“Moving out of the safe zone”: Promoting learning communities and reflective supervision in a social work statutory child protection agency

INTRODUCTION: Social work supervision in statutory child protection settings is often confused with line management and has little focus on professional development, critical reflection and exploration of practice. Within Aotearoa New Zealand, the statutory child protection agency Oranga Tamariki (OT), is under considerable scrutiny regarding the management of risk, child abuse, and the over-representation of Ma ̄ori tamariki within the child welfare system. This article covers the first collection of findings from a larger supervision study.METHODS: Using critical reflection as the methodological lens, four experienced OT supervisors participated in a learning community where supervision recordings were brought to each meeting to improve reflective capacity, critical reflection and skills. Data were collected from the learning community and thematic analysis was undertaken to explore current supervision practice in OT.FINDINGS: The three themes generated from the learning community discussions were: supervisory skills/interventions; the structure of supervision; and working with emotion and trauma. These themes highlighted the significance of the learning community as a forum for supervisors to share their existing supervision practice together, “moving out of the safe zone” as they engaged in positive and constructive feedback with their colleagues in a supportive space.CONCLUSIONS: Reflective supervision, within statutory child protection, is essential for learning, critical reflection and cultivating robust decision making in social work practice. The creation and development of professional supervision spaces such as learning communities provide the basis for supervisors and supervisees to develop their skills and ensure accountable, anti-oppressive and ethical practice.

Art of Becoming a Social Work practice educator

Through this practice note, I share some of my reflections and learning of becoming a practice educator. The experience has enhanced my skills as a social worker and team manager and now as a social work doctoral student. Based on my observations of supervision as a practice assessor and my experience of having many different managers throughout my career, I have noticed when social workers move into management without a practice educator qualification, the supervisory relationship experience is a different one than that of a practice educator – turned manager. I question why this is. Is reflective supervision only reserved for students? I am suggesting that it should not be. Each supervisor should be supported and enabled to connect with their Art, as supervision is a form of Art.

Pre-service Teachers' Experiences of Dialogical and Reflective Supervision through Digital Technology

In this article, we review teaching practice supervision methods using Microsoft Teams as a digital, dialogic, and reflective tool in the supervision of the pre-service teachers’ teaching practicum. We applied qualitative thematic analysis to data from conversations and supervision discussions between 40 pre-service teachers and their supervisor on the Microsoft Teams chat channel to investigate pre-service teachers’ experiences of teaching-practice supervision through digital platforms. The dialogical, digital, deep (DDD) pedagogical framework guided the analysis of the data. We found Microsoft Teams enhanced pre-service teachers’ written dialogue, increased peer support, and enabled and deepened collective group dialogue, leading to increased understanding of teaching and learning through analyzing, interpreting, evaluating, producing, and creating knowledge.

Working conditions and wellbeing in UK social workers

Summary UK social workers are exposed to chronically poor working conditions and experience extremely high levels of sickness absence. The aim of this study was to gain an in-depth understanding of working conditions and wellbeing of social workers. Seven UK social work employers sent a survey of working conditions, wellbeing, and turnover intentions to all child and family social workers, followed by a series of individual semi-structured interviews with respondents. Data were collected between January and May 2019. Six hundred and seventy-six (41% response rate) completed surveys were returned and 19 interviews undertaken. Findings Quantitative findings demonstrated that working conditions scored better than previous studies, with positive scores on autonomy, peer, and managerial support. However, the four remaining conditions (demands, relationships, role, and change) each scored worse than 75–90% of respondents in UK-wide benchmarks of individuals from various occupations. Regression outcomes demonstrated that demands, control, change, relationships, and peer support each significantly impacted employee wellbeing. Furthermore, over 20% of respondents suggested that they were frequently exposed to poor service user behaviour. Thematic analysis of interviews suggested that workload (demands), relationships with peers, management, and services users, and the way in which change was communicated were the main difficulties cited. Applications It is clear that work is needed to support social worker stress and wellbeing at work. Management should support individuals in terms of developing peer and managerial support, and adopting best practice in reflective supervision. Furthermore, a more robust system of caseload allocation would support and improve significant workload pressures.