The latest edition of the International Journal of Therapeutic Massage and Bodywork was prefaced by an editorial that had us thinking back to our previous blog about credibility as a massage provider. While ours was written for clients seeking a qualified and trustworthy massage experience, the journal took the perspective of the provider itself asking: how is credibility built, conferred, and maintained?
Massage is not legally regulated in New Zealand, but there are ways that we and other responsible massage providers ensure that our work is trusted. These are the ones that the editorial covered:
Recognition
For many medical and medical-adjacent industries, credibility comes through recognised professional standards, accreditations, achievements. These are a fairly simple formula for being recognised as credible.
For massage therapy, where these structures are not in place or perhaps not government recognised, and where public discourse varies, recognition does not come so easily. Clients do not fully understand our scope of practice, professional standards, and education.
The structures of professionalism are an easy source of recognition. Without these, or with less of them, massage therapy and similar bodywork practices must display professionalism in practice: in communication, in treatment, in public presentation, and in every professional interaction.
As massage therapists, we must know how to effectively communicate and display the nature and purpose of our work. We also lean into education, research, and regulation as it develops. Credibility is built, and while we know the impact and importance of our work, others may not.
Identity, trust, and practice
Beyond certificates, licenses, and even generalised public recognition, credibility is personal. A practitioner must take personal responsibility for pursuing education, mentorship, and growth. They must act ethically and professionally within the context of their practice, and build trust not at a whole-industry level but as an individual.
The Elemental Body Therapies team does this through:
- Consistency of service and standards
- Staying up to date with research and best practice
- Continuous improvement and training in new methods
- Understanding client goals and needs to guide their care
- Clear and honest communication
- Ethical practice such as informed consent
Our proven track record with many clients is what helps us to build trust. Credentials support credibility, but we further it and maintain it through our actions, words, and standards of behaviour; through our practice.
Accountability and ongoing responsibility
Credibility, then, comes from both a wider social perspective on the profession, often but not exclusively influenced by regulation and accreditation, and the professional trust that is built by individual practices and practitioners.
To maintain and develop credibility, the massage industry as a whole, globally and nationally, must encourage continued research, the development of professional structures, and safe, ethical, evidence-informed care. In New Zealand where there is no legal regulation of the profession, we must hold ourselves accountable through regulating bodies such as Massage Aotearoa New Zealand.
Credibility is framed in the IJTMB editorial as “an ongoing professional responsibility,” and as “granted by patients, colleagues, regulators, and the public when professional values are experienced as trustworthy, standards are visible in practice, and accountability is consistently demonstrated.”
At Elemental Body Therapies, we believe in the benefits of massage so much that we’ve all individually made it our career! Our team is made up of qualified practitioners, and we do all that we can to uphold credibility - for the profession, and for our own professional reputations.