Clinical Supervision
I offer clinical supervision for Individuals and Groups. My fees for individual supervision is €90 per 1 hour session. Group supervision max 4 people is 45 euro per person for 120 minutes session.
Supervision has been defined as having three main components: client care, professional standards and professional development (Hewson and Carroll, 2016).
Hawkins and Shohet classify supervisors' roles as multimodal, sometimes of a counsellor offering support, or at times as an educator offering a space where supervisees can learn and develop, also as a manager overseeing the quality of the work, and in some cases as a consultant responsible for dealing with the organisations they work for (2006).
The main functions of supervision have contended to revolve around offering supervisees support in professional development, upholding professional and ethical standards, and offering management of welfare and resilience (Proctor, 1988).
The literature demonstrates that benefits such as self-awareness, development of skills, self-efficacy, and stronger client relationships can be seen in those engaging in clinical supervision (Wilson et al. 2016).
Pope and Vasquez consider ethics in supervision as a guiding light that helps to clarify how given choices affect the lives of clients, colleagues and the public. They see ethics as a liberating power able to "…frees us from the confining webs of habit, fatigue, fallacy, dogma, carelessness, hurry, and daily pressures. It helps us see new possibilities, respond in new ways, and act with greater understanding" (p. 2). Clinical supervision has been considered the most critical aspect of clinicians' practice (Orlinsky, Ronnestad, & the Collaborative Research Network of the Society for Psychotherapy Research, 2005). The literature demonstrates that those engaged in clinical supervision gain more self-awareness and self-efficacy, develop further their professional skills, and form stronger client relationships (Wilson et al. 2016). In Ireland, the Irish Public Health System promotes continued supervision as a cornerstone of good clinical governance (Health Service Executive, 2015). It is of immense importance that professionals are also aware that, although supervision plays an essential factor in supporting supervisees' professional growth and development, there is also mounting evidence internationally of inadequate and harmful supervisory practice (Ellis et al. 2017). Issues about developing awareness about ethical dilemmas and how to manage them are of immense importance in supervision.
Ways to mitigate acting in harmful or unethically call supervisors and supervisees to study and review the code of ethics they must abide by (Hawkins and Shohet, 2006); continuously develop and revisit their moral character, values, and motivations for working with people (Hawkins and Shohet, 2006); understanding their philosophy of working therapeutically (Moore, 2016); consult with supervisors and peers periodically (Carroll and Shaw, 2013); maintain continuous professional development (IACP, 2018); make use of ethical problem-solving tools (Falender, 2020) and be attentive to one's personal factors may contribute to unethical behaviour (Carroll and Shaw, 2013). Becoming an ethical practitioner relies on continuous learning, requiring conscious reflection and the accumulation of ethical wisdom and also a journey of developing a warm, kind and compassionate heart.
Supervision is made more cohesive by supervisors when following a conceptual framework or model that functions to enhance the supervisor’s capacity to provide supervision that responds to the needs of supervisees while keeping organization and professional contexts (Bernard and Goodyear, 2014).
The Supervision Model that I follow is based on the 7 Eyed Supervision Model and grounded in the Internal Family System Psychotherapeutic Model.
Process Model: The Seven-Eyed Model (Hawkins and Shohet, 1989)
This has been considered as a core supervision model taught in supervision training and is most utilised in practice in the Republic of Ireland (Carroll, 2020).
The 7-eyed model encompasses developmental, resourcing and qualitative functions of supervision, but it also emphasises the relational aspect of the therapeutic triad (Hawkins & Shohet, 2006).
This process model consists of:
1-focusing on the client and what and how they present
2- Exploration of the strategies and interventions used by the supervisee
3- Focusing on the relationship between the client and the supervisee
4- Focusing on the supervisee
5- Focusing on the supervisory relationship
6- The supervisor focuses on their process
7- Focusing on the wider context in which the work happens. It looks at the supervisor’s role not only as nurturing and comforting, but importantly the role of the supervisor in this model is seen as one of helping supervisees become aware of denied, suppressed or unaware unconscious processes happening within and the in-between the persons involved in the therapeutic triad (client-therapist-supervisor).
Integrating IFS into Supervision and Consultation: The 8 Facets of IFS Supervision
Sourced from Liz Martins and Emma E. Redfern (2020)
The 8 Facets of IFS Supervision is a map with which to view the landscape of IFS Supervision. It is intended to give assistance in navigating, noticing, and parts detecting across the system(s) in which supervision takes place. Inspired by the Seven-Eyed Model by Hawkins and Shohet (Supervision in the Helping Professions), it supports supervision from an IFS perspective.
Although the language in this introduction to the 8 Facets refers to an individual client, therapist, and consultant, the model can easily be adapted for supervising work with children and young people, couples, or families and for group supervision settings.
1) Facet One: Self
Belief in the existence of Self is the gamechanger at the heart of the IFS model. In IFS theory and philosophy, Self suffuses the model. An overarching goal of IFS Supervision, as with IFS therapy, is an increase in Self-leadership and all that this brings. Because of this, IFS Supervision has some similarities with working with IFS therapy with a client in that we are seeking to support greater access to Self within the supervisee’s system.
Our diagrammatic model of IFS Supervision depicts in yellow the Larger Self which is the container for and at the heart of the global system. Self is also at the heart of each individual system which is shown by the smaller yellow circle within each of the three categories of participant (client, therapist, supervisor) participating in the triangle of supervision (Hughes and Pengelly, 1996).
Supervision questions include:
What do we notice about the presence of Self within the various systems?
How can we support our own Self-leadership
2) Facet Two: The Client’s System (1 of the 3 participants in the triangle of supervision)
Using this lens or focus, the supervisor and supervisee attend to the client’s system of parts (Managers, Firefighters, and Exiles) and access to Self. We take note of who in the system brought the client to therapy, and what triggered this, while also noticing any polarised parts who might not want to be in therapy. We bear in mind that some parts, especially exiles, may not know the client is in therapy and many parts will not know Self well or not know of Self’s existence. We notice exile and protector beliefs and hold curiosity as to how they may impact on the therapy.
We also attend to the client’s wider context and the impact of and relationships with parts in siblings, parents, partners, dependants, colleagues, bosses, carers etc. Looking out for and enquiring about the presence of Legacy Burdens, Unattached Burdens and Cultural Burdens (legacy and personal) may feature here.
We also explore the presence of Self in the client’s life.
Supervision questions include:
How much Self is available within the client’s system?
What parts are showing up?
3) Facet Three: The Therapist’s System (1 of the 3 participants in the triangle of supervision)
Using this lens or focus, we attend to the supervisee’s system of parts (Managers, Firefighters, and Exiles) as they show up or are triggered in the work with the clients and as they show up or are triggered in supervision. We also attend to the supervisee’s wider context and the impact on their internal system from outside, for example, ‘managers’ within their training establishment or employment.
For supervisees moving from an existing modality to IFS or integrating IFS into an existing way of working, attention may need to be given to parts invested in old ways of working or who have yet to meet and trust Self.
We attend to the supervisee’s access to Self and how this varies with which clients, and at which points in supervision parts may become active. We use IFS approaches to unblend the therapist, and possibly may go on to work therapeutically with therapist parts, if contracted for and done in the service of the client. Care is taken not to shift the supervisory relationship to an exclusively therapeutic relationship.
The main purpose of this aspect of supervision may include:
a) to help the supervisee relate to their parts so the supervisee can engage with clients from Self
b) to assist the supervisee in using awareness of their own parts’ activation as a source of potential information about the client (and supervisor).
Supervision questions include:
How does the therapist feel towards the client
Which therapist parts might be blocking or impacting on the work with this client?
What parts come up around supervision?
4)Facet Four: The Supervisor’s System (1 of the 3 participants in the triangle of supervision)
Here the attention is on the supervisor’s here-and-now experience in the supervision: what parts are activated in relation to the supervisee, in response to the material being shared, and in response to the client as experienced by the supervisor. The supervisor will give attention to these responses as a possible source of information about what might be happening in the supervisory relationship and/or the therapeutic relationship (parallel process).
The supervisor will seek to unblend in the session. Where helpful they may choose to speak for their own vulnerable or protector parts in order to normalise and model transparency. Where the supervisor identifies trailheads for themselves, they may work with these trailheads later, alone or with peers, or with a supervisor of supervision, in order to enable more Self presence.
The supervisor may speak for and choose to lean into certain parts at certain times:
Teaching parts who share experience and knowledge, model how to do IFS
Creative parts who use role play, psychodrama, externalising and other techniques
Encouraging parts who validate the therapist’s system and their work with clients
Evaluating parts who determine competence with the supervisee
Supportive parts who inquire about the supervisee’s self-care and wellbeing
Supervision questions include:
What parts are showing up in my system right now?
How do I feel towards the supervisee/their client right now?
Are the parts activated in me providing information about parts active in the therapist/client, and/or trailheads connected to my own history?
5) Facet Five: The Healing Journey/Flow of the Model
Where the therapist is working to the IFS model, the focus here is on the therapist’s technical understanding of and ability to use the IFS model with clients and their own system. Attention on stuck points will feature. The main purpose of this aspect of supervision is to increase the ability of the therapist to help the client to unblend, to work with the 6 Fs, to establish Self-to-part relationships and to support progress through the Steps of Healing of the IFS model.
Where the supervisee is not familiar with the IFS model, the supervisor may need to use different language and concepts more familiar to the therapist. However, the IFS model will still provide a guide to the therapy process, for example, getting to know and appreciating protectors and gaining their permission to approach exiles.
Supervision questions include:
Where is the work with this client in relation to the IFS healing journey?
Is the work flowing or is it stuck?
In the therapist’s work, where do they feel confident and clear about applying the IFS model; where is there confusion or challenge?
6) Facet Six: The Therapeutic Relationship (client and therapist)
This aspect of IFS Supervision focuses on and assesses the ph or “psychotherapeutic H” of the therapeutic relationship. The vertical lines of the H refer to the ability of the therapist and client each to be their own “I” in the storm (Schwartz and Sweezy, 2020, pp.89-90) such that they can achieve Self-to-part relationships within their own system. The crossbar of the H refers to the ability of the supervisee and client to relate to the other from Self, speak for, not from, parts and have parts relax/step back as required.
Supervision questions include:
What parts are relating or being triggered in the therapeutic relationship?
Where does unblending and/or building internal Self-to-part relationship need to be given attention?
7) Facet Seven: The Supervisory Relationship (supervisee and supervisor)
This aspect of IFS Supervision focuses on and assesses the ph or “psychotherapeutic H” of the supervisory relationship. The vertical lines of the H refer to the ability of the supervisor and supervisee each to be their own “I” in the storm such that they can achieve Self-to-part relationships within their own system. The crossbar of the H refers to the ability of the supervisor and supervisee to relate to the other from Self, speak for not from parts and have parts relax/step back as required.
Self-supervision or supervision of supervision may be useful if supervisor parts are overly active in a supervisory relationship.
Supervision questions include:
What parts are relating or being triggered in the supervisory relationship?
Where does unblending and/or building internal Self-to-part relationship need to be given attention?
8) Facet Eight: The Wider System
In IFS supervision, we hold in mind the systemic understanding that at the organisational, community, cultural, national, and even global levels, Managers, Firefighters and Exiles exist with their polarities, alliances, and cultural and legacy burdens. These burdens may include racism, patriarchy, materialism, and individualism (Schwartz and Sweey, 2020, Ch. 18), as well as the impact of colonialism. Focusing on these aspects in IFS Supervision is likely to include working with issues of diversity and inclusion and implicit bias.
Supervision questions include:
What cultural and personal legacy burdens are present in this therapeutic/supervisory system
How is bias experienced/hidden/expressed by parts in the therapeutic/supervisory system?