TIC Thoughts

This week I participated in two events that centered around trauma informed care. Several things were stood out to me during these events and while I am still processing I wanted to put them out there. Plus, it helps me to reach my goal of blogging at least twice per month this year. Admittingly, this blog post won't be the same as my others. Here I am just putting thoughts, ideas, and things that really stopped and made me think. 

• "Racial oppression is a traumatic form of interpersonal violence which can lacerate the spirit, scar the soul, and puncture the psyche". - Dr. Kenneth Hardy
• We cannot build authentic rapport without addressing historical trauma. 
• Protective space and protective relationships are the foundation of trauma informed practice and supports the brain's neuroplasticity in healing. 
• Trauma is a public health problem. 
• Safety cannot exist without incorporating culture. 
• Trauma involves a loss of power and control. 
• "Nothing for us without us"; we must include those who are affected in meaningful ways. This is completely aligned with TIC principles. 
• We are harmed in connection- we can only heal in connection. 
• Evidence based practices must be implemented within the context of the community. 
• Keeping the work of trauma informed care moving forward requires collaborations which is a from of community care. 
• Sense of belonging is both necessary for those being served and the professionals who are part of the service. 
• To help foster belonging, take time to address when there is a breakdown in safety or a violation of norms. 
• Equity and culture are embedded in being trauma informed. 
• When we practice TIC everyone benefits. We need to have a common language and framework. 
• Transforming systems is foundational to healing- community collaborations are needed to moving the work forward. 
• Healing is more than resilience. 

Some questions I am still pondering:

• How do I foster a sense of belonging in the groups I work with?
• How do we give voice and choice to those we are working with in a meaningful way?
• How am I working to address historical traumas?

Self-care: Practice or Play

For the past year or so, I have observed more and more conversation about self-care from both social workers and others. I have read posts on social media with friends and colleagues discussing what they are doing for self-care. I even started a Facebook group with the intentions of encouraging people to engage in more self-care.

One post really got me thinking. A friend discussed their plans for having a spa day and getting their nails done. My initial thought was “Oh good for her”, but as I thought more about the post, I had to ask myself is that practicing or is that playing? There is an interesting dichotomy between practicing and playing, but we do not discuss it much when we talk about self-care.

So, what is the difference?

Practicing requires word and dedication. One does not become good at anything by doing it every so often. If I am trying to learn to play the piano, I would not be very good if I just worked at it once a week.

The word play is defined as to “engage in activity for enjoyment and recreation rather than a serious or practical purpose”. The word itself probably brings up images of something enjoyable that you may have done as a child or you do now. Adults do not play all the time; that is the quintessential hallmark of being an adult. I can play a board game, but no one probably say I am practicing a board game. I can also play a sport, but if I wanted to be taken seriously it would be more appropriate for me to practice that sport.

Are you practicing or are you playing self-care?

Practicing and playing are both important and social workers need to do both. However, playing self-care (i.e., getting nails done, drinking a glass of wine, or eating some fine chocolates) is not enough. We also need to develop practices of self-care. We need to attend to our emotional, spiritual, mental, and physical health. Each person’s path to self-care is different, but I encourage you to consider how to move from playing with self-care to developing more practices of self-care.

As you consider this, you begin to realize it is strongly related to resilience. Six psychosocial factors have been found to promote resilience and these include optimism, cognitive flexibility, active coping skills, maintaining a supportive social network, attending to one’s physical well-being, and embracing a moral compass (as cited by Nugent, Sumner, & Amstadter, 2014). These factors have been studied in individuals who have experienced resilience after a trauma, however, I contend that as social workers are living through a global pandemic with the burden of trying to care for a society that is plagued with injustices. If we have not experienced our own trauma, we need to be acutely aware of secondary traumatic stress. 

Play with your self-care. Find relaxation and enjoyment, but don't forget to practice self-care too. 

 

An "Aha" Moment

The New Social Worker magazine put out a solicitation for articles for Social Work Month 2021. I decided to try and submit something I have gained a deeper, clearer, and stronger realization of over the past year. I was excited to find out that it was accepted and published. 

"From a macro perspective, the most essential thing I want social workers to know is that we must work on changing the whole social environment" (Jones, 2021). 

You can read more here. 

Can “why” help prevent burnout?

Long story short, I decided to take some classes towards a Master’s in Business Administration. Will I complete it? Who knows…I honestly know. I am just taking a class at a time and focusing on enjoying learning new information. The first class I took was on Marketing for Nonprofits. I’ve always been kind of interested in marketing so I was excited about the course.

I believe it was in the second week we had to watch a TEDx Talk by Simon Sinek. In it, he talks about how most leaders and organizations know what they do, and then some go further and know how they do it. Few organizations know why they do what they do. Sinek refers to this as the Golden Circles; a seeming simple concept, but very impactful once fully realized.

Inspired leaders and inspired organizations communicate from the inside out; they start with why. Too often in social work we get caught up in the what and how. We want to know what we need to do our how to address a situation or what the issue is and how do we empower clients to address their issues that the why gets lost. I don’t know if you have every been in a situation where you do things just because someone has said this is what we do without explaining why it’s done that way. It drives me up a wall. Some people are so content without connecting to they why.

I think part of the reason social workers burnout is because they lose that connect with their why. Our jobs stress the what and how and it’s usually up to us to connect with our why. This March, social workers have been inundated with messages about being essential, but the funny thing is I think we already knew that. Knowing we are essential to the very social fabric of the country isn’t enough to save us from burnout. In fact, there is no single solution to the problem of burnout. However, there are things social workers can do to help prevent burnout such as self-care and appropriate supervision. Check out this article with some guidance on preventing burnout.

Social work is not a profession for the light hearted. If you are in micro practice you are working with people on some of their worst days. If you are in macro practice it is easy to forget that change takes awhile to happen. We can get so caught up in our daily "to-do" lists or whatever priority has come up. We take a strength's based approach to our work and sometimes we are the only ones looking for the good in others. When society is falling apart, social workers are there advocating for change. It's no wonder we spend so much time focusing on the what and how that put the why on the back burner of our minds. 

While not the single solution to burnout, I would encourage my fellow social workers to spend some time in reflection and reconnect with your why. Why drives our behaviors. Your why is probably what got you into the social work profession in the first place. Maybe your why has changed over the years (and that’s ok), but going beyond the what and how of what you do to connect with why you are in the profession can be part of the solution to preventing burnout.

This social work month- Connect With Your Why.

Social Work Month 2021

 

Cultural Competence

Over the past year or more I have been reflecting on what it means to actual be culturally competent. The Code of Ethics states that "Social workers should have a knowledge base of their clients' cultures and be able to demonstrate competence in the provision of services that are sensitive to clients' cultures and to difference among people and cultural groups". 

I'm not here to talk about the cultural competence vs. cultural humility, but for the record I appreciate the semantics of cultural humility. What I've been reflecting on is how do we "do" cultural competency? How do social workers shift their practice to provide services in a culturally competent way? 

I've been talking to other social workers about this. Now I have thoughts on this, but I am still trying to put those thoughts into words... so here are a few thoughts. 

1. Seeing a person as an expert of their own experience. 

2. Recognizing our own bias. 

3. Exploring values. 

This third bullet point really got me thinking recently. Exploring and clarifying values is a critical part of therapy, in my humble opinion. Values are often based in a client's cultural upbringing so helping a client to explore and clarify their values helps the social worker learn more about a client's culture. 

This could be very common knowledge, but it was light a lightbulb went off in my head. When we learn our client's values we get a look into their culture and what is meaningful to them. It also helps us to avoid approaching cultural competence as a cookie cutter method. Black/African American people are not a monolith; Latinx people come from a host of cultures. We can know about culture, but listening to a client, positioning them as the expert of their experience, and working with them to explore their values are strategies for competent practice. 

What Makes a Good Supervisor?

First of all, let me just say we are under a level 3 snow emergency here in Lucas County. I am working from home so although the office is closed I am still working. Although I am grateful that I do not have to go out in this snow today. Also, I do not have some clever way to relate this snow emergency or the picture to the topic of this post. I just wanted to show you the snow. 

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In a supervision group I was facilitating recently, we got on the discussion of work supervisors. I am not the work supervisor for anyone in this group so I thought it would be interesting to hear there responses on what makes a good supervisor. I believe it is good to hear from social workers what they think makes a good supervisor. As I said to the group, one day you will all be supervisors at some level so it is important to start developing your skills now. 

What makes a good supervisor?

• Someone who listens and validates. 
• Someone with a serving attitude. 
• Supportive, empowering, and strengths based.
• They are a leader instead of a "boss".
• Collaborative.
• Approachable- they are open to feedback.
• They act as a coach, mentor, and guide. 

Without prompting, these social workers shared qualities that are inherent in social work. Does this me all social workers make good supervisors? No, being a supervisor isn't for everyone. However, social workers do possess many of the skills they need to be good supervisors. 

For me, the one critical thing missing from this list is technical skills. Now I wouldn't expect that this group of social workers would say that during our conversation, but I do feel like the supervisor does need to possess the skills of what they are supervising. Is that common sense? Maybe, but I felt that any list needs to explicitly say that a good supervisor has the technical skills of related to they are supervising. 

So what about you, what qualities do you feel are needed to make a good supervisor? Do you agree or disagree with this list? Is there something critical that is missing?