Thoughts on Supervision
I preface my thoughts here with the fact that I work as an executive coach in commercial organisations and I practice as a coaching supervisor with supervisees practising as coaches across the private and public sector.
What is the case for supervision in coaching? What are the benefits? What are the disadvantages?
Benefits
For me, the case for supervision in coaching rests in the importance of our task as coaches i.e. the process of facilitating another’s individual change and how this comes about. It requires significant interpersonal, intellectual and communication skills on the part of the coach, along with high emotional awareness and competence, all of which can be extremely exciting and energising and at the same time, extremely demanding. Necessarily, the coach works alone with each client, unless we engage in team coaching.
Supervision is a ‘safe’ practice where the coach can give an account of their work, with an experienced ‘other’ and reflect on their caseload, their individual clients and the systems in which the client works, their own process and approaches, and the demands of the task. While often in the coaching process, our attention is focused on our client, in supervision, we can focus our attention on ourselves and the impact on us of the client and the work that we do. It provides a time to muse, reflect, consider and learn. We can exchange ideas about interventions and interpretations of what is happening in the client system without competing.
By taking time out to reflect, we can address recurring themes or patterns in our own practice and in our clients’ experiences. We can experience what it’s like to receive dedicated attention, we can express our ‘not knowing’, our vulnerabilities and confusions, which in turn gives us an empathy with our clients. We can resolve quandaries, learn from the parallel process, and receive feedback from a respectful other.
A significant benefit for me is the power of the supervision relationship. When there doesn’t seem to be any ‘work’ to do, then attending to our relationship can generate rich support and data about issues that may lie beneath the conscious surface.
Disadvantages
Sometimes a disadvantage of supervision may appear to be the time we need to take away from our everyday work. For me this is far outweighed by the benefits.
Another disadvantage could be that by accounting to another about our practice, it may infantilise us, diminish our own authority and autonomy, expose vulnerabilities that we’d prefer not to acknowledge, so we lose confidence in our capability.
Depending on the frequency of sessions, if there is a long time gap between them, an issue that may have seemed significant or challenging at the time may defuse/deflate/disappear and so the impact and the potential learning from the reflective process may be lost, unless we are doing our own reflection either in real-time or as a continuing self-discipline.
Another disadvantage may develop through familiarity with the supervision relationship. Both parties unwittingly become over-familiar and/or predictable and therefore may collude and avoid challenge. One way to reduce this possibility is to change supervisors every couple of years and/or to put additional peer review/action learning set activities in place. These will provide additional avenues to give and receive feedback from colleagues. At the same time, it is important that the supervisor is constantly refreshing themselves in terms of new ideas/latest thinking.
Do we need to develop standards for coaching supervision or guidelines for best practice?
Yes, in time and with consultation and without re-inventing the wheel from some very effective models developed, tried and tested amongst the helping professions.
What skills, experience, qualifications and expertise should be expected of supervisors?
This question raises a vast array of possibilities. Whether they are all obligatory/mandatory is open to debate. These are in no particular order of importance or priority:
- Knowledge and experience of the process of different types of coaching and mentoring in a variety of contexts
- A ‘Catholic’ appreciation/awareness/knowledge of different models and theories underpinning diverse coaching approaches
- An understanding of individual, group and organisational change and the skills to facilitate change in others
- The skills to teach/coach/give feedback
- A good grounding in psychology, or at least an appreciation of different psychological models/theories
- Solid professional coaching experience
- Post Graduate qualifications – ability to draw on and refer to the appropriate literature
- Involvement in the industry, presenting papers, running workshops, training people to coach
- A delight in the process of supervision and a passion for its value; an appreciation of how it differs from coaching
- Ability to recognise adverse behavioural issues, either in supervisees or their clients and refer on
- An understanding of learning and learning to learn
- Organisational structures, cultures, politics to capture nuances in client systems
- Appreciation of and ability to work with ethical and boundary issues
- An integrated personal model of supervision that is transparent and appropriate to the coaches
- Sound personal awareness at a physical, mental, emotional and spiritual level
- Understanding of the phenomena of projection, projective identification, transference, parallel process, the relational unconscious
- Some understanding/awareness of mental health and well-being and how to recognise dissonance with knowledge and ability to re-direct
- Advanced interpersonal skills such as listening, questioning, rapport-building, feedback – giving and receiving, curiosity
Should supervision/supervisors be regulated/accredited in some way?
At this stage in our development as a profession, I think there should be some accreditation process, which intrinsically suggests regulation, albeit I shy away from that word. For me, regulation prompts concern that by so doing, candidates might ‘doctor’ their skills set or knowledge to jump through the appropriate hoop, and thus appearing on a register without accountability..
Has supervision had an effect on the quality or impact of your or your clients’ coaching?
I’d like to address this with each hat on separately:
As a supervisor – I have found that through the process of sharing another’s reflection on their practice, it prompts me to consider my own coaching approach. There are many common coaching issues that emerge from across my supervisee base, so it is valuable for us all to consider the multiple options available to us in finding effective ways to address these.
Based on explicit feedback from my supervisees, I am confident that their effectiveness has increased as a direct result of the work that we do together. This might be in terms of such elements as contracting, interventions, boundary issues, managing the organisational client, the personal well-being and confidence of the supervisee, all of which in turn impacts on their effectiveness with their clients.
As a supervisee – I am sure that my effectiveness is significantly influenced by my supervision. Testing ideas, thinking issues through, identifying new approaches, being aware of possible pitfalls, sharing my ‘wobbles’ and receiving reassurance and endorsement from some one I trust and respect is invaluable.
Author: © Alison Hodge April 2008
Alison Hodge Associates
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