Richard Sears – Clinical Supervision: An Evidence-Based Framework for Developing Competent, Compassionate, and Skilled Clinicians

Outline

Why Integrate ACT Principles into Clinical Supervision?

• What makes ACT so accessible?
• The 6 core principles of ACT
  • Being in the moment v. lost in the past or future
  • Accepting reality as it is right now
  • Noticing thoughts v. getting caught up in them
  • Connecting to a bigger sense of self
  • Making values-driven decisions
  • Taking meaningful action
• Limitations of the research and potential risks

The SHAPE Framework of Clinical Supervision

Supervision Values

• Clarify goals and big picture values for the supervision process
• Contract to create meaningful commitment
• Check in regularly on direction and goals of supervision
• How to give difficult feedback effectively
• Attending to the highs and lows of the supervisory relationship

Hold Stories Lightly

• How to help supervisees learn from experience to loosen strict rule-governed behaviors
• Attend to workability
• Monitor stories and encourage flexible responding

Analysis of Function

• How to foster curiosity about the context and function of client behaviors
• Functional analysis of how the supervisee affects client behaviors
• Attending to the context and workability of what happens in the supervision sessions

Perspective Taking

• Why it’s important to promote flexible perspective taking
• How to help supervisees notice variations of experience and perspectives across contexts
• How to take different perspectives of the same experience
• Building reflective ability by seeing things form clients’ and supervisor’s perspectives, and assessing workability

Experiential Methods

• Why it’s important to use experiential methods to increase sensitivity to client-therapist context
• How to show rather than tell – use of role play, modeling, video, direct observation
• Noticing the effects of describing versus evaluating
• What to do when the supervisee is stuck or when things are not working