Clinical Supervision
/ External Supervision
for Social Workers and other Helpers & Healers
Online or in-person in Sydney
What is it?
Supervision is a confidential space for to support your professional and personal development as we yarn & deeply reflection on our selves and our practices (which is the combination of our skills, knowledge, ethics and choices), and to strengthen our sustainability and well-being practices.
It has can be known by different names depending on your role, training, workplace, frameworks, theories, and politics i.e. clinical supervision, external supervision, reflective supervision, professional supervision, practice supervision, reflective supervision, co-reflection, co-reflection sessions, supervision sessions, professional coaching, professional mentoring, work mentorship, external consultation, external case consultation, external coaching, off-site supervision, peer supervision, collaborative supervision, debriefing session, social work supervision….
My use of language:
I use both words “worker” and “service-provider” to refer to person who is providing care or a service.
I use both words “client” and “service-user” to refer to the person who is experiencing care or service from someone else.
This may not fit perfectly with what words you or your work uses. You might use other words like “visitor” or “community member” or something else.
Please feel welcome to replace my word choice in your mind with what fits best for you.
I use narrative therapy’s practice of centreing the client’s(your) choice of words and language so I will use your words and how you define experiences and issues, to minimise the use of external interpretations or clinical jargon that may unintentionally influence, change or misinterpret.
My background is social work so my language is influenced by that but whatever your title or role is called as long as you’re helping and/or healing people I’m here to support you.
Who is it for?
- Anyone who helps and cares for others in both paid and/or unpaid roles
- Students including from disciplines of counselling, social work, community services, social sciences, human services, and psychology.
- Individuals including new grads or those navigating their early career, peer workers, activists, human service professionals, health workers, volunteers, carers and community leaders.
- Individuals, teams, and/or groups engaging in For-Purpose work regardless if they’re in government, corporate, not-for-profit, private practice, or the community.
Some supervisees I’ve worked with have included: Wayside Chapel, Lou’s Place, MYAN NSW, Greens NSW, multiple teams at Legal Aid NSW, Women’s Justice Network, Defense, Women’s Health Centres, Barnardos Australia, Uniting, BRISSC, Aboriginal Legal Service, and people in private practice.
I have supported people in roles such as Students, Peer Workers, Counsellors, Social Work Students, Social Workers, Lawyers from CLCs, Team Leaders, Area Managers, Senior Lawyers, Community Workers, Youth Workers, Lived Experience and Living Experience Workers, Case Workers, Case Managers, Headspace, Community Development Workers, Activists, Advocates, Politicians, Social Workers, Psychologists, Counsellors, Relationship Coaches, Relationship Counsellors, Project Officers, Intake Officers, Case Workers, Drop-In Workers, Group Workers, Mutual Aid, Volunteer… what ever your title or role is as long as you’re helping, caring and/or healing people I’m here to support you.
Why do it?
- You want to develop and deepen your professional identity in theories & frameworks for specific issues, to exploring to figure out what kinds of roles and work best fits for you.
- You want to process the experiences and feelings that come up from your work.
- You want to be acknowledged and supported in the emotional load of trying to help in often complex and unfair systems.
- You want to share the weight of hearing and holding onto clients’ stories of trauma and distress so it doesn’t feel so heavy on you as only one person.
- You want to explore potential challenges to your work and/or professional growth.
- You want to develop greater self-awareness, critical reflection skills, self-esteem and confidence in your work.
- You want to develop your clinical competence, skills, and/or practice framework.
- You want to challenge your existing thinking or way of working.
This one is common for people wanting to leave more rigid and/or medical roles due to political and ethical reasons i.e. moving from an individual and neoliberal model of mental health/recovery to more liberation practices. - You want to grow your understanding, skills and knowledge to explore possible solutions to issues for your clients, cases, area of practice, or workplace issues.
- You want to receive emotional and psychological support, validation, a feeling of belonging and solidarity, and feel seen and understood.
- You’re feeling isolated, burnout, stressed or feeling like you want to leave your current job, team or profession.
- You want someone to support your unpack ethical and moral dilemmas.
- You want to talk about experiences and concepts like moral injury, vicarious trauma/vicarious resilience, compassion fatigue, and/or burnout.
It can also be as simple as: - You are feeling stuck and unhappy in your work, or
- Nothing is wrong you just have external supervision as a regular part of your routine as park of your self-care and best practice toolkit to be able to work sustainably.
I truly love to work with students, new grads or early career peers – don’t be shy!
My Beliefs & Practice Framework
I believe the personal is professional is political.
I work primarily from an Anti-Oppressive Practice, Trauma-Informed / Trauma-and-Violence-Informed (you can ask if you’re not sure about the difference between the two), Response-Based Practice, and Liberation lens as as supervisor. I think it is important to center Anti-Oppressive Practice and social justice as imperfect allies that lean in. I center the service-user, ethical practice and justice (although these things may occasionally feel like they are in conflict).
I am experienced in many interventions and models but that is not the same thing as my practice framework which is the foundation that guides how we understand and think about our work and world.
I’m very anti-hustle culture/neoliberalism/capitalism and very much about being intentional and slowing down in our work.
My own aim is not to make as much money as possible or to hoard power. My aim is to practice as ethically as much as possible while making a sustainable living.
Trauma-and-Violence-Informed Care & Practice
Truly trauma-informed care is a social justice framework that needs to be more than a focus on the neurobiology and reactions of an individual, and expand to include recognition and disruption of the systemic contributors to trauma and violence. This where the phrasing of Trauma-and-Violence-Informed Care/Practice originated.
Actually Trauma-Informed Supervision:
- Recognises power dynamics between supervisee and supervisor (and uses it e.g. reflects on positionality and privileges, tries to share power where possible, checks in, explicit consent, creating agreement on how to work together, invites regular feedback)
- Recognises power dynamics between the service-provider and service-user (and appropriately reflects and responds to it, taking the onus as the person with more power to be accountable and purposeful)
- Recognises lived and living experience of both service-users and service-providers (and sometimes we are both without the neat separation of the two)
- Recognises and validates the experience of trauma (and know how to to work with both your own trauma and your service-user/client's trauma)
- Recognises and normalises the response to trauma (and know how to have appropriate boundaries, know what is too close to home, how to transform your own lived experience to passion, self-disclose and share appropriately for the client's benefit using peer work principles, and how to hold space when someone is reacting negatively to something or escalating due to trauma)
- Understand the difference between intention and impact, and be able to hold both grace for good intentions and accountability for the impact at the same time (for both myself as a supervisor and the supervisee when we could do better next time)
- Be able to receive feedback and respond non-defensively to constructive criticism
- Practices and initiates repair and connection when there is rupture, conflict or disconnection with kindness and curiousity
What supervision sessions are like with me:
As a supervisor I move between roles of mentor, coach, educator, counsellor, and consultant depending on the needs and context of each situation. My ideal supervision relationship is very relational, reflective and long-term.
I work together with you to build trust and respect so that hopefully there’s a feeling of psychological safety where we can both admit to not knowing something, being imperfect, and trying things out.
I will not shame you for being human and don’t believe I am an expert who knows everything.
I share my professional and personal experiences, and also ask you to try to practice vulnerability, self-reflection, and sharing in our sessions together too. I understand it takes time to build trust and feeling safe enough to share so I don’t expect it immediately but want a shared commitment to work towards it.
Our supervision sessions will blend theory, values, sharing personal and professional experiences, solidarity, leaning into discomfort, discussions about power, criticism of oppressive systems including the AASW, and embracing imperfection and a growth mindset.
Some people want more structure so will send me stuff before session, and some people just want to come for a yarn and see what emerges in the space between us. Most people are somewhere in-between and come with some ideas about what to talk about. In a one hour supervision (most common though we can do longer) there’s enough time to discuss 1 to 3 issues, but it is totally okay and common to dive deeply into one issue over multiple sessions or revisit things.
I am flexible to your needs as my purpose in supervision to how to best support you so please let me know what works and doesn’t work for your brain. I work a lot with people with disabilities so let me know
What we can discuss
Our sessions will be guided by your current challenges and needs but we might cover any of the following and much more:
- Organisational issues, ethical dilemmas, team conflicts, interpersonal/coworker/employee/staff issues
- Ethical issues e.g. balancing bodily autonomy/dignity of risk with duty of care
- Moral injury, burnout, vicarious trauma (and the difference between all three)
- Sustainability and work-life balance
- Reflection on both direct and indirect work with people and programs
- Debriefing on crisis or high conflict/stress situations
- Use of self and impact of your own history/experiences on your work
- Boundaries, communication, assertiveness
- Being a manager/dealing with management
- Conflict management/conflict resolution, restorative/transformative justice processes
- Working in challenging and/or complex contexts e.g. working with people who have caused harm to others
- Being Neurodivergent in the workplace
- Dealing with imposter syndrome
- Counselling/casework case consultation
- How to center social justice/Anti-Oppressive Practice in a neoliberal capitalist society
If you are a professional therapist we might also discuss:
- Groups and groupwork planning/debriefing, relationship with co-facilitator (can have a group/triad sessions).
- Setting up private practice and related processes.
- Checking profile and brand copy to be as Anti-Oppressive Practice as possible.
- How to be both an ethical private/independent practice therapist and make a living wage.
- Case consultation on individual, relationship, and group counselling sessions.
- Upskilling in thinking more systemically e.g. relationship counselling including non-monogamy.
- Decolonising therapy frameworks/tools.
My own journey with clinical supervision:
Clinical supervision is an essential part to my ethical practice and the sustainability of my work. I graduated social work and immediately went into a role that was full of moral injury and trauma, and not enough support or training by my employer… so I had to look for support elsewhere and found that having a good external supervisor was able to support and guide me.
I continue to seek supervision for myself now that I’m in private practice (and work for myself) and pay for it because I find it hugely worth it.
I also use my own supervision to get refine my ethics, check my choices against my value, explore career directions, validate my struggles and choices, vent about frustrating situations and the broken system, give me ideas since I don’t know what I don’t know, refresh me from feeling burnt out, and challenge me lovingly to be best social worker I am meant to be.
I have different clinical supervisors I navigate specializations in (e.g. relationship counselling, Anti-Oppressive Practice, etc.) and see each of them on a regular and/or as needed basis. It can be an upfront cost but it is tax deductible (so save your receipts!) I see this an investment in myself and the quality of care that I offer to the people I work with.
The Details
Where are sessions held?
Online
Zoom
In-person at your location
Travel expenses will apply
In-person at my Sydney office
Inside Souliberate Wellness Centre
Suite 3, 482 King Georges Road
Beverly Hills NSW 2209
Opposite Beverly Hills train station, the building entrance is on Morgan Street. Street parking available along Morgan Street and Tooronga Terrace. There’s a bus stop right outside too.
Public transport:
The train station is 1 minute walk away (next to the shop).
Bus stops is literally across the street.
Driving/parking:
There’s free timed and untimed parking on the streets.
When?
Tuesday: 11:00 AM – 7:30 PM
Wednesday: 2:00 PM – 7:30PM
Sunday: 11:00 AM – 7:30 PM
Cost
Supervision can be self-funded and claimed back on tax and/or agency funded.
Individual clinical supervision
1 hour sessions: $150+GST = $165
Individual job mentoring and coaching
1 hour: $150+GST (non contact work is included in the timing for example proof reading CVs.
Group supervision (2 to 4 participants)
Min. 1 hours: $250 to $350* per session +GST
Group supervision (6+ participants)
Min. 1.5-2 hours: $350+* per session +GST
*Group supervision costs are applied on a sliding scale with consideration given to funding, community, advocacy or activism work and not-for-profit status. This approach allows me to practice equity and social justice in my work. It is a creative, system-wide solution to subsidising greater access to people and groups who would otherwise not afford these services.
