Expert Reflections on Navigating Ethical and Clinical Challenges in Supervision

This course will teach the participant to

• Describe supervisors’ ethical obligations to supervisees, clients, the profession, and the community.
• Identify the roles of supervisors.
• Discuss ethical and clinical issues involved in boundaries within supervision.
• Describe the steps to ethical decision-making in supervision.

Part One – General Reflections on Supervision

• How supervision is distinct from mentoring, consultation, and psychotherapy
• Qualities of effective supervision
• Key ethical issues in supervision
• Stages of supervision
• Supervisors’ ethical obligations to supervisees, supervisees’ clients, profession, and community
• Supervisors’ role in acculturation of supervisee to mental health profession
• Roles of a supervisor
  • Evaluative
  • Skills training
  • Developing supervisees’ insights into self
  • Protection of supervisee’s clients
• Who you are makes a difference
  • Optimal qualities and characteristics of the trainee
  • Optimal qualities and characteristics of the supervisor
• How you do it makes a difference
  • Basic supervisor competencies
• Supervision styles – didactic, role modeling, experiential
• Developing supervision: supervision changes as supervision changes
• Best practices for supervision
  • Case report versus behavioral demonstration
  • Orientation-driven supervision
  • Diversity training

Part Two – Navigating Ethical and Clinical Issues in Supervision

Reflections on boundaries in supervision

• Boundary crossings versus boundary violations
• Dual and multiple relationships
• Self-disclosure
• Gifts
• Touch
• Out-of-office experiences and accidental encounters

Reflections on ethical requirements of the supervisor

• Record keeping
• Regular schedule
• Assuming liability for both supervisee and supervisee’s clients
• Professional mental health associations’ rules and regulations for supervisors

Ethics in the practicum and internship

• Changes in clinical supervision over time
• Depth and scope of ethics training in graduate studies
• How to evaluate the ethical competence of supervisees
• Critical aspects of clinical supervision

Ethical Decision-Making in Supervision

• Steps to ethical decision-making
• Ethical decision-making associated with boundaries in therapy and supervision
• Seven steps to ethical decision-making
• Questions that arise during supervisory process