Clinical Supervision in Child Welfare PracticeMoving Beyond the Administrative

1
Clinical Supervision in Child Welfare
PracticeMoving Beyond the Administrative
Katharine Dill, Doctoral StudentMarion Bogo,
Professor Faculty of Social Work University
of TorontoFunding provided by Royal Bank
Fellowship
2
Context

• Changing the child welfare landscape
• Transformation Agenda and the desire to move
  towards more clinically focused practice
• Child welfare supervisors are seen as the
  catalyst for organizational change and practice
  initiatives

3
And more importantly, there is a desire to move
away from the administratively focused aspects of
supervision
4
Project Objectives

• Develop a conceptual framework for understanding
  child welfare supervision that includes
• Analysis of empirical studies A thorough review
  of the existing literature on social work and
  child welfare supervision
• Listening to the perspectives of child welfare
  supervisors

5
Turn to your neighbour

• Discuss and record
• What does clinical supervision in child welfare
  mean to you?
• How do you incorporate clinical supervision into
  your supervisory sessions with your staff
  members?

6
Review of the Literature
7
Supervision Defined

• A staff member to whom authority is delegated to
  direct, coordinate, enhance, and evaluate the
  on-the-job performance of supervisees for whose
  work he or she is held accountable. In
  implementing this responsibility, the supervisor
  performs administrative, educational and
  supportive functions in interaction with the
  supervisee in the context of a positive
  relationship. The supervisors ultimate objective
  is to deliver to agency clients the best possible
  service both quantitatively and qualitatively, in
  accordance with agency policies and procedures.
  (Kadushin, 1976, p.21 2002, p. 23)

8
Key Elements of Social Work Supervision

• Integrates the elements of clinical, educative,
  administrative and supportive supervision
• The working relationship between client-worker
  and worker-supervisor-also referred to as
  parallel process

9
The Future of Supervision

• Supervisors will require change management
  skills, and an understanding of diversity and the
  impact on practice.

10
Review of the Literature

• Two recent reviews of social work supervision
  research
• Majority were small scale, exploratory,
  contributed modestly to our theoretical
  understanding of social work supervision
• Minimal research on child welfare supervision

11
Organizational Context

• Organizational culture can influence supervisors
  and staff performance
• Organizational climate can influence job
  satisfactions for child welfare supervisors and
  promotes trust among colleagues

12
Organizational Context

• Skilled supervision translates into greater staff
  retention
• Supportive supervision affects staff morale and
  job satisfaction

13
Supervisory Relationship

• The supervisory relationship
• can greatly influence practice
• value supervisors who relate practice to theory
• more credible when supervisors use of authority
  was based on skill rather than simply position

14
Outcomes for Children

• Organizational environment can promote the
  psychosocial functioning of children in care
• Absence of good quality supervision was found to
  be problematic

15
Study Objectives

• Contribute to the knowledge base for supervision
  in child welfare practice
• Qualitative design
• Exploratory study

16
Methodology

• Focus groups
• Utilized the long interview format
• Researcher conducting focus group is an insider
  
• Advisory committee of senior managers
• All focus groups were 1.5 hours in length
• Tape recorded and transcribed

17
Sample Population

• 19 supervisors from a variety of agencies
  participated in two focus groups
• 32 supervisors participated in six agency based
  focus groups
• 90 had an MSW and remaining supervisors had a
  BSW or related degree
• 68 of the supervisors were female and 32 were
  male
• Predominantly Euro-Canadian and ranged in age
  from 28-61 years of age

18
Findings

• The safety of children
• Interwoven elements of supervision (clinical,
  administrative, supportive and educational)
• Power and authority issues
• Organizational context
• Becoming and developing as a Supervisor

19
Safety of Children

• Supervisors passionate in their commitment to
  protect children
• View themselves as accountable for the agency
  mandate of protecting children
• Mandate is met through the encouragement and
  development of competent staff members
• Successful outcomes in practice measured in baby
  steps successful return home of child, client
  enters treatment

20
Interwoven Elements of Clinical Supervision

• Focusing on the dynamics of the workers
  relationship with clients
• Team interactions
• Integrating a strengths-based perspective when
  engaging clients
• Educational component in terms of promoting
  worker development

21
(No Transcript)
22
Clinical Elements

• Focusing on developing workers practice through
  transfer of learning from case to case
• Teaching techniques include
• Video review
• Going out with workers on cases
• Observing workers and clients behind one way
  mirrors
• All activities are followed up by specific
  feedback

23
Clinical Elements Continued

• Supervision needs to be a safe place to learn and
  grow
• Having faith in workers capacity
• Absence of a supervisor/supervisee positive
  relationship makes it more difficult to address
  underlying clinical issues

24
Competing Roles

• Supervisors play the role of manager and
  evaluator
• Discussed how challenging and time consuming this
  can be
• Required to transition quickly from one role to
  another

25
Power and Authority Issues in Supervision
26
Power and Authority

• Dialogue between supervisors and workers needs to
  take place
• If workers feel stifled then the parallel process
  may occur with clients
• Implications for the Transformation Agenda

27
Becoming and Developing as a Supervisor

• Early experiences as supervisors foundational
• Supervisors trained in the era of risk assessment
  articulated that they did not possess a clinical
  framework
• Supervisors need supportcold toast syndrome
• Importance of peer and managerial support

28
Getting the Basics First

• Newer supervisors highlighted the need to
  understand the paper work and administrative
  elements prior to moving to a higher order
  conceptualization of clinical supervisory practice

29
(No Transcript)
30
Tell us more

• Review your notes
• Were there any issues, ideas, concepts that we
  missed in the study that you believe require more
  thought or analysis?

31
Study Limitations

• Self selected sample population
• Limited geographical representation
• No perspectives from front-line staff members or
  senior managers
• Insider perspective greatest strength and
  greatest weakness

32
Discussion

• Elements of supervision are viewed as separate
  entities and need to be more interwoven and
  embraced by supervisors and organizations
• Supervisory development is critical
• Organizational succession planning
• Open dialogue and integration of how power and
  authority issues play out in child welfare
  practice
• Impact of organizational culture on clinical
  excellence

33
Conclusions

• More research required
• Newer supervisors require support, training and
  guidance
• Competent child welfare supervision has
  significant implications for staff morale,
  development and ultimately good outcomes for
  children and families