1. Submitted by: Mr. TRAN MINH TAN
Course: MSSW, Asian Social Institute, Manila, Philippines
Subject: Advanced Social Work Supervision
Submitted to: Prof. EDNA V. CUNANAN
Topic: THE HUMAN FACTOR OF SUPERVISION DYNAMICS
I. The supervisor:
1. Roles: According to Peter Howkins and Robin Sholet in the book of
Supervision in helping professions
• A counselor giving support
• An educator helping your supervisees learn and develop
• A manager with responsibilities for the quality of the work supervisee
is doing with their clients
• A manager or consultant with responsibilities to the organization
which paying for the supervision
According to several writers have looked at the complexity of roles that
provide for the supervisor (Bernard 1979; Hess 1980; Howkins 1982; Holloway
1984, 1995; Ellis and Dell 1986; Carroll 1996), among the sub-roles most often
noted are:
• Teacher
• Monitor educator
• Counselor
• Coach
• Colleague
• Boss
• Expert technician
• Manager of administration and relationship

2. 2. Needs:
• Professional needs:
o Good working environment
o Responsibilities and power
o To be respected
o Professional working equipments
o Clear working regulation/ job description
o Co-operation from colleagues and higher level management
o Promotion
o Higher payment
o Creative in order to find out the best way to complete tasks
o Learn from other’s failures
o A good and long relationship with partner
o Update professional knowledge
o Feedbacks from supervisees and others
o
• Personal needs
o Family
o Friends
o Suitable jobs
o Entertainment
o Income

3. 3. Accountabilities: Refers to your liability or answerability as a supervisor
for the way in which your organizational obligation and functions are
discharged either by yourself or those to whom you have delegated it.
• With higher level
• With partners
• With supervisee
• With clients
4. Self-nurturance and growth:
• Updated himself/ herself by reading books, magazines, newspapers
• Apply new technology/ strategies
• Reading actual cases/
• Being supervised by friends/boss
• Get suggestions from friends/boss
• Supervisory meeting/ exchange/ sharing experiences
• Review theory regularly
II. Supervisee:
1. Roles
• Leaner /teacher
• To be monitored/ Monitor educator
• To be counseled/ Counselor
• To be coached /Coach
• Colleague/colleague
• Staff /Boss

4. • Junior/ Expert technician
2. Needs:
• Professional needs
o Good working environment
o Responsibilities and power
o To be respected
o Professional working equipments
o Clear working regulations/ job description
o Co-operation from colleagues and higher level management
o Promotion
o Higher payment
o Creative in order to find out the best way to complete tasks
o Learn from other’s failures
o A good and long relationship with partner
o Update professional knowledge
o Feedbacks from supervisees and others
o Supports from supervisors
o To be treated fairly/ equally
o To be trained to improve professional knowledge
o Feedbacks from colleagues and clients to improve himself
o
• Personal needs
o Family

5. o Friends
o Suitable jobs
o Entertainment
o Income
3. Motivation:
• Feeling good with his work
• Chances to improve knowledge and skills through trainings and
workshops
• Promotion
• Salary
• Support, sympathy and encourage from supervisor
4. Accountabilities:
• To direct supervisor
o Progress and process of all projects’ activities
o Finance related to all activities conducted by supervisee
• To the partners
o Plan of Action (POA)
o Working plan
• To clients
o Answering client’s questions
o
5. Growth:

6. • Always be optimistic, to see opportunities in difficulties not
problems in difficulties.
• Take challenges
• Consult with supervisor regularly
• Updated himself/ herself by reading books, magazines,
newspapers
• Apply new technology/ strategies
• Reading actual cases/
• Being supervised by friends/boss
• Be open for suggestions from friends/boss
• Supervisory meeting/ exchange/ sharing experiences
• Review theory regularly
6. Different types of supervisees:
• Staff
• Student
• Paraprofessional
• Volunteer
III. The supervisory relationship:
1. One to one/ One to many/ Many to one
2. Supervisee and clients: In this worker-client relationship, supervisees
use the knowledge they have acquires from their professional training, and
follow the advice given by their supervisors to achieve the intervention
objectives
3. Client and agency: The process of social work supervision in an agency
is affected by the agency’s organizational goals, structure, policy

7. procedures, service setting, and climate. All are related to the culture of
the task environment of the organization
4. Supervisor and supervisee: as a “middle person,” is a mediator and a
liaison between the agency and the supervisee. On the one hand,
supervisors are administrators and, as such, members of the agency’s
management; on the other hand, they are the most senior frontline
supervisee. Supervisors have to play various roles in order to fulfill their
responsibilities.
Effective supervisory relationship: According to some authors, here are
some tips to keep the effective supervisory relationship of both supervisee
and supervisor.
For Supervisee:
• Show respect. Try to understand the business from the supervisor
perspective. Try to treat him or her with the respect the position and the
responsibility warrant.
• Do our best. In doing our best, we'll gain greater satisfaction from our
work, earn our supervisor's trust, and help the organization achieve its
goals.
• Give honest feedback. Choose our words wisely and use a gentle tone.
Both should promote and contribute to an environment of mutual respect.
• Don't try to hide problems. Try to solve the problem. If we can't and the
problem becomes serious, let our supervisor know as soon as possible.
Offer solutions and ask for additional recommendations. Don't let our
boss find out about the problem from someone else.
• Maintain boundaries. Remember to keep our business relationships
about business. However close we may be with our supervisor, he or she
is still the boss, and at times that means making unpopular or difficult
decisions.
• Be positive. Communicate with questions or suggestions, rather than
complaints. Volunteer suggestions to mitigate the problem, and don't be
offended if they're not always implemented.
• Manage anger. This doesn't mean we have to sit and stew when we are
angry. But learn how to communicate our anger appropriately.
• Embrace strengths. If our boss tells us that we're good at something or
have done an excellent job on a project, thank him or her and take it to
heart. Recognize our own talents and nurture them.

8. • Face shortcomings. We can't be skilled in everything we do. Ask our
supervisor for advice to help us grow in areas where we're weak. Take
his or her advice and make an honest effort to improve.
For Supervisor:
• Listen to supervisees: Listen to supervisees’ concerns, complaints, and
suggestions. Listen in a non-defensive manner and with an open mind. If a
supervisee has a complaint about us, be willing to accept the criticism.
Listening is an essential part of good supervision relationship. A good
supervisor listens attentively. When a supervisee wants to talk, make the
time to listen. Make the supervisee the most important person in the room.
Listening is an imperative role of the good supervisor and this creates a
good working environment.
• Talk to supervisees: supervisory relationship send clear, concise, and
consistent messages. They let their supervisee know about the job, its
expectations, and the expected outcomes. Supervisory relationship make
sure there clear understands of expectations by asking the supervisee to
verify understanding, thus avoiding miscommunications or
misunderstanding. A good relationship is patient, but is also thorough;
knowing that at times what is said needs to be documented for future
reference by the supervisee as well as the supervisor.
• Respect supervisee: Every person on this earth wants to be treated with
respect. It is part of our human nature. A good relationship knows that
respect will result in success. This means, a good relationship never be
littles, talks down to, berates, or mistreats his supervisee. Right
relationship between supervisee and supervisor is not about being “nice”
but rather represents himself/herself in a professional and responsible
manner and obtains the authority and the respect he needs from others to
be effective in his/her job.
• Expect responsibility. Hold your staff responsible for the work they do and
the way they behave. These are the tools to good supervision, to low
turnover, to high morale, and to high productivity. A supervisory

9. relationship knows this and holds his staff responsible for the work they do
and the way they behave.
5. The concept of emotional bank account
An emotional bank account is an account that you have with everyone you
know, in particular friends, family and loved ones. You make deposits by
doing something nice and meaningful to or for that person and you make
withdrawals when you hurt them or treat them badly. The balance in your
account is the amount of trust that’s been built up in a relationship, the
more trust the higher the balance. Just like a monetary account, you want
this account to have a large balance so that the relationship you have with
that person is a high trust relationship.
BEHAVIORS THAT BUILD OR DIMINISH TRUST ACCOUNTS
Deposits Withdrawals
Clear expectations Unclear expectations
Kindness, courtesy Unkindness, discourtesy
Making/keeping promises Breaking promises
Loyalty to the absent (don’t talk negatively Disloyalty, duplicity
about them)
Apologies Pridefulness
Seeking first to understand Seeking first to be understood
Accepting responsibility Blaming others
Exercising patience with others Manipulating
Distinguishing between person and Thinking win-lose
behavior
Assuming the best of others Being defensive
Rewarding open, honest questions and Not rewarding others
feelings
Admitting mistakes, apologizing, ask for Not admitting mistakes
forgiveness
Renewing your commitments to others Being dishonest
Being open to the influence of others Showing favoritism
Accepting the person and the situation Not giving credit
Agreeing on the limits, expectations, Sending mixed messages
consequences
Being there for others Showing a lack of courage
Letting natural consequences teach Taking advantage of others
Help others find solutions to problems Blame others for mistakes

10. Six major deposits
• Understanding the Individual
• Attending to the Little Things
• Keeping Commitments
• Clarifying Expectations
• Showing Personal Integrity
• Apologizing sincerely when you make a withdrawal
“Bad Habits are like a good comfortable bed, easy to get into and
hard to get out of”
6. Harmonizing organizational and personal needs
A system is presented for result-oriented allocation of time, energy, and
resources between the three important forces controlling any manager's
life: himself, his family and friends, and his organization. A manager is
constantly faced with seeking the proper harmony and balance between
his own needs and desires, the needs of his family and the objectives of
the organization for which he works.
• Set the proper objectives and make step-by-step project plans to meet
those objectives
• Time management skills
• Be active to control your works, not be controlled by works
• Balance my professional needs and personal needs
• My personal vision should have compliance with organizational vision
IV. References
1. Erlinda Abustan-Cordero, Consuelo Lo-Gutierrez and Evelina Asuncion-
Pangalangan, Administration and Supervision in Social Work.
Schools of Social Work Association in the Philippines, Manila, 1985
2. Stephen Covey,“The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People”

11. 3. Skidmore, Rex A. Social Work Administration: Dynamic Management
and Human Relationship. United States, 1995.
4. http://www.yourpotential.net/5/18/The_Emotional_Bank_Account.h
tml
5. http://partnering.inet.net.nz/a/bank.htm
6. http://blogs.southworks.net/nbeni/2008/07/23/the-seven-habits-of-
highly-effective-people-sharpen-the-saw/