Defining supervision in social work
“Supervision is a forum for reflection and learning… an interactive dialogue between at least two people, one of whom is a supervisor. This dialogue shapes a process of review, reflection, critique and replenishment for professional practitioners… It is accountable to professional standards and defined competencies and to organisational policy and procedures”.
Davys and Beddoe 2020, p.22
Other definitions and information on the development of supervision and learning theories are provided here. How we define supervision shapes our expectations of ourselves and others in supervision sessions and the expectations of our own development as supervisors and the support available for this. There are many other possible definitions for seeing supervision with slightly different lenses. All stress the goal of benefitting people who use services and their carers.
This definition highlights accountability and the link between supervision and performance review or appraisal processes:
“Supervision is a process which aims to support, assure and develop the knowledge skills and values of the person being supervised (supervisee), team or project group. It provides accountability for both the supervisor and supervisee in exploring practice and performance. It also enhances and provides evidence for annual performance review or appraisal; it sits alongside an organisation’s performance management process with particular focus on developing people in a way that is centred on achieving better outcomes for people who use services and their carers.”
SSSC Supervision Learning Resource
This definition focuses on social worker support to strengthen ethics:
“Supervision is the systematic, reflective process which supports social workers to make ethical decisions. It also improves confidence, competence and morale, leading to a better service for those who use social work services.”
BASW Supervision Policy
This definition focuses on relationships within the wider context:
“Supervision is a joint endeavour in which a practitioner, with the help of a supervisor, attends to their clients, themselves as part of their client-practitioner relationships and the wider systemic and ecological contexts, and by so doing improves the quality of their work, transforms their client relationships, continuously develops themselves, their practice and the wider profession.”
Hawkins and Shohet (2012)
The development of supervision in social work
In the late 19th century, volunteer social workers gathered around experienced leaders in an apprenticeship model and supervision was concerned with adherence to agency policy and the distribution of resources.
At the turn of the century evaluation of the perceived worthiness of clients needing help turned to greater examination of the causes of poverty and social justice. From the 1920’s onward social work supervision was strongly influenced by growing psychoanalytic thinking.
From the 1980’s onward, in common with the rest of the public sector, supervision was increasingly concerned with ideas influenced by private sector concepts around performance and accountability.
Supervision has been described as “the most original and characteristic process that the field of social casework has developed”, (Robinson (1949) in Davys and Beddoe, 2020).
Kolb’s experiential learning cycle
The learning cycle underpins much of the theory of supervision and professional development in social work. It involves four stages, namely: concrete learning, reflective observation, abstract conceptualisation and active experimentation. (Kolb, 1984).
From the 1980s, building on this, various writers developed these ideas to inform social work supervision, notably by Morrison (2001). Models were set out to help social workers and the wider helping professions improve supervision practice, naming the different processes and roles involved.
Familiar to many readers will be the popular Honey and Mumford (2005) learning styles set out in the overview for supervisors. Various 40 and 80 item questionnaires are available online which can be used with new workers. This may be helpful when the supervisor is familiar with these learning styles.
Often when we are younger or in an earlier stage of career development we might exhibit a stronger style which may soften over time to inhabit a balance of styles. No style is more desirable but we all need to be aware of areas where we would benefit from the relative strengths of supervisors, colleagues and mentors who may widen our perspective.
The four styles relate to preferences for the above parts of the supervision cycle:
Experience – Activist style
Reflection – Reflector style
Analysis – Theorist style
Action Plans – Pragmatist style
Reflective questions for you as a supervisor
- Think about one or more of your current/past supervisors who represent a mix of different strengths and styles. For each supervisor note down your response to these questions.
- What stage you were at in your own professional development?
- What was good/not so good about this person’s style for you?
- How did you fit together in terms of individual characteristics?
- How might your experiences impact your style of supervision with NQSWs now?
Go to supervisor resource 2 – How people using services benefit from supervision
Supervision and outcomes for people using services
The Social Care Institute for Excellence (SCIE) found that supervision led to outcomes (measured by workers), including empowerment and participation of service users, fewer complaints, and increased positive feedback. However, they noted, that there is a lack of research on how supervision impacted the desired outcomes of those using services.
“changes to the supervisory process are not informed by the perspectives of service users and carers and miss a crucial aspect of understanding how supervision impacts on practice”
Social Care Institute for Excellence (SCIE)
Supervision can support social workers’ resilience
The people who use our services may benefit from a more resilient and stable workforce. Effective supervision has a clear role in supporting worker resilience. Child protection workers were less likely to leave their roles and community workers got significant protection from stress and burnout when given supportive supervision within an organisational culture positive about good supervision practice (Hawkins & McMahon, 2020).
These concepts are discussed further in the wellbeing and resilience resource. Views from people who use services are also discussed in later sections. In the seven-eyed model section, we consider feedback from user groups including care experienced young people and adults with disabilities on supervision issues.
Useful ideas
- Read the vignette from the training resources for supervisors and think about how you could help an NQSW with the person who is using services in this situation.
- Consider how you could incorporate the views of people who use services and those who care for them in contributing to local supervision and professional development policies.
- Perhaps you might involve users of services to give input to such policies or in training sessions your organisation may run for social workers including NQSW practitioners.
Information and links
- Please remember that clicking these links will take you to pages and resources external to the SSSC NQSW website.
- You can read the full SCIE report mentioned in this resource here Effective supervision in social work and social care.
Go to supervisor resource 3 – Learning about supervision from the NQSW supported year pilots
As part of the suite of supervision information and resources, we include here some learning and development materials for managers, supervisors and employers.
Adaptable materials for your organisation
We offer some adaptable training materials which your organisation can use online or face to face to provide learning sessions to NQSWs.
These are notes for people facilitating learning sessions for each suggested half-day training session for either NQSW or their supervisors. These notes include some learning from themes arising from the presenters and participants in test sessions.
The intended audience for these materials includes experienced supervisors who wish to train others who are either new or established supervisors of NQSW.
This recognises that in smaller organisations or in rural or remote offices there may not be readily available social workers with a learning and development role.
The materials include an example of a simple one-page feedback form you may consider using locally to help you adapt the materials as you develop the training with an intention of creating an off-the-shelf option that could then be adapted to suit local needs.
These materials would not be suited to a mixed group of NQSW and their supervisors without significant revision.
We would recommend that you take time to read the supervision and professional development overview along with the supporting materials on this website and integrate this information into your session.
In the test session that we ran, the overview for either NQSW or their supervisors was used as pre-reading to reduce direct input from the trainer and to create discussion applied to experience in practice and group work among the participants.
This session for NQSWs includes two experiential components around contracting and negotiating individual supervision and introducing a model for peer group supervision.
“The training made me think more about the supervision I give to everyone, not just NQSWs”
Experienced supervisor
The session for supervisors was developed following consultation with the sector and benefits from initial testing out. The training materials include a pack of suggested slides, trainer notes, a pre-reading overview and an evaluation template all of which can be adapted to local needs.
“The supervisors training session was helpful, delivering further sessions ourselves would be good as it is such a huge undertaking to roll that out and to ensure that everyone is getting the same standard of supervision”
Local Authority Manager
There are notes for the session included for you to download. You can download and adapt both the presentations and the notes. The content is for you to take and expand or apply locally as you wish within the wider framework of standards and ethics for NQSWs and the supported year. This approach is sometimes known as remixing and attributions/references within slides to original material need to be maintained in any remix. Although these materials are offered to be adapted locally, it is really important to note the context of these and the supporting information.
There are many more related resources allowing you to go into more depth should you wish to expand the training beyond the half-day session outlined.
Please also see How Social Workers learn in the workplace
Useful ideas
- We will be using these materials in the next stages of our national project and would love to hear about what you think.
- Let us know how these might be used in your organisation
Access our additional guide to supporting NQSW professional learning and development
Training material downloads
Peer support and mentoring
Peer support has been consistently identified as one of the most significant sources of support for NQSWs. Employers and supervisors will make arrangements for formal peer support for an NQSW with an identified peer. They will also encourage a culture of wider informal peer and colleague support. Peer support and mentoring are a core element of an effective approach to the NQSW supported year in Scotland.
NQSWs can learn informally from colleagues and peers through offers such as shadowing, informal debrief or general assimilation of the ethos and culture of an individual or wider team. They also have a valuable contribution to make to the learning of others through the exchange of knowledge.
Where employers have an existing mentoring scheme, NQSWs may benefit from provision of mentoring during the NQSW supported year. Mentoring provides opportunities to discuss work-related issues and generate possible solutions to challenges. There are several definitions of mentoring, many evolving to suit the context and purpose of the individual setting, however, all models will have the mentee firmly at the centre, with reflective practice the cornerstone. If mentoring is used, there needs to be clearly defined roles for the mentor and the supervisor.
What is peer mentoring for NQSWs?
Meetings with a mentor can provide NQSW with additional peer support during their supported PRTL first year in practice period and an opportunity to discuss their thoughts and feelings in relation to their NQSW role, in a confidential, safe and supportive environment.
The relationship should support the NQSW to identify key aspects of their NQSW role and provide a protected and dedicated time/ space to review their practice through reflection and discussion.
If a mentor is formally agreed to support a NQSW this is usually to provide a: collegial relationship based on a shared professional experience; dynamic process which can support the sharing and exchange of knowledge, skills and experience; less formal relationship which allows the NQSW to develop their professional identity; safe environment in which the NQSW can share thoughts, feelings and anxieties regarding their role.
Mentoring allows an environment for NQSWs to explore experiential learning related to your organisation; policy, procedure and culture; and explore application of theory and research to support social work practice. We have included some ideas about the kinds of topics that mentors might discuss with NQSWs.
Examples of topics for peer discussion
- Initial impressions of the team and organisation
- Day-to-day practiceAreas of anxiety
- Challenges and areas of work which have gone well
- Familiarisation with the local area (where required)
- General discussion of thoughts/ feelings of being a NQSW
- Reflecting on workload and managing time pressures
- Working with organisational policy and procedure
- Accessing local resources
- Working in partnership and inter-professional contexts
Encouraging the NQSW to reflect on their work practice experiences is the key to a positive mentor relationship. Appropriately sharing your own professional experiences as a Social Worker – your own successes and areas you struggled with can be supportive to a NQSW.
As your relationship progresses you might want to discuss: What were the challenges?; What succeeded and why?; What has been key learning?; What theories or research have they used to analyse their practice?
NQSWs can engage with their mentor through willingness to develop a learning relationship; agreeing to mentor meetings; willingness to be open and honest about their work practice successes and areas for development; willingness to share their thoughts, feelings, anxieties about their role as a NQSW; willingness to participate in discussions which examine use of self in the social work role.
Different people are involved in supporting NQSWs. These include team members, managers, supervisors and mentors.
Reflective questions for you as a mentor
- Thinking about different roles of people involved in supporting NQSWs.
- What are the main similarities and differences?
- What skills do you value in those that support you in the different roles?
- What skills do you bring to the role that you have in supporting NQSW?
- What skills or knowledge do you want to develop for this role?
- We would encourage you to think about your responsibility for the wellbeing of the NQSW, reflect on relationship building, communication and consider aspects such as confidentiality.
We have developed material to support peer-group reflective practice as part of the suite of supervision resources for NQSWs, Managers and Supervisors.
Peer group reflective practice for NQSWs
You can also find out more about mentoring and how to support mentoring in your organisation:
We will be developing information and examples of mentoring with NQSWs as part of our national project. Please get in touch if you would like to share your experiences or examples.
Giving and receiving feedback
It is important for us all when receiving or giving feedback that we frame this as specific, actionable, timely and respectful for it to be most effective.
Feedback should be about practice and not personality and it is helpful to present feedback as your perspective which makes this easier to hear. Often it is the way that feedback is said for example tone of voice, volume and pace and how you present this for example body language, eye contact etc that will have a negative or positive impact.
Feedback is an essential ingredient of professional development. Feedback can always helpfully promote learning and development and should help us understand what is needed to improve and develop practice. NQSW should receive feedback in relation to their social work practice throughout their supported year in practice.
Feedback should
- support increased awareness of what we do and how we do it
- be affirming and professionally challenging
- focus on behaviour and not a person
- be based on observations of actual social work practice, not inferences
- be specific and not general; descriptive and not judgemental
- focus on sharing ideas/ information, rather than giving advice/ immediately offering solutions
- be balanced – challenging and constructively critical and praiseworthy when good performance is noticed
Please note this is under development and suggested content information as this website evolves as part of our NQSW national project in 2020-21. Your feedback is welcome on additions and amendments to the information and resources included here.