Jim Holloway believes the revised Ethical Framework gives us an accessible set of refined terms to help guide our work
I got an odd look the other day when I suggested to a wonderfully conscientious supervisee that the new Ethical Framework for the Counselling Professions1 is a supreme work of fiction. I admit that was very pointedly postmodernistic of me – not my preferred mode as it happens, but it can sometimes stimulate useful new thinking. In this case, after a slightly tense discussion, my supervisee sat back and realised the essentially paradoxical nature of the Framework. In the plainest terms, the paradox is this: we say all these fine things in it about how superbly we conduct ourselves, and it’s obvious we don’t behave like that, because if we did it wouldn’t be necessary to write it all down. A good way to develop this idea is to ask yourself how you would be practising differently if the Framework didn’t exist. We might say the Ethical Framework is fictional only in the sense that it’s aspirational – it points you to the best version of yourself, which, unless you’re a living saint, isn’t going to appear. We sit in the frame to talk and then something happens. We are the work that animates the frame. all day every day. And this hints at another basic but more personal paradox: the very best version of me is one in which I accept my imperfections. Another supervisee told me she had no trouble at all accepting the new Framework as both excellent and flawed. She said she feels similarly about her religion: for her, it is at once emancipatory and restrictive. This led us to talk about how counselling as a vocation might have a sort of religious aspect for some counsellors, with BACP as a type of church. Could the Ethical Framework be mistaken for scriptural dogma? I really hope not. Although it could be aptly be described as our trade association’s ‘Articles of Faith’, it has not been delivered to us as a divine revelation, and its chief scribe, Tim Bond, is not a holy prophet (as far as we know!). However, it does tell us there’s a strong moral code to be followed and we’re committed to following it. While not primarily proclaimed as such, isn’t supervision itself a morally based activity? Our professional lexicon seems to favour the word ‘ethics’ over the more pious-sounding ‘morality’ – though of course the Ethical Framework does lay out a list of desired moral qualities for us to nurture in ourselves. (By the way, have you noticed that ‘fairness’ has been dropped from the list, and ‘competence’ has been renamed ‘diligence’? Something to ponder, briefly. I think the two new additions, ‘care’ and ‘identity’, complement the others well but need a bit of discussion to make good sense of them as active personal virtues.) Although it’s packed with enormous nominalisations (‘justice’, ‘wellbeing’, ‘integrity’, and so on), the Ethical Framework does give us an intelligible and manageable structure for remembering first principles, realigning values, giving shape and finding direction. In supervision sessions, ethical principles are often named but I’ve noticed how rarely supervisees refer to or include the Framework as a whole. I wonder about that. Perhaps there’s a clue in the title: it’s a framework, not the work itself. We sit in the frame to talk and then something happens. We are the work that animates the frame. And, in fact, we’re still building the frame. I remind supervisees that the evolved document we have now is the result of painstaking collaboration between hundreds of peopleoveraverylongperiod–morethanthree decades in fact, if we take the new Framework as having begun its life as the first BAC Code of Ethics and Practice in 1984. That code must have had its critics back then, just as the current Framework does now. Not all my supervisees seem aware of the major concerns some BACP members have raised about the new Framework; or, if they are aware, they don’t hold particularly strong views about them. The debate is important and I feel we owe it to our fellow professionals to keep up with the arguments, even if we don’t always know where we stand. For a clear summary of the ideological, statutory and legal issues, I recommend Peter Jenkins’ helpful article and the eloquent correspondence in Therapy Today between Arthur Musgrave, Els van Ooijen and Tim Bond. Despite perhaps being read by some practitioners as a worthy collection of numbered rules, the Ethical Framework clearly expects us to think for ourselves – and we expect this of ourselves, surely. See the very last sentence (item 78): ‘We will take responsibility for considering how best to act... and will be ready to explain why we decided to respond in the way we did.’ We know from experience that describing our work in regular supervision is the best method to practise being ‘ready to explain’. The way I see it, because the Framework has wrestled for years with some vague, unwieldy or obtuse terminology to do with values, qualities and principles, we now have an accessible set of refined terms to help us shape our explanations. By using this shared language in actual practice, we contribute to its further refinement. And the whole point of learning this language is to comprehend and contain the moral and ethical uncertainties brought into the supervisory space through our clients’ stories. The ethical world we seek to construct may be a fiction, but it’s always real people who live in it. References 1. BACP. Ethical Framework for the counselling professions. Lutterworth: BACP; 2015. [Online.] http://www.bacp.co.uk/ admin/structure/files/pdf/14237_ethical-framework- jun15-final.pdf (accessed 18 April 2016). 2.JenkinsP.WhatiswrongwiththeEthicalFramework? Contemporary Psychotherapy. [Online.] http://www. contemporarypsychotherapy.org/volume-7-no-2- winter-2015/what-is-wrong-with-the-ethical-framework/ (accessed 18 April 2016). 3. Letters.Theunethicalframework?TherapyToday2016;27(1). [Online.] http://www.therapytoday.net/article/show/46
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August 2020
CategoriesEncouragement: An Essential ingredient of Supervision - Anthea Millar
Supervision comes in many shapes and sizes, inspired by numerous models and theoretical orientations. Yet when ‘unpeeled’, it seems there is a common ingredient at the heart of all effective supervision practice: encouragement. This is also an essential value at the heart of our Cambridge Supervision Training courses and the book Practical Supervision: How to Become a Supervisor for the Helping Professions co-authored with my colleagues Penny Henderson and Jim Holloway. Adler, over 80 years ago, took an optimistic view of human nature, believing that a need to belong and contribute to the group is inborn in each individual. However, humiliation and shame, disconnection and disgrace, inferiority and deficiency are deeply threatening dangers to us all, and prompt us to lose courage (feel discouraged) in making positive connections and contributions. So we may resort to patterns of self-destructive behaviours if, in our family of origin, we experienced these forms of discouragement. Adler also suggested that neither heredity nor environment is the ultimate determiner of personality. Instead he believed that this desire for pro-social behaviour is embedded in us, and we all have the capacity for constructive change (Ansbacher and Ansbacher 1956). And crucially, this change is most likely to occur in a relationship with a person who is encouraging. Encouragement has been described as: ‘…the process of facilitating the development of the person’s inner resources and courage towards positive movement. The encouraging person helps the discouraged person remove some of the self-imposed attitudinal road blocks.’ (Dinkmeyer and Losoncy 1980 p 16). Looking more specifically at supervision, Lemberger and Dollarhide (2006) state that the process of encouragement can ‘..assist the supervisee to aspire to the highest possible level of professional competence. Encouragement is literally “entering the courage” and assets possessed by the supervisee….(it) can further buttress the working relationship between the supervisor and supervisee and open up new meaning-making opportunities for both…’ (p119). In a bid to identify the many forms that encouragement can take, and having a bit of fun with alliteration, I have created a diagram that aims to illustrate my thoughts about the main Elements (or ‘E’s) of supervision. These elements are ordered to echo key phases in the supervision process, and are framed by encouragement. Ethics Where there is a clearly contracted working alliance that is underpinned by a strong ethical framework, such as that provided by the BACP, both supervisor and counsellor can work more courageously. The increased courage comes from being supported by a set of principles that are not there to ‘police’ but to encourage mature reflection. Without the encouragement of an ethical frame, dilemmas can seem insurmountable; or of much greater concern, we may miss the dilemma altogether, and unwittingly enter into unethical practice, becoming both discourager and discouraged. The Essential ‘E’s of Supervision Ethics Equality Empathy Exploration Enabling Insight Education Extension Effectiveness Equality and Empathy‘To be human means to have inferiority feelings’(Adler 1964 p54). Adler suggested that the development of inferiority feelings result in large part from subjective childhood comparisons with other family members. As these feelings are so uncomfortable, we compensate by striving to overcome them through such patterns as superiority and perfectionism. Here’s where problems can arise in the supervisory relationship. This ‘slippery pole’ dynamic of inferiority and superiority will show itself as a discouraging power imbalance, that destroys a sense of equality. Equality does not mean that the supervisor and supervisee need to have the same level of experience, values or theoretical orientation – what it does mean is that there is a cooperative partnership that acknowledges and honours difference. By not getting caught into ‘How am I doing in comparison to others’, and reflecting instead on: ‘What am I doing?’, we then offer a supervision space based on equality that encourages supervisees to risk disclosure of problematic issues much more readily. Most counselling and supervision approaches have empathy as a fundamental basis to the relationship and I certainly see this as essential to offering an encouraging frame for the supervision work. However encouragement is always about authenticity, where a willingness to be honest (congruent) with a supervisee is as important as offering of empathic understanding. Exploration and Enabling InsightEnabling the supervisee to present and explore what is going on, whilst keeping a careful eye on the client’s well being, is a complex task. As supervisors, we may be tempted to come in too early with our theories, interpretations and answers. Equally, with the aim of being empathic, we may delay intervention, listen attentively, but offer no focused input to the supervisee. One example of very many interventions that can encourage supervisees to explore and gain insight is the process of Socratic questioning (Millar 1999). Using Socratic questions, the supervisor does not play the role of expert or authority. The skill of the supervisor is in having an idea of what direction would elicit the most useful information, clarification, or insight. Each new question is based on the supervisee’s previous answer or statement. Gradually, the supervisees are led to their own insight, and make their own conclusions as to what they are doing, and what they could be doing more effectively. Education and ExtensionWhether in the role of supervisor or supervisee, taking risks and extending our skills is often deeply encouraging. Our learning can be particularly rapid after making mistakes or discovering gaps in our knowledge. However it is at exactly these moments that we can feel most vulnerable to inferiority feelings. By protecting ourselves from this discomfort, we are not protecting the client, and poor practice may be perpetuated. Supporting the supervisee to have ‘the courage to be imperfect’ (Dreikurs 1970) through feedback that will educate and extend, is an essential aspect of taking supervisory authority (Henderson 2006). So how can this verbal feedback be offered encouragingly so that it is neither punitive nor unhelpfully praising? (Dreikurs 1958, Dweck 1999, Kohn 1993). Adlerian practice puts the emphasis on first identifying a person’s strengths, before presenting areas for development and change. This provides a firm base from which we can be more receptive to other forms of feedback. A similar process can be used both for identifying strengths and challenging areas for growth, as verbal encouragement, differentiated from praise, focuses on what the person is doing, rather than how the person compares with others. This is achieved by avoiding the use of single adjectival labels such as ‘good’ ‘unethical’, ‘clever’, ‘non empathic’, and also by keeping in mind the assets and positive intentions of the supervisee. By using descriptive language, paying particular attention to verbs, feedback offered is very specific, identifying what the supervisee has actually been doing. From this base, the supervisor may add their view, or provide educative information as appropriate. EffectivenessLast, but not least, is the need to assess not only the supervisee’s competence, but our own effectiveness as a supervisor. Some crucial ways for the supervisor to ensure this include regular opportunities for mutual feedback between supervisor and supervisee, supervision for the supervision work, ongoing professional development and further supervision training. Encouragement is a many faceted process that is the essential ingredient for supervision. But it is not easy. I have continually to deal with my own tendency to move into a superior and judgmental mode, but have discovered, gratifyingly, that when I am more encouraging, I actually feel more encouraged. So I would invite all supervisors to reflect on what they might develop further to ensure encouragement is at the heart of their supervisory practice. This practice will in turn encourage and enable the most important person of all: the client. ReferencesAdler, A. (1964) Social Interest: A Challenge to Mankind. New York: Capricorn. (Original work published 1933) Ansbacher, H.L. & Ansbacher, R.R. (Eds). (1956) The Individual Psychology of Alfred Adler. New York: Harper & Row Dweck, C (2000) Self Theories: Their role in Motivation, Personality, and Development. Philadephia: Psychology Press. Dinkmeyer, D. & Losoncy, L.E. (1980) The Encouragement Book. New Jersey: Prentice Hall Dreikurs, R. (1958) The Cultural Implications of Rewards and Punishment. The International Journal of Social Psychiatry. Vol IV, No 3, Winter 1958 Dreikurs, R. (1970) The Courage to be Imperfect. In Articles of Supplementary Readings (Chicago: Alfred Adler Institute 1970) Henderson, P. (2006) Learning to take Supervisory Authority. In P.Prina, K.John, C.Shelley, A.Millar (Eds). UK Adlerian Year Book 2006. London:ASIIP pp 40-49 Henderson, P., Holloway, J. and Millar, A. (2014) Practical Supervision: How to Become a Supervisor for the Helping Professions. London: Jessica Kingsley Publishers. Kohn, A. (1993) Punished by Rewards New York: Houghton Mifflin. Lemberger, M.E. & Dollarhide, C.T. (2006) Encouraging the Supervisee’s Style of Counseling: An Adlerian model for Counseling Supervision. The Journal of Individual Psychology. Vol. 62:2, pp106-125 Millar, A. (1999) The Use of Socratic Questioning in Classical Adlerian Therapy. In P.Prina, C.Shelley, C.Thompson (Eds). UK Adlerian Year Book1999. London:ASIIP |