Mastering Social Work Supervision

Citation

Nilsson, D. (2012), "Mastering Social Work Supervision", Social Care and Neurodisability, Vol. 3 No. 4, pp. 191-192. https://doi.org/10.1108/20420911211286605

Jane Wonnacott has extensive experience of providing supervision training including close collaboration with the renowned late Tony Morrison. Her in‐depth knowledge of not only relevant theory but also the actual practicalities involved in this crucial aspect of professional practice is amply demonstrated throughout. Many supervision texts struggle to find an appropriate balance in relation to offering readers an academic approach and a practical skills development one. In this respect, I found that Mastering Social Work Supervision is indeed masterful in the way it naturally integrates theory with practice by moving beyond the territory of merely being a practice skill manual, towards engaging readers in an intelligent applied theoretical discussion.

The content of Mastering Social Work Supervision leads the reader through introductory chapters on context and foundational understandings of professional supervision onto a more in‐depth exploration of “The authoritative supervisor” and then includes more specialist chapters on supervising assessments and performance management, finishing with a small postscript chapter on “supporting and developing the supervisor”.

Naturally any reader, and reviewer, is going to have personal chapter preferences for topics that offer new angles or insights for that individual. I certainly found the chapter on authoritative supervision particularly engaging with its embedded discussions on game theory and stress management. This builds naturally and helpfully upon an earlier exploration of supervision as “leadership”. The one area that I felt could have been usefully further developed was the final “postscript” chapter which explores the support and development needs of supervisors themselves. This is emerging as an even more critical factor within the current political/organisational context of diminishing resources where supervisors find themselves increasingly pressured and isolated by organisational demands. Wonnacott rightly identifies this as an important issue and draws the link with serious case‐review findings regarding under‐supported and isolated managers. This “postscript” goes some way towards addressing this but could possibly be further expanded upon.

The chapters all contain helpful case‐studies to illustrate key concepts and have summary “Points to consider” along with suggested “Tasks” to assist the reader in applying a reflexive approach within their knowledge development. The text also contains a number of useful examples of tools and frameworks that can be directly applied or adapted to a variety of human service practice settings.

This book appears ideally pitched for a broad readership from those professionals newly embarking on supervision provision to those with much more extensive experience who wish to deepen their knowledge and abilities. Indeed, given the fundamental importance of continuing professional development for all social workers, and others working in health and social care, this text could be useful for any reader receiving supervision (as we assume all do under professional guidelines). This book could enable readers to undertake self‐directed professional development in order to explore their understanding of this crucial area of practice. It is after all every professional's responsibility to provide the best outcomes possible for service users and effective supervision is a key process for ensuring this. Whilst this book is primarily aimed at social workers, many of the underlying concepts have generic applicability (e.g. emotional intelligence) and it may also be useful to other professionals providing supervision in the health and human sectors. Mastering Social Work Supervision provides an excellent opportunity for professionals to undertake accessible intelligent reflexive self‐development on supervision at a very reasonable price!