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It is interesting that the dilemma (‘Managing boundaries’, October 2010, Therapy Today) is presented in the second person.
Supervision intervention
It is interesting that the dilemma (‘Managing boundaries’, October 2010, Therapy Today) is presented in the second person. This perspective forces the responder to make a choice. One option is to discuss the shortcomings of the supervisor as if they were one’s own; the other is to reply in the third person and disown the supervisor’s work. Naturally I would prefer to take the latter stand: the supervisor isn’t me; I hope I would never work this way with a supervisee. But in the interests of trying on this supervisor’s person I will accept the invitation to reply in the first person.
While I have noted that I have ‘challenged’ Jason on the succession of issues I am concerned about, there is a glaring absence of information in this scenario about how I have been addressing the apparently increasing unprofessionalism of his work. This suggests that I may not have carefully planned out or implemented a method of effectively helping Jason address these issues or indeed to see them as problematic in the way that I do. Jason’s defence structure is such that he does not react to ‘challenging’, so another style of intervention should now be attempted.
I don’t seem to be experienced in dealing with supervisees who break the rules, which may suit Jason perfectly if he is genuinely unwilling to undertake further training. It would appear that in fact it is I who may need further training, particularly in how to deliver appropriate feedback to enable ethical practice.
It is good news that I have been taking my concerns about Jason’s work to my peer supervision group, but it is worrying that of all the feedback given by the group, the suggestions to either dump or report Jason are the ones I am considering. Both of these courses of action sidestep my responsibility to provide Jason with a suitably robust supervisory approach. Additionally, both are unnecessarily punitive, humiliating and potentially damaging to Jason under the circumstances. After all, it was I who said ‘none [of the issues of concern] have warranted immediate action’. Am I harbouring an unacknowledged wish to be rid of Jason, or worse, to punish him for not being a well-behaved and easy supervisee?Caroline Vermes
MEd, MBACP (Accred)
