Texas Counselors Creating Badass Businesses

87 How to Navigate Supervisor Problems: A Guide for New Graduates

June 21, 2024 • Dr. Kate Walker Ph.D., LPC/LMFT Supervisor • Season 3 • Episode 87

Share episode

Embarking on a new journey as a mental health professional can be exhilarating, yet navigating supervisory relationships often comes with its own set of challenges. We wrap up our series by gifting graduates with essential insights into recognizing and addressing red flags in supervisory dynamics. From the importance of the initial supervision session to the foundational paperwork, we arm you with the knowledge to foster a constructive environment for your professional growth. Listen as we dissect the OER triad—orientation, evaluation, and remediation—and how it influences the supervision process, ensuring you're equipped to differentiate between the natural hurdles and those signaling a need for change.

My own tale of early professional struggles underscores the episode's narrative, as we delve into the ethical and business considerations of supervisory relationships, particularly in private practice settings. Learn from my experiences about the business savvy required to thrive, and the repercussions when it's missing. This chapter serves as a poignant reminder to address issues promptly and the agency you hold to seek a better match, should your current supervisor fall short. We also discuss how to smoothly transition to a new supervisor, highlighting resources available for those in search, and ensuring you continue to uphold your commitment to providing quality mental health care.

This episode isn't just a celebration of your academic achievements but a guiding light as you step confidently into the professional world. For those of you still within the university's embrace or seeking a new supervisor, we provide practical steps and resources, such as the Texas Supervisor Coalition and Kate Walker Training website, to aid in your search. As we conclude our series, remember that the right supervisory relationship can significantly impact your career trajectory and the lives of those you aim to help. Congratulations on reaching this remarkable milestone, and may your path forward be as rewarding as the noble work you set out to do.

Get your step by step guide to private practice. Because you are too important to lose to not knowing the rules, going broke, burning out, and giving up. #counselorsdontquit.

Speaker 2:

Down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down, down.

Speaker 2:

Thank you, welcome to the third series in our three-part series that is a gift to the new graduates. This is my graduation gift to you, this three-part series on how to find a great supervisor, what makes a terrible supervision contract and, of course, what makes a great one. And then today's episode how to break up. If you have found a supervisor, you've signed all the paperwork and you get in there and you're just like, ooh, this is not working out. How do you know? I mean, I know new graduates, you're coming out of a program with professors and evaluations and exams and you're used to kind of okay, this is just the way it is and I've just got to kind of put up with it. Well, supervision is different, and if you didn't listen to episode 60, and if you haven't listened to episode 86 about how to find a great supervisor, go back and listen to that. But this episode is really going to. This episode is going to introduce you to some red flags, things to look out for. And even if you are in the supervisory relationship and you've gotten your LPC associate or your LMFT associate license and you're like, okay, I'm in this, I'm kind of stuck. You know you're never stuck, You're a grownup, you can change your mind, it's okay. So listen to the following red flags and we can kind of brainstorm together.

Speaker 2:

I'd love to hear your thoughts about this and I know I've got some supervisors listening into this too and I'd love to hear your thoughts as well. At the end of the day, we are all on the same team. We are out there trying to fill the gaps in access to affordable mental health care in rural Texas, underserved areas and all over the country. So we want this to work. This is not about finger pointing. This is about, okay, what do we need to do to make things better? So, graduates, new graduates this is geared toward you but new supervisors, seasoned supervisors, any supervisor if you're listening to this and you think, ooh, there's some things I could do in my supervision practice to really make things better all the way around for me, for my supervisees, for the clients out there, then by all means do it and reach out to me. If you have questions. You can reach out on email, you can go into our Facebook groups you know we have Texas counselors creating badass businesses and if you're a supervisor, you can join the Texas Supervisor Coalition Facebook page.

Speaker 2:

And I'd love to hear your thoughts on what I'm about to present regarding okay, what are the red flags when it comes to a supervisor and supervisees? What should you do about it? So the first red flag I want to talk about actually you can figure out pretty quickly, and red flag does not mean deal breaker. Let me be really clear about that. But a red flag for me, if I was teaching you new supervisee, is if you have signed the paperwork right. There are two sets of paperwork the state paperwork that establishes the supervisory relationship and the supervision contract that we talked about in episode 85. And you've signed that and you have shown up for your first session of supervision and you kind of just jump into talking about clients.

Speaker 2:

What's missing? There is an orientation. Now we talk about the OER triad orientation, evaluation and remediation and here's what that means. The orientation is where your supervisor will go over all of those details that they talked about with you in the contract. So it's more than just here are my emergency procedures. It's hey, here's how to schedule with me, here's how to find me, here's what an emergency is, here's a way to know the difference. So you'll have a conversation about these things rather than just here's the contract, take it. Difference so you'll have a conversation about these things rather than just here's the contract, take it or leave it. It's where the collaboration starts.

Speaker 2:

Right, this is where the relationship with you and your new supervisor really gets solidified and you'll be able to have an idea of the next part, the E in the OER triad, which is the evaluation schedule. Right, if they're not going to evaluate you and you would find this out in the orientation. Right, because in an orientation, your supervisor is going to probably give you a copy of the evaluation so you can look at it. Right, that's the best way to pass the test is to know what's on the test. Right, and the O and the E mean that.

Speaker 2:

The R, which is remediation, because for clinical supervisors in Texas, they must remediate you before they terminate you. But if they have never taught you the skill, how can they evaluate it? And if they've never evaluated it, how can they remediate it right? So those three things evaluated it, how can they remediate it right? So those three things orientation, evaluation and remediation are super important and you'll find that out quickly as soon as you start meeting. So you can even ask your supervisor hey, are we going to do an orientation where you kind of talk me through all of your procedures and things like that and they may have just forgotten, they may have gotten busy, right? I love giving people the benefit of the doubt because we're all on the same team here. But that's the first. We'll call it the beige flag, right? So it's not quite red, but it's getting there.

Speaker 2:

Another 100% red flag I'm not even going to try to change this one. I mean red flag is if you have a supervisor and you notice all they do is meet you for group supervision. Now, let's be clear group is two or more supervisees. So if you're meeting with one other supervisee, that's actually called triadic and it's okay. It may not be what you like, but you can count triadic supervision as individual supervision. Yay, and this is a total green flag. Your supervisor may let you do that and split the cost of supervision with your colleague who's doing triadic with you. But if you have all group, which is more than two supervisees meeting together, and you notice a month goes by and another month goes by and you guys are kind of talking to each other and you're like, wait a second, has anybody else had individual or triadic supervision? And everybody's like no, we always just meet as a group. Super duper red flag. Because not only are you getting shortchanged new supervisee, it's actually the supervisors breaking the rules. Your license, your LPC or LMFT associate license, specifies in the rules that you must have only roughly and I'm not going to use specific language from the rules because they're worded a little bit differently but you can't have more than half of your supervision meetings in a group setting Another red flag.

Speaker 2:

Group setting Another red flag. If you have a supervisor and when you guys meet together the first time, you're just getting to know each other. And this happens a lot, believe me, and it's not because we have bad people out there, I promise you this. Just kind of it's the nature of how change happens and life happens and things like that. But let's say you meet your supervisor and they say, great, we'll meet on Tuesdays at five, awesome. Well, if time goes by and you're like, oh, I got to change jobs, or maybe you have other responsibilities, other family members, and you go to your supervisor and you say, hey, that five o'clock on Tuesday time, yeah, it's not going to work for me anymore, and your supervisor says, oh well, that's the only slot I have, right. So see, not a bad person, but definitely a red flag about going forward with supervision. Right, you need a supervisor who has some flexibility, and it may not be even a job thing or a kid thing. It's simply you get sick and you miss supervision at 5 o'clock on Tuesday, or you have to go out of town or traffic's bad or something. If your supervisor or potential supervisor, if you're still in the interviewing process only has one time available for supervision, that's going to be tough. So I call it a red flag. How do you know it's time to break up? But it can also be one of those things that you ask that question during the interview process hey, exactly how many slots do you have for supervision? How do you make up supervision? What do you do, et cetera. You get the idea.

Speaker 2:

Now this next part is tricky. So I think of it as somebody talking behind your back. So when you to talk about all of those feelings inside of you that are triggered by the clients, you see it's normal you should be able to talk about these things in a safe space. Now let's put a pin in that, and I'm going to talk about if you are actually breaking the rules, if you are doing bad things Okay. So we have normative conversation with the supervisor and we have things you shouldn't be doing. Okay. So if you're doing things you shouldn't be doing, yeah, your supervisor has an obligation to report you to the board, to call your job and let your job know these things are bad. You are doing bad things. Don't do those things. What I'm talking about here in this segment of the podcast, though, is that safe space, so in your contract should be a section on confidentiality. What you say in supervision stays in supervision, and if there's an issue that needs to be discussed with your job, that it will be a collaboration. We will all be in on the conversation as a team.

Speaker 2:

Where the red flag starts flying is when you find out your supervisor has been talking about you with other people at your agency and you were not aware of that. So you can imagine if you've been very open about some counter-transference that you've been experiencing and you talked it through with your supervisor and then the next thing you know, your schedule is impacted or you're taken off a particular case and you had no idea that this was even talked about, or it comes up in staffing right. That can lead to real feelings of betrayal. We call it triangulation and it's the supervisor's job to protect that relationship. So your supervisor has an obligation to report you to the board and to your job site if you're doing bad things. They also have an obligation to protect the public. So if a conversation is necessary and that can totally happen your supervisor comes to you and says, hey, we need to have a conversation with your job site because I'm really concerned about X, y and Z. So when they bring you in on this conversation, that's the right way to do it. If they leave you out of the conversation, that's when that red flag is flapping in the wind is flapping in the wind.

Speaker 2:

Another thing to kind of be aware of and this isn't going to be news to anybody because you just got out of a graduate program, you had that professor that was all critique and zero encouragement, or they would, you know, watch your video and they couldn't find anything nice to say. Or maybe I'm actually bringing up memories of maybe more of a family situation or maybe a bad boss that you had years ago when you were working at McDonald's. So we've all had the experience, I would assume, of having a superior or a supervisor or a boss or an authority figure who was all critique and no encouragement. That's discouraging and supervisees. You don't have to put up with that. You can get into this process and think, okay, I'm stuck, I'm in it, you know what? It's better than nothing. Or they were the cheapest supervisor in town, or they are expensive, but they have the specialty that I really need and you can talk yourself into thinking that it's okay but it's not right.

Speaker 2:

So if you have a supervisor that's just critique, critique, critique, criticize, criticize, criticize, and you're feeling the burden of it and you're starting to burn out and you're dreading going to supervision because of it, we need you right. You're too important to lose because you're going to supervision with somebody who doesn't understand how to encourage right, who doesn't understand how to teach or doesn't have a teacher's heart. So please consider just looking around right, doing a little interviewing, because that is a red flag, because it impacts you and your desire to stay in the business. We need you to stay in the business. Okay, I'm going to jump back to this idea of terminating without remediating. Okay, I'm going to jump back to this idea of termination without remediation.

Speaker 2:

So, in Texas, the rules are your supervisee. So, in Texas, the rule is, if you're a supervisor, you must remediate your supervisee before you terminate the supervisory relationship. Okay, so you remember my examples earlier. There's the example of you're doing bad things and you need to be stopped. The public needs to be protected. Yeah, your supervisor probably won't remediate you there. They're probably just going to take action against you and protect the public Yay, that's good. Don't do bad things. Protect the public Yay, that's good, don't do bad things.

Speaker 2:

If your supervisor, though, gives you, let's say, an evaluation and you are just not meeting expectations on certain criteria, well, they may give you what's called a remediation plan. Now, the remediation plan that I teach in the 40-hour training to become a supervisor in Texas is very structured. It has a specific, measurable, attainable criteria. There are time-limited dates that that criteria must be met. Think about, like writing a paper it's due on Tuesday, right? So you have a specific assignment, it has to be done by a specific date and then we can move forward to see if you're starting to understand and master the skill requiring remediation. So your supervisor has an obligation to remediate you when they feel you don't have the skills necessary to see clients. Right, because our number one job, everybody's number one job, is to protect the public. Right, your supervisor is in charge of making sure you can do that.

Speaker 2:

So here's the red flag part. If your supervisor comes to you and says hey, you know what, I'm really tired of your attitude, I'm firing you. And you're like, wait what? I haven't been evaluated. Or I've been evaluated and you said I was amazing. And now you're saying I have these amazing evaluations and you're firing me. Well, that's a red flag, right? If your supervisor has not made an attempt to either evaluate you or is terminating you without remediating you it's tough to say then that may be the red flag for you to look for another supervisor.

Speaker 2:

Now notice what I'm saying here. I'm not saying that just because you got a remediation plan, you should quit supervision. Please don't do that. Please don't supervisor hop. Just because somebody gave you a negative evaluation or gave you a remediation plan. They're trying to help you, new supervisee, they're trying to help you master the skills. So an evaluation that didn't go like you wanted it to, that's okay. A remediation plan doesn't mean you're terrible. It's okay. In fact, the opposite is true. That's what I'm trying to tell you here.

Speaker 2:

If you have a supervisor that never evaluates you or tries to fire you without remediating you, that's where the red flag is, unless you are doing bad things. I always got to bring it back there because I never know when somebody is going to like hit pause on this podcast and they're going to listen and be like wait a second. So let me reiterate one more time If you are doing bad things, yes, your supervisor probably will just do what they need to do to protect the public. But if it's part of supervision, part of the normal level one, level two, level three, learning process you're trying to learn new skills, then a good supervisor will teach you the skill, they will formally evaluate the skill and then if they think over time you're not meeting expectations, they will remediate you before they terminate you. That is good supervision. That's a good supervisor. So story time.

Speaker 2:

I had a supervisor when I was first starting out and it was way back in the early 2000s. So this supervisor was in my town, super convenient, and he was going to allow me to see clients in his private practice, which was great, which was great. Back then, of course, we could not own our own private practice, so the only private practice experience that a new intern is what we called it back in the day. The only experience you could get in private practice is if you found a supervisor willing to just let you see cash-based clients in their practice, because there was no incident to billing and no way that an intern could ever be credentialed with insurance. So sounded wonderful, and not just to me. There were several of the folks that I graduated with and we were all like, yay, we get this great experience, we're going to be in the super cool office, we're going to get to see clients in private practice. We all had other sites, of course, but this was such a cool opportunity we thought, right, dun, dun, dun. So here we are meeting.

Speaker 2:

Week one Awesome, it was so good to see friends. Week two Okay, super cool, we're talking about interesting things. Week three Wait a second, has anybody seen clients yet? No, okay, oh, we're still being charged, by the way right. Week four Same thing.

Speaker 2:

We're talking about interesting things and we're paying for supervision, but we're not seeing clients. And on top of that, we were all being charged rent. So a portion of the light bill, a portion of the scheduling software I don't think it was software back in the day, but anyway you get the idea a portion of the service that answered the phone. So we were being charged for supervision and we weren't able to see clients because of whatever reason. I mean there were 10 of us there was, just there weren't enough clients, cash-based, for all of us to be able to see. You know what we needed to see in order to accrue hours and actually justify supervision? We were paying rent for an office that we never used, and this was a small office, I think there were only two rooms, and so you can do the math there, right? There was just no way that we were getting our money's worth from supervision.

Speaker 2:

So I put all that out there to say that not every supervisor is a great business person. Now, that doesn't mean they're not a wonderful supervisor and an excellent clinician and you're going to get a wonderful experience with them. But the red flag is if you sense or you have evidence, or you know that you are with a supervisor who is just not a good business person and you're thinking to yourself I'm spending a lot of money or I'm not really getting the opportunities that I was promised, or you know all of these things. Maybe you're being misclassified as a W-2 or as a 1099, and it should be the other way around, and I have a great episode on that. I'll put the link in the show notes.

Speaker 2:

For whatever reason, if you start to feel your supervisor who is in the dual role of the business owner and sometimes that happens, especially in underserved communities, and we are really relying on supervisors to do so many things, and it's okay, right, I think it's a wonderful unicorn supervisor who's willing to hire their supervisees, but sometimes it happens that they just don't have the business skills and you, the supervisee, should not have to suffer because of that. So if you feel like the relationship has been established and you feel safe and that supervisor has done an amazing job of establishing a safe space for you to process your concerns, absolutely have the conversation first. Right, and that's the case with all of this have the conversation with your supervisor first. But if you're starting to feel resentment. If you're starting to get angry and you've had the conversation and you just don't feel like things are getting better, well, the supervisory relationship is already negatively impacted because you're feeling like your supervisor is getting an advantage at your expense. So, before it deteriorates into something that will impact clients negatively, it's in your best interest, it's in the client's best interest, it's in your supervisor's best interest to have the conversation, and perhaps part ways.

Speaker 2:

Now, one of the things I promised you with this podcast episode is how do you find a new supervisor? And actually you need to go back to episode. And actually you need to go back to episode 86, where I take you through the questions you can ask. I tell you what good supervisors are looking for. I tell supervisors what supervisees are looking for. That's a really good episode to sit down and start thinking about. Okay, I need to take my time and find a supervisor.

Speaker 2:

And you can't have a break in supervision, especially if you're seeing clients, because if you're not under supervision, you cannot see clients. All right, I'm going to say that again. If, for some reason, you and your supervisor break up, you part ways and you are not being supervised, then you cannot see clients. So this is where you have to be able to have the conversation. Make sure you're being very proactive about if you're needing to replace your supervisor.

Speaker 2:

Get out there and interview, ask the questions. There are some great supervisor directories out there. You can contact your university and you can say hey, are there any other supervisors that you are aware of? The Texas Supervisor Coalition on the Kate Walker Training website, we have an amazing supervisor directory divided up by regions in Texas, so you can look there. Stay on top of this supervisees, lpc associates, lmft associates. Stay on top of good supervision. Once again, welcome to the field. I'm so proud of you for graduating with this degree and having the dream to go out and see clients and make the world a better place. Now go find a great supervisor and you guys do great things together and keep saving the world with excellent therapy.