After your hours: preparing for California clinical licensing exams
Completing your hours is a major milestone, but the licensing exams are the final gate. Here's what each pathway requires and how to prepare.
About
Licensure tracking that actually understands the rules
Licentio exists because the tools available to California clinical associates either ignore the regulatory complexity or leave clinicians to figure it out on their own. We're building the system that validates every hour against Board of Behavioral Sciences (BBS) rules before it's ever submitted.
The problem we set out to solve
Earning clinical licensure in California requires thousands of supervised hours, documented across dozens of categories, validated against rules that differ by license type and change over time. Associates track this work in spreadsheets, paper logs, or tools that amount to digital spreadsheets. None of them tell you whether your hours actually meet BBS requirements until you submit your application and wait to find out.
Supervisors sign off on hours they can't easily verify. Clinical directors have almost no visibility into where their team stands. The entire process runs on trust and manual cross-referencing, and the consequences of getting it wrong range from delayed licensure to rejected applications.
Who We Are
Built by the people closest to the problem
Nikki Cardoza, LCSW
Clinical Co-Founder
Nikki is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker and Executive Director of a children's mental health clinic. She oversees clinicians at every stage of licensure and saw firsthand how little visibility directors have into their associates' progress. Licentio was built to change that, so leaders can spend less time on paperwork and more time on the work that matters. Nikki brings the clinical perspective to every product decision, from how sessions are categorized to what a supervisor actually needs to see.
Zach Cardoza
Technical Co-Founder
Zach is a software engineer and founder of Kaweah Tech, with over 20 years of experience delivering production systems across healthcare, agriculture, and manufacturing. When Nikki described the tracking problem her clinicians faced, he recognized a system design challenge no existing tool was solving. Licentio is built with the same rigor he brings to every product: type-safe, well-tested, and designed for regulatory complexity.
"Our supervisors and associates were all using different methods to track hours, and that inconsistency made it hard to stay aligned and confidently sign off on anything. We needed a way to streamline the process for everyone. If we could all use the same tool, we wouldn't waste time comparing calendars, double-checking records, or making constant revisions. We could focus on what matters most: delivering quality supervision."
Our Journey
How we got here
2023
The problem surfaces
Nikki, managing a team of associates at a children's mental health clinic, realizes she has no reliable way to track where each clinician stands in the licensure process. Existing tools track hours but can't validate them.
Late 2024
Research and validation
Zach digs into the BBS regulatory framework and the competitive landscape. The pattern is clear: every tool on the market is a logging spreadsheet with a better UI. None encode the actual rules.
Early 2025
From logging to compliance
Zach begins building a simple hour-logging tool to solve Nikki's immediate problem. As the rules engine takes shape, it becomes clear that tracking hours is only half the challenge. The product shifts to a compliance-first approach: validate every entry against BBS requirements, not just record it.
Late 2025
Architecture and design
The technical foundation takes shape: a rules engine that validates every logged session against BBS requirements in real time, a supervisor approval workflow no competitor has built, and a schema designed to scale across license types and states.
Early 2026
Building Licentio
Development begins in earnest. The product name is finalized, the brand identity is established, and the core application starts coming together: session logging, validation, progress tracking, and the supervisor portal.
- Current milestone
2026
Beta launch
Licentio opens to early users. California LCSW, LMFT, and LPCC associates can start tracking hours with full BBS rule validation, free during beta.
What drives how we build
These aren't aspirations. They're constraints we hold ourselves to in every product decision.
Compliance first
If we can't validate it against the rules, we don't ship it.
Transparency by default
When something counts, we show you why. When it doesn't, we show you which rule applies.
The whole relationship
Associates, supervisors, and directors are all part of the process. The product works for everyone involved.
From the Licentio Team
Field Notes
Practical guides on California licensure requirements, supervised experience documentation, and the compliance details that matter for LCSW, LMFT, and LPCC associates. Written by clinicians and built on BBS rules, not opinions.
Telehealth supervision under current California BBS rules
The BBS permits telehealth supervision under specific conditions. Documentation requirements are the same, but the logistics need extra attention.
What to expect when you submit your BBS application
The BBS application review is thorough and not instant. Knowing what to expect helps you prepare clean documentation and realistic timelines.
Get in Touch
Questions, feedback, or partnerships
Contact us
Whether you're an associate exploring Licentio, a supervisor with questions about the approval workflow, or a clinical director interested in organization accounts, we'd like to hear from you.
We typically respond within one business day.
Beta users get a direct line to the team. Your feedback shapes what we build next.
Built by Kaweah Tech
Behind Licentio is Kaweah Tech, a Tulare, California studio with over 20 years of engineering experience and more than 40 production systems delivered across healthcare, agriculture, and manufacturing. We build custom software and applied AI for industries where the details have to be right.
Join the Licentio beta
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