Staff and Student Supervision: A Task-Centred Approach (National Institute Social Services Library)

Originally published in 1979, this successor volume to Dorothy Pettes’ earlier Supervision in Social Work volume aimed to provide supervisors and team leaders with the information they needed to function more effectively as either staff or student supervisors in both individual and group supervision. It covers the role and function of supervision in modern day social service organisations and compares and contrasts supervision in casework, group work, community organisation and residential work. A final section reports developments in the preparation and teaching of prospective supervisors.

Staff and Student Supervision was the most up-to-date and comprehensive book on supervision to be published at the time. It provides detailed analysis of the tasks undertaken and the problems faced by both staff and student supervisors, while at the same time moving into new and experimental areas. The task-centred approach, as presented by Miss Pettes, closely links in with new developments in social work practice and provides the supervisor with a firm base from which to maintain professional accountability and responsible involvement. It also suggests ways of involving workers in a flexible two-way partnership with the supervisor. This approach would have appealed to those preparing to become supervisors for the first time as well as to experienced supervisors ready to develop their skills further; to tutors and to training officers who would find much of value in the book; and to practitioners generally who would welcome Miss Pettes’ concise account of the supervisor’s role in relation to social work practice and administration.

Dorothy E. Pettes