Professional Leadership for Social Work Practitioners and Educators

Anna Fairtlough

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2016
• Topic: Social Sciences
• eBook ISBN:
  9781315413754
• Subtopic: Professional Development
• Index: Social Sciences

Professional leadership is increasingly recognised as being vital to enhancing social work's reputation and effectiveness. Although professional leadership is one of the nine domains of the professional capability framework in England, sometimes leadership is assumed to be the prerogative of managers rather than the responsibility of all professional social workers. The participation of social workers and social work educators in shaping professional cultures within organisations through practice innovation, practitioner research and workforce development is thus crucial. Drawing on theories that challenge hierarchical concepts of leadership, this book will enable experienced social work practitioners and educators to develop their professional leadership to more expert levels. Throughout the book there are case examples illustrating examples of advanced professional leadership in action, research highlights and exercises utilising self-reflection, action planning, creative writing and imagery to provide practical support to the reader.

Chapter 1

Introduction

Chapter objectives

• Introduce the content and approach of this book.
• Discuss the changing policy context for social work professional leadership in England.

A few years ago I was working with a group of social workers on a post-qualifying (PQ) programme. The students were dedicated professionals working in complex and stressful situations. All had worked as educators for qualifying social work students. They were working in settings such as child protection, children’s rights, disabled children, hospital social work with adults, schools-based social work, mental health and youth justice. Most were women, reflecting the gender imbalance in the profession, though there was greater representation of black and ethnic minority people than in the senior management teams of their organisations. They occupied different posts such as social worker or practice supervisor, and others held professional development roles.

On that day they were practicing the skills of solution-focused coaching (Jackson and Waldman 2011) to support each other to improve social work practice in their organisations. Each was developing a specific project. These included setting up reflective supervision groups, an advocacy programme for young people, bringing schools-based social workers together to learn from one another, developing family group conferences and recruiting service users to train and mentor social workers in their team. One person was coaching another – ‘goldfish-bowl’ style – in front of the others, and the participants were giving each other feedback on their coaching skills. The conversations were lively and reflective. Everyone was engaged on multiple levels: in supporting each other, in developing their own piece of social work practice that they were passionate about and in improving their skills and understanding of how to do both of these things. One participant compared the demoralised atmosphere of her workplace with what was going on in the room. She looked round the room and said, ‘I wish we could bottle what we all have here’. This is what this book aims to do.

So what elixir would be in this bottle? It depends on your tastes. For me, it would bring that subtle but distinctive form of cheerfulness and energy that I love about tea. Throughout my professional career as a social worker, manager, educator and researcher I have looked for opportunities that give me those feelings and people that share them. Some of you would probably prefer the dynamism of an espresso or the refreshment of iced water. Exercise 1.1 at the end of this chapter uses this metaphor to consider what sustains you in your professional career.

What these practitioners were doing was exercising professional leadership. They were finding possibilities to develop new forms of professional practice in frequently chaotic environments. As part of their academic work they were critically reflecting on their practice and developing their ability to locate and appraise research and other evidence relevant to their projects. As a group they were mentoring each other, creating connections to sustain resilience and hope in the face of considerable obstacles. Through exercising coaching skills they were supporting each other to identify the desired outcomes for their practice innovation, to notice and affirm what they were already doing well, to plan next steps and to evaluate their progress. These practitioners wanted not only to develop themselves professionally but also to influence social work practice in their organisations and beyond.

The students were on a programme called the MA in Advanced Social Work: Practice Education. I had written this programme during one of several revisions of the post-qualifying framework in England over the past twenty years. There had also been changes to qualifications for what had been called practice teachers, which were then called practice assessors, and are now practice educators, or practitioners in the field who educate and assess qualifying students. I thought that these changes were retrogressive and downgraded the importance of the practice education role. The programme offered opportunities for social workers not just to learn the basic skills of ‘enabling others’ as a practice assessor but also to take their skills to more advanced levels. However, I came to realise that it would have been better titled an MA in Advanced Social Work: Professional Leadership. Many people seemed to think of practice education as just ‘working with students’ rather than, as I conceived it, something that encompasses the many ways in which social workers can innovate in practice and contribute to creating a more skilful, reflective, ethically aware and evidence-informed workforce.

Professional policy context

I have practiced social work and social work education in England. Necessarily, this will influence the examples of practice I draw from and the terminology I use. The past eight years have seen many changes in the policy context for social work and social work education in England, which has influenced my thinking about this book. However, although the professional frameworks I discuss are context specific, many of the underlying themes such as tensions between professional autonomy and increasing bureaucracy, contested public, professional and political definitions and understandings of social work and the impact of austerity policies and inequalities on service users, social workers and the organisations they work in may be common not only to other countries within the UK but also internationally (Lyons et al. 2012, Cree 2013, Beddoe and Harington 2015). Although the focus is on social work much may also be relevant to other professional groups.

In 2008 media fury surrounding the murder of a young child who had been known to social workers and other professionals was directed at all the professionals involved, but particularly the social workers. A famous cover of the Sun newspaper on 12 November had a headline ‘Blood on their Hands’, referring to all social work professionals involved in the case. Some social workers received death threats, and the director of Children’s Services was publicly sacked by a government minister. A year later the then-Labour government established the Social Work Task Force (later the Social Work Reform Board to take forward its recommendations) to enquire into what was ‘going wrong’ with social work. It rapidly became a sector-wide enquiry taking evidence from service users, practitioners, managers, educators and others into all aspects of social work education, employment and professional standards.

The Social Work Task Force (2009) identified a range of interconnected problems that were undermining the efficacy of the profession. Social work was perceived to lack authoritative leadership at national and local levels. Employers were not always facilitating an environment in which social workers could practice effectively, so social workers were too often working with excessive workloads with inadequate support and supervision. Staff vacancies and turnover, particularly in child protection, were high and morale low. As had been graphically illustrated in the response to Peter Connolly’s death, public perception of social work was poor. This was compounding difficulties in recruiting and retaining capable social workers. Qualifying social work programmes were not always preparing social workers adequately for the job, particularly when practice placements did not provide effective learning experiences. The task force recommended that a new framework for professional standards be developed and laid out a plan for whole system change to establish stronger national and local leadership, improve working conditions and enhance initial and post-qualifying training. Although there were some detractors, there was broad consensus from the profession in favour of these recommendations.

The incoming Conservative and Liberal Democrat coalition administration of 2010 expressed support in taking this programme of work forward. However, the Coalition, and the Conservative majority administration elected in 2015, have also set up their own reviews of social work practice and education and have implemented new policy initiatives, including major changes in the bodies that regulate social work. This has resulted in a more complex, contested and confusing policy context. One of the first actions taken by the coalition was to abolish the General Social Care Council, whose responsibilities for registering social workers and regulating social work education were given to the Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC). However, the government has recently declared that a new social work body will eventually take over these responsibilities (Department for Education 2016).

The Professional Capability Framework (PCF) underpins how the Social Work Reform Board envisioned social work practice (British Association of Social Workers n.d.). The framework moves from a competency-based model, which was criticised for atomising practice into disconnected tasks (Horder and Kelly 2001), to a holistic one that recognises the interconnected ethical, emotional, intellectual and practical capabilities that social workers need for effective practice. The PCF includes nine domains of social work practice. In order to demonstrate any of the domains the values, knowledge and skills of the other domains must also be integrated, a little like a hologram. Importantly, in contrast to the previous framework that only specified minimum qualifying standards (though minimum standards for continuing registration with the HCPC have been retained), the PCF provides a framework for whole-career development. There are nine levels of practice applicable to people entering the profession, proceeding through different stages of qualifying training, to the first year of qualified practice and through social worker and experienced, advanced and strategic social worker. At the two highest levels, specialisms of practitioner, practice educator and manager are introduced.

The aspiration to improve leadership and public understanding of social work was fulfilled by the establishment of the College of Social Work in 2011, but its sudden collapse in 2015 has once again opened up a vacuum in national leadership. The British Association of Social Workers (BASW) has taken on some of the functions of the college and has seen a recent revival of local branches and a substantial increase in membership (Robb 2016). It remains to be seen whether BASW can fulfil its aspiration to be recognised as the professional body that represents social work in Britain. Two chief social workers, one for adults and one for children and families, have been appointed to provide expert advice about social work to government, although this has generated controversy about their relationship to the profession and role within government. Many local authorities now employ principal social workers who, while continuing to practice social work, also provide a professional lead across the organisation and a national leadership role through the Principal Social Worker Network. Work on developing national career structures is underway (Local Government Association 2012, Department for Education 2016).

The Standards for Employers of Social Workers in England (Local Government Association 2014) outline how employers should create a positive and accountable social work environment. Annual health checks ascertain how well these standards are being met. Employers are expected to establish strategies to monitor the effectiveness of their social work services, to undertake workforce planning and to maintain strategic partnerships with higher education institutes (HEIs) to support delivery of social work education. Social workers should be supported to practice effectively through appropriate supervision and caseload, risk and resource management. Social workers need to be enabled to maintain their registration as social workers and to access continuing professional development (CPD). An assessed and supported year in practice (ASYE) for all newly qualified social workers (NQSWs) has been developed, with common assessment methods and standards.

There has been renewed emphasis on the responsibility of practice organisations to provide practice learning opportunities for students. Staged Practice Educator Professional Standards (PEPS) 1 & 2 for practice educators who are working with first- and final-placement qualifying students have been introduced (College of Social Work 2013 – available on BASW website). All practice educators now have to be registered social workers, and only those meeting stage 1 & 2 PEPS may take the decision that a student is ready for qualified practice. Skills for Care (2013) has provided guidance on the role of the practice development educator (PDE), who takes responsibility for supervising, teaching and assessing qualified social workers undertaking CPD. Core principles underpinning CPD for social workers, including portability, measuring impact, holistic work-based assessment and the integration of reflective supervision and practice, have been developed (Skills for Care 2014).

Two further reports into the professional education of social workers in adults (Croisdale-Appleby 2014) and children’s services (Narey 2014) have reopened debates about the future of social work education. These include how we define and understand what social work is or ought to be, who should be recruited onto social work programmes and what they should learn, to what extent initial qualifying training should be specialised, and the relationship of the academy with practice. Narey (2014), in particular, was critical of the PCF as providing insufficient guidance on the role of the statutory children and families social worker. Accordingly, new statements have been developed by both the Children and Families and Adults chief social workers that define the social worker’s role in these two statutory settings (Department for Education 2014, Department of Health 2015). For children and families social workers, these will underpin new assessment and accreditation processes. Fast-track programmes into social work such as Step up to Social Work and Frontline for children’s social work in which employers play a more leading role in training social workers have been established. Successful candidates are offered a generous bursary or salary. A similar pathway in mental health is underway. Although these programmes have recruited well and employers have generally received them positively, there have been criticisms. Concerns have been raised about their rapid introduction without longer-term evaluation of their effectiveness, the compressed time scales and increased specialisation possibly resulting in a narrower and less critical learning experience and the lack of diversity amongst successful candidates (Smith et al. 2013, Croisdale-Appleby 2014). In 2015 the government announced further expansion of these programmes, which could destabilise existing qualifying programmes, potentially adversely affecting the wider academic workforce and their research capacity.

Alongside these reforms has been the government-commissioned review of child protection. In three reports, Munro (2010b, 2011a, 2011b) concluded that central government and local managerial targets designed to improve child protection processes have, paradoxically, sometimes had the opposite effect. Effort has been directed towards defensively demonstrating that the correct processes have been followed rather than ensuring that children, young people and their families have indeed been helped. What was needed was a move from a ‘compliance to a learning culture’ (Munro 2011b, p. 7) in which social workers were better enabled to develop and exercise professional expertise. However, although some progress has been made towards this, Munro (Liquid Personnel and Munro 2015, p. 2) admits that progress towards system change has been slow, recognising that ‘work conditions have undoubtedly got tougher’, with ‘funding cuts, rising referral rates and continued public criticism creating a fearful culture’. Practice examples 1.1 and 1.2 show how important professional principles of social work, when turned into rigid targets, can penalise social workers for taking actions to promote children’s welfare.

Practice examples 1.1 and 1.2 Misuse of professional principles

1.1 An experienced social worker is due to visit a child in care in a stable placement some distance away. A crisis situation and transport difficulties delay her. She decides to stay overnight (at her own expense) and visit the child the next morning. As a result of this she is ‘named and shamed’ on a list of social workers who fail to undertake statutory visits on time. If she had asked the foster carers to keep the child awake she would not have been disciplined. However, her choice to delay this in order not to disrupt the child’s routine and to give her time to properly engage with the child and her carers is clearly in the child’s interests and good social work practice.

Here the organisation is privileging one aspect (timeliness) of good practice in social work with children. An organisation committed to a well-led professional environment would ensure that their social work accountability framework valued ethical and committed practice as well. They would also ensure that the worker’s caseload was realistic. If missing targets was a consistent feature of the social worker’s practice, an effective organisation would try to support her to manage her time rather than shame her.

1.2 An independent social worker is undertaking life story work with a young person about to leave care. She visits the social work team to look at the young person’s file. Part of the agreed work with the young person is that they will look at some particular parts of the social work record of her life together. The young person is adamant she does not want to do this in the office. The senior practitioner who meets the independent social worker shows little interest in the therapeutic aspect of the work and tells her it is management policy that she cannot take copies of any part of the file out of the office. The independent social worker outlines the stringent arrangements she makes to ensure security of service users’ records. The senior practitioner cannot find a written version of the policy, nor can she articulate the professional reasons behind it, but, when challenged, merely repeats the requirement.

Here the senior practitioner is not considering how applying the organisation’s rules on document security might, in this instance, hinder the therapeutic value of the work to the young person. An alternative approach would have been to discuss with the independent social worker the best way of combining the security and confidentiality of the young person’s records with her ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• List of figures
• List of exercises
• List of practice examples and research highlights
• List of abbreviations and acronyms
• Acknowledgements
• Note on author
• 1 Introduction
• Part 1 Values and knowledge for professional leadership
• Part 2 Leading social work in different contexts
• References
• Index