational Interviewing provides the framework: you partner with the client to explore ambivalence without judgment, validate their concerns, and discuss both the perceived costs and benefits of change. By validating worries, you reduce resistance and build trust. Co-creating small, concrete steps gives them agency and makes progress feel achievable, which is essential when motivation may be shaky. Connecting those steps to personally meaningful goals and supports helps the client see recovery as relevant and attainable, not as an external imposition. This approach is more effective than pushing a program, dismissing concerns, or focusing only on information about medications, which can overlook the client’s values, readiness, and broader barriers.