[00:00:00] Hello and welcome to the Inside Social Work Podcast, a podcast that aims to inspire, engage, and connect social workers with other social workers and allied health professionals doing interesting and amazing things across the world. I’m your host, Marie Vakakis. Thank you for listening, and I hope you enjoy today’s podcast episode.

Hello and welcome to another episode of the Inside Social Work Podcast. We have hit over 50,000 downloads. I am so excited. Thank you so much. I really appreciate everybody listening to the podcast. Uh, if you’ve got some topics that you’re interested in me covering, uh, feel free to to reach out to me. You can email me at marie@insidesocialwork.com or through Instagram.

Uh, [00:01:00] Marie Vakakis. Uh, today I wanted to talk about, about a bit about supervision and why it’s so important. You have heard a lot of the guests talk about the importance of supervision, how it keeps them learning and engaged, and also as a tool to reduce burnout. And for some people they haven’t had really good quality supervision or they’re not exactly sure what that looks like.

So I thought I’d spend some time today and help and, um, give you some ideas around what you can use supervision for, um, and why supervision is important. And this is going to be, uh, part of a bigger series. So over the next few. Uh, weeks. I’ll put in some small episodes continuing on from this topic. So we’ll look at some different components of supervision in the future, like group supervision, uh, how to handle a rupture, what to do if there’s a crisis, a whole bunch of other stuff.

But for now, I just wanted to start off with a bit of an [00:02:00] introduction. You know, what is supervision? And for social workers, this is such a crucial part of our work. It really provides a forum. For critical reflection and ongoing learning. For me personally, supervision has been, um, a lifesaver in terms of my burnout, uh, caseload management and continuing to practice, um, my own skills of reflection because there is no point, uh, in any of our careers.

We’ve finished reflecting. There’s always things to look at to think about our own, uh, social location, to think about what we bring to a space to explore dynamics, uh, gender, uh, culture. All sorts of diversity can really be impacted on how we, how we show up in the space. And that’s really valuable to continue to reflect on for those who [00:03:00] have supervision as part of their workplace where it’s line management.

It may not be supervision in the purest sense. So I think that can be really tough where maybe it’s hard to be vulnerable and share some of the things you’re struggling with. Especially if you think your job’s on the line. If you’re in a position, if you’re back filling a position or you’re on a short term contract, you probably want to pretend that you’ve got it all under control.

And so that makes it hard because. There might be some of those fears might be legitimate, and it also means you’re not getting the support that you need to handle, uh, tricky cases. Uh, manage a difficult caseload or workload or feel that you can appropriately use supervision for your own personal growth and professional growth and development.

So when we look at supervision, uh, it’s to enhance professional skills and competence. Uh, it helps strengthen our capacities and achieve positive outcomes for the people that [00:04:00] we work with. And I think this is the bottom line of it, is we will do better work when we are doing good work, uh, for clients. So, oh, that was a really roundabout way of saying it, but if we’re in the right head space, if we’re.

On top of our own mental health and we are managing, um, our own wellbeing. We’re at lower risks of burnout. We’ll do better work. So we’re better able to serve our community when we have those things in place. And for those, you know, I’m a learner. I love learning. So for me, supervision, I have, uh, several hours of it a month in various forms, individual and group.

Um, paid and peer, and I loved learning. So I have different supervisors for different modalities. I like the connection. I like the, uh, learning from other people’s experiences. Um, and it, it, I, I just love the vulnerability of other people as well, especially in group supervision. I think that’s a really great one to sometimes if you don’t feel like you have as [00:05:00] much you want to share or.

Uh, you don’t have any clients that really, or service users that come to mind hearing other people’s stories and share their, uh, concerns or maybe they want to help case conceptualise. You can learn so much from that. So supervision can be used for a number of things. Um, you know, and it really is an essential part of social work.

Some of the things that I hear my supervisees struggle with is knowing, um, what to do with supervision. They might go through all of this stuff and find a supervisor, uh, and then they don’t know what to do. So I really wanna talk about that in a later episode, but I thought I’d start right at the beginning and help you figure out, well, how do you choose a supervisor?

So if you are choosing one that’s not provided to you by work, let’s say you’ve decided to pay for external supervision, uh, and engage someone you know, fortnightly or monthly, it’s [00:06:00] really important to find someone who you can work with and you trust who, you know. It’s almost sometimes like finding a therapist, like you want to connect with them.

And it’s funny, I remember I had a supervisor who clinically, or like on paper was excellent. But in this space, I just, it just felt. I don’t know. The, the vibe wasn’t right. And I remember she had a little stand with, um, a teapot and a selection of teas. And I was, I love tea. I’m a huge tea drinker. And I was like, oh, great.

Can I have a cup of tea? And she’s like, oh no, that’s just for me. And I was so taken aback by that. Like, why have this beautiful teapot with all these herbal teas and infusers and, um. You know, there on display in between my chair and your chair, and it’s just for you, it felt so cruel. Um, but that’s not the reason why I didn’t go back.

But the vibe wasn’t right. And I’ve, I’ve changed supervisors over the years as my needs [00:07:00] change, um, as I want to learn something new. For different perspectives, and I think that’s really important. So some of the things to consider, uh, firstly is what you want out of supervision. So if you’re getting some line management supervision at work, you might want something different.

You might be building up your skills to apply for mental health accreditation. Perhaps you are looking to get a different perspective, um, for those who work as the only social worker or one of only a few in a team. Such as schools, for example, this might be a really important person for you to help you conceptualise things from a social work perspective rather than maybe as an educator or, uh, you know, sometimes, uh, wellbeing teams are made up of leading teachers and, and other disciplines that may not be, um, as useful in this specific area of, of supervision.

So some of the things is to, you know. Explore, look them up. Uh, check out their LinkedIn profile, uh, websites. [00:08:00] Maybe ask for some referrals. You know, see what they’ve put out there. See if you align with some of their things. Are they putting out content around, you know, anti-oppressive practice or feminism, or are they showing, um, a special interest in working with a particular population group or neurodiversity or family violence?

Like there might be things that you think. That kind of suits me and fits in with what I want. So have a bit of a look, do a bit of investigating, uh, look at their background and their work experience and see if that matches what you’re looking for. And if they don’t have a lot of things listed, um, on the internet, that’s okay too.

A lot of, um, practitioners of really excellent practitioners, but maybe aren’t as, um. Or don’t really prioritise putting up their credentials and building social media, uh, profiles and a presence there. So don’t let that deter you. But you can ask them, you know, do you have any, um, what’s your experience?

Uh, do you have any areas of interest? Um, you can ask them, you know, what’s their approach to [00:09:00] supervision because everyone has a different approach. Some of very structured, some will let you structure things. Some are very free and fluid and, um. You know, just take each session as they go. So if that’s important to you, um, ask them, you know, do they have a particular approach?

Um, how do they assist you to meet requirements of, uh, registration? So if you wanna apply for that accredited mental health social worker status and register as that, um, you know, just checking that they have the skills required to support you in that process. Um, you know. And then get a bit of a sense of, you know, does it feel, do they feel professional and knowledgeable?

Um, are you both compatible? Um, is this a, a mentorship thing or is it strictly supervision? Uh, how can you contact them between sessions, you know, will they provide references for you? So really kind of a, establishing some of that in those early sessions is really important. And then, you know, is it convenient?

Is it gonna work? Do they have the capacity to [00:10:00] take on new supervisees? Do they have the frequency that you’re looking for? Um, do they also have groups or additional training that you might be interested in? Because sometimes you can really connect with someone’s, uh, philosophy in someone’s style and really want to absorb more of what they offer.

And that might be something to look at as well. So I hope that’s been helpful. Um, this is part one of the series on supervision and, uh, I’ll put some of those prompt questions in the show notes. So hopefully that was helpful for you. And, um, keep your ears and eyes out open and tuned in. I’m muddling all my words, but you know what I mean.

Um, listen out for the, um, the rest of this series so uh, you can listen to all of them and learn a little bit more around supervision. Thank you for listening. I hope you enjoyed today’s podcast episode. The Inside Social Work Podcast would like to acknowledge the traditional owners of the land on which we record this podcast today and pay our respects to elders past, present, and emerging.

Thank you for [00:11:00] listening. If you would like to support the podcast, you could leave a rating or a review on iTunes or wherever it is you get your podcast. And feel free to join the Facebook group. It’d be great to hear from you. Have a lovely day. Bye.