Clinical Social Work Supervision

My name is Shanna Sears and I am a wife, mother of 2 girls and have practiced as a professional clinical social worker since 2005. I started my career in social work as a clinician in community mental health working with children and families.  I then moved to a hospital setting working at Integris Mental Health Spencer as a therapist on the adolescent unit.  I also worked in the utilization review department completing assessments for admission and completing reviews for the adolescent unit and the specialized STAR unit (Sexual Trauma and Recovery).  After having my first child in 2009, I decided to change my population of service and started working for Integris Jim Thorpe Rehabilitation.  I had the honor of working with some of the best professionals in the rehabilitation field with specialization in spinal cord injury patients and brain injury patients.  I had my second child in 2011 and then had an amazing opportunity to work for the government and learn new skills.  The best and most challenging experiences I had in social work was working for the VA Medical Center from 2012-2020, spending 6 years in the homeless program and 2 years in suicide prevention.  The VA transformed me into what I would describe as a truly competent, independent and well rounded social worker.  In 2020, I chose to leave the VA and work as a contract social worker providing home based care for clients with development disabilities and individuals in nursing homes.  I have also taken advantage of the experiences I started at the VA by providing clinical supervision as a senior social worker, and started my own business to help foster growth and competency for social workers seeking clinical license.  I  truly believe every person that chooses social work as their profession has something special to offer the practice and I want to help prepare them for their future.      

Clinical supervisors fosters the development of competence, demeanor and ethical practice for the supervisee.

Clinical supervisors are responsible for providing direction to the supervisee, who applies social work theory, standardized knowledge, skills, competency and applicable ethical content in the practice setting.

Clinical supervisors ensure that the supervisee provides competent, appropriate and ethical services to the client.

The clinical supervisor relationship is built on trust, confidentiality, support, empathy, constructive feedback, safety, respect and self-care. 

Three primary domains of supervision include: administrative, educational and supportive.

**My personal goal is to assure these standards are met.  The process is not always comfortable because the work we do in this field can be very taxing and demanding.  My hope is that we can meet the standards of the NASW to develop professionally but also grow personally to fully understand your purpose in the field while also being able to give wholly to your family and personal life.   

The pillars in which I focus my supervision on are the following:

ETHICS-Building an ethical foundation based on the SW code of ethics as a guideline. Developing and maintaining a sound ethical backbone within your personal life and professional life is a primary goal to embodying the clinical social work license. We will “constantly look at different problems, issues, values, principles and regulations within your place of work. The goal is to explore what actions best achieve fairness, justice and respect for others and evaluate these decisions after implementation”. (NASW Best Practice Standards in SW Supervision) 

As clinicians we are inevitably going to make human errors.  The important aspect of human error and making mistakes in this field is to assure that those errors are quickly identified and remedied, that we maintain humility and honesty in the midst of our errors and that we maintain a firm foundation of ethical grounding daily to reduce the chances of errors harming others. 

COMPETENCY & COURAGE-We must always be a student of human behavior and lean into the difficult problems faced in our field with curiosity by having the courage to ask the hard questions with humility and openness.  

SELF AWARENESS & SELF CARE-Knowing and fully understanding your own story will better prepare you for helping others with theirs. I use the challenges in supervision to provide many opportunities for reflection, personal growth and development of self-care that is effective and focused on the whole self (emotional, physical, spiritual).

COMMUNICATION & BOUNDARIES-This includes verbal, written and non-verbal communication. We will hold a high standard of practice to assure that all communication is comprehensive, thoughtful, educated and concise. This also includes advocacy, interdisciplinary communication and assuring to focus on appropriate boundaries within the clinician/client and clinician/workplace relationships. 

Individual supervision sessions are 60 minute sessions completed in person and via zoom when necessary.  Depending on the location of the supervisee's employer, I either meet them at their place of work or we make plans to meet at a local Metropolitan Library System.  I am available to my supervisees every day of the week for questions, processing ethical dilemmas, client consultation or guidance.  

I also provide a 90 minute group supervision session once every 4-6 weeks.  This gives all supervisee's a chance to discuss their work experiences, gives supervisee's a safe place to challenge barriers with feedback and direction and gives supervisee's an opportunity to share strategies and skills with their peers.  Per Social Work Board regulations will be no more than 4-5 supervisee's to a group at once.    

- Readiness for transformation from a student to an active provider

- Honesty and humility

- Willingness to self reflect and openness for feedback

- Reliability, ethical awareness and diligence

$100/hour