193 How To Run A Supervision Session That Is Useful And Covers Bases

If you listened to the episode for new grads and thought, oh no, that sounds like my supervision setup, this episode is for you.

I want to be very clear. There is no shame here. Many supervisors step into this role because someone asked them to, because their workplace needed them, or because their state required very little training before allowing them to supervise. You only know what you know. But once you see the gaps, you can start tightening the system.

In this episode, Dr. Ashley Durbin and I talk directly to supervisors who want to improve the way they structure supervision. We walk through what needs attention first, including caseload review, regular meetings, supervision notes, state rules, accountability, and what to do when a supervisee’s job setting is bigger than your current supervision structure can support.

This is not about being perfect. It is about knowing what you are responsible for and choosing one or two things to fix this week.

In this episode, we cover:

• Why loose, supervisee-led supervision can create risk
• How to review large caseloads without pretending you can cover every client in depth
• Why supervisors need to document rule review, directives, and follow up
• What to do when one hour of supervision is not enough
• Why “I didn’t know” is not a strong defense when client care is involved
• How community, consultation, and state organizations help supervisors stay current

If you are a new supervisor, start low and slow. Leave room for crises. Leave room for rule changes. Leave room for the real work of guiding someone into ethical, competent practice.

Want to learn more? Check out this month’s free resource from Kate Walker Training.

Want deeper support? Inside the Step It Up Membership, we discuss supervision structure, documentation, ethics, marketing systems, and sustainable practice growth for therapists and supervisors.

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. 

Transcript

Why Supervisors Feel Unprepared

SPEAKER_00 0:13

Welcome to Bandless Therapists, building practices and money. When it's all about working smart and not harder. And here's your host, Dr. Kate, and love to play open. If you listen to our episode for New Grads and thought, oh no, that's me. This one's for you. Dr. Kate Walker here with Dr. Ashley Durbin. And today, we're covering what you can actually do this week to tighten up your supervision. Now, let's get to work. Hey, I'm Dr. Kate Walker. Welcome to the podcast. I'm joined by my social work colleague, Dr. Ashley Durbin, and we are going to talk to you, supervisors. We did an episode recently where we talked to new grads about what to look for in a supervisor and what to do if they felt like their supervision experience was lacking and they didn't know what to do. So this is for you, supervisors, because if you listen to that episode and you're like, oh no, that's me. He, you know, if you're new to supervision, or maybe it's like what Ashley talks about, you know, somebody at work voluntary you were now the supervisor, and you're like, oh my gosh, you know, or maybe you're in one of those states that doesn't require a lot of training. And, you know, we teach the course to become a supervisor all over the country. So we know you're out there, states that only require three hours of a course to become a supervisor, you know, versus a state that requires a 45-hour course. I mean, there's going to be some different levels of confidence when you exit a course. Or, or maybe you took a course that is that it was 45 hours, but you finished in 20 minutes and it gave you a certificate at the end that looked like your child's participation trophy for soccer last year. I mean, there are all kinds of things you may be going through as a new supervisor, and you felt kind of bad after you listened to that episode. So I want you to know there's no shame here, there's no judgment here. We want to go over some things today so that you know what to tweak. And as we always say by the end of the episode, just pick one or two things to tweak this week. Right? There's something you can fix it, there's something you can tighten up. It's the fact that you're here, the fact that you're even listening to this and you're wanting to do something good to improve your supervision. I'm I'm just so I'm so proud of you. I don't know you, but I am so proud of you that you're here doing a good thing. So Eshley, if you want to take us through sort of like what what new supervisors might do if they feel like they kind of identified with that last episode.

Add Structure With Contracts And Notes

SPEAKER_01 3:04

Yeah, I think probably one of the biggest things that we're gonna see is the um, I don't know, maybe label it imposter syndrome or or what have you, but like kind of go loosey goosey when what's needed is some structure. I think this is my tendency is to kind of let the supervisee guide, you know, it's their work, it's what they're doing, and and I'm not there with them in the session doing it. So I kind of leave leave a lot to them to do. But the reminder of like they're new to this, you have been a seasoned uh worker in this field for hopefully a little while, if not a long while. You're the guide, you're the expert, you're the SME. So getting some structure in place, getting some more formal kind of evaluation and paperwork and contracts and all of those things, when you're feeling lost, like relying on what we said we would do, can be really, really helpful.

SPEAKER_00 4:07

Yeah. And if you're not sure what these things are, as Ashley and I talk about them, that's okay, that's okay too. I mean, you only know what you know, and Ashley, you say that all the time, or you don't know what you don't know. And if you are not trained on how to create a contract, or you were not trained on how to keep good notes, or what should be in a note, or how to remediate, or, you know, um how to supplement your your training, you know, if it if it wasn't only a three-hour course or a 15-hour course or something like that. So here are some things you can do to make sure you're at least covering the minimal basis, okay?

Caseload Review And Case Priorities

SPEAKER_00 4:51

Uh so number one, review reviewing a caseload. Yes, I know your supervisee may work somewhere where they're getting a staffing once a week. That is true. But remember with supervision, you're in a relationship with this person where you're sharing the liability for these cases. And yes, I know many of them have like 50 people on their caseload because they're being overworked and underpaid. We know we've been there. And that's another conversation, you know, if they're in the wrong job. So to say, okay, no, my due diligence is I've got to cover these cases. We have to go through these cases. Then you have to have a way to prioritize them. You have to have a way to make sure your supervisee understands, okay, yeah, we will be covering this. I will be following up on that. Does that mean you will spend less of a session maybe talking about the Instagram Grays Anatomy episode that, you know, helps people do couple counseling? Maybe so. And does that mean maybe your groups have to become smaller? Does that mean that maybe you have to spend more hours in your week on supervision because you just got a new supervise in and they really need to be onboarded and they really need to acclimate to their new work setting? Yes. So I don't know which one of these is you, but these scenarios are all very real. And Ashley and I have all have both been there. You know, but it there's some tough decisions to make when that's the case. Absolutely.

External Supervision And Real Liability

SPEAKER_01 6:31

Yeah, and and it's one of those, you know, kind of I've been an external supervisor more often than I've been internal. So just the disconnection of like truly not knowing I'm not in charge of signing off on notes, I'm not in charge of billing insurance. I I literally, you know, there can be quite few things that I know of that this person is doing. And, you know, not that we try and be big, scary like liability people, but it is we're saying some of this puts you and your license at risk if you have people operating under your license, under your supervision, and you just don't have uh any frame of reference for what they're doing. And, you know, those 50-person caseloads and whatever else, you know, if we're only having one hour of supervision for 40 hours of work, if they are working full time, that who could possibly take care of 40 different people in supervision in one 16 minute round, you know, it's just impossible, especially if we have other stuff to do, paperwork for the board or you know, a crisis pops up or whatever else, it can just cast steal all of the time that you had dedicated to doing something else in that session. So, you know, maybe that's also something I talk a lot about. Like, if you are a supervisor and you've either been voluntoled or whatever to do this work and you only are planning one hour a week for all of your people, think about having a little more flexibility in your work schedule to allow for things like crises so that your people aren't waiting until our Thursday at

Availability And Crisis Support Expectations

SPEAKER_01 8:16

10 a.m. session. And they know that if they call you and they really are in crisis, if something is going on right now and they don't know what to do, they can reach you. Because I think that's one of the things I've seen the most is people just being unavailable and and inflexible and saying, you know what, you can't reach me, you know, before three and after four, and and really only having that hour is, especially for a new supervisee, in my opinion, just not enough.

SPEAKER_00 8:44

And if they're in a setting where they're in over their head, I mean, that's where our associates get in the most trouble. They've taken a job, the pay is wonderful, and uh, here are your 40 people that you're going to be seeing a week. Oh, now we're we've upped it to 60. Oh, now we want you to do 10 minute sessions and you know, billet this code and now you're up to 80. Well, if you're that supervisor who's been voluntled and you don't have three hours a week to give to this person, then you need to look at the these are the hard decisions. Are you do you want to keep that supervisee? Do you want to keep that supervisee with the condition that they change jobs, that they need to go find something else to do? Do you want to keep that supervisee with the caveat? They've got to see you two hours a week. Yes, I know the board only says one, and that's too bad because when you get to 30 people, I add another hour. That's just the way my supervision runs. Are these tough decisions? Yes. But might it be a decision that causes your supervisee to think twice about continuing with you? Absolutely. But look at your liability, look at your obligation. And number one, let's think about client care. I mean, I if your obligation is to review a full caseload, and I mean when I was doing supervision, I had a procedure so that I knew of the people on the caseload, but I could not in any way, shape, or form go over each case. And so my supervisees knew that I defined being prepared, I just made air quote signs, as you give me the top three cases we need to cover this week based on the level of crisis or the level of you're confused about what the treatment plan should be. So we had criteria, but the point is we had a system in place to make sure their caseload was I was overseeing it, but at the same time, I was only diving into a few cases.

SPEAKER_01 10:52

Yeah. Yeah. And I think um, you know, just a subtle, not so subtle reminder that you're the guide in this session, which means you're also in charge of ensuring the clients are doing okay, that if there is room for retraining, more training, more specialized training that your person needs, that you're the one directing and getting it. And two, in that in that scenario that you don't work where they work, you being able to fill out the paperwork and vice versa to talk to their work supervisor and game the other side of it. Um, you know, you just like think about that kind of like wrapping all the way around and figuring out if there are other ways. If one hour isn't enough and you see something else going on, put it in the plan that more is needed. And here's what we have to do by when. Take a documentation training, take an ethics training, you know, talk to your, you know, have your supervisor at work call me about X, Y, or Z case and whatever. Not that our supervisees would dang lie to us or or obfuscate the truth, but being able to know, you know, and and one of Kate's famous things of saying, like, I don't know is not a good defense to to the liability of like do your due diligence in trying to figure out what is going on. If there is something that you need to do a little more work on, get after it.

Free Bonus Practice Audit Break

SPEAKER_00 12:28

Hey, quick pause. This month's free bonus is the summer practice audit pick three. It gives you a menu of seven practice areas, lets you choose three, and hands you a checklist for each so you know exactly what done looks like. It takes about an afternoon and it's completely free. Grab it at KateWalkertraining.comslash bonus. Now back to the episode.

Cover Board Rules And Document It

SPEAKER_00 12:56

So we're talking about this idea that you cannot do the impossible, right? If someone's caseload is too big, your obligation is to provide structure. Your obligation is to provide space to meet and to process. Another obligation you have is to cover the rules. I don't care if it says in your state rules. If it's not in black and white, this is still best practices. And if you've heard me, you've heard me say this. If something goes sideways, the board will pull those notes and they will look for that rule related to whatever went sideways. So in the note, put down, we covered rule number 681.1 covering this. And you make it a five-minute portion of each supervision that you have with these folks. Again, in the back of my mind, you're I I can hear you saying, but I don't have time for that. I have too many supervisees to do that. Okay, that's like saying I've got 14 people in my car and only four seat belts, right? I I'm not gonna go in there and tell you how, you know, to install a seatbelt, right? I'm not gonna get in your car and buckle you up. But you have to look at the liability you're driving when Ashley and I talk about these things, that it we're really just talking about the bare minimum of what you need to do to make sure your supervision sessions cover your bases.

SPEAKER_01 14:27

Yeah.

Track Rule Changes And Find Community

SPEAKER_01 14:28

And I think if if you are a new supervisee and you're in that zone of trying to figure out what the right number of supervisees are, if you're a new supervisor, is what I meant. If you're trying in the zone of trying to figure out how many supervisees you you need to take, go low and slow is our recommendation for this because there are so many things that pop up, like, you know, I'm a big fan of going to the board meetings, of engaging with the process of like there's new rules being proposed or there's comments on rules or a comment period that's open, whatever. Being able to also guide, you know, it's a lot easier to give your opinion and say, I don't think this is right now, than having a rule that doesn't actually serve you or your supervisees. And there are some things, like I think back to, I think one of the more recent changes that we've had in the state of Texas was you used to have 48 hours to report for mandated reporting per the board rules. Now it's 24. The amount of people who don't know that that happened, including a whole slew of supervisors because they're doing their private practice or they're working or whatever else, not tracking the things that the board is coming out with is again not a good excuse to not know your rules because you, as a supervisor and your supervisees, both have said in getting a license, I read the rules and I know what's in them. So, you know, the CE broker is another one of those things. There were 16 training sessions on CE broker. There were 64 emails sent out about CE broker. And every single beginning of every month or towards the end of the month, when your CEs are due, we see all of these people go. Since when do we have to use CE broker? Well, January of 26th. We're now seven months into this jamboree. You not getting the emails, you not getting the training systems is not a good excuse for not return uh renewing your license. That's not gonna work with the board and it doesn't work with us. You should know. And if you don't know, if you don't have time to know what the board is doing, maybe you need to take a step back and figure out what time in the week you do before you start guiding people who are gonna be held to the standard.

SPEAKER_00 16:38

And we have groups for this. So even if you're not in Texas, you can be part of the Texas Supervisor Coalition Facebook page. And I know lots of us hate Facebook, but belonging to some kind of a group or a professional organization in Texas, we have the Texas Counseling Association, um, the ACA for counselors, they have different divisions all over the country that you can be a part of. I recommend being in a state organization, though, because you need to be kept abreast of local rules that are changing. And hey, if there is no organization, start one. I mean, why not? Go to your pup, go to the public board meetings, keep up with the rules. Yes, it's hard. So

Reduce Supervisee Load Or Add Help

SPEAKER_00 17:22

I'm gonna revisit what I said a second ago. We want you to make money supervising. If you're allowed to do that, if you're off site, if that is something your state allows, yes, we want you to make money supervising. And we want you to stay out of trouble supervising. And we want your supervisees' clients to be protected. Sometimes all three of those things cannot exist. Okay, it just can't. So if you're in a situation where these things are resonating with you, you listen to that other episode about things to look out for if you're a grad student and you're thinking, oh my gosh, I'm running off the rails here. Then one of the things you can do this week is perhaps lower your caseload, your, I'm sorry, not your caseload, your supervisee load, right? Help them find another supervisor. Or if your state allows it, tell your supervisee to pick up a second supervisor so they can take over some of that caseload. Both of those things are great. I mean, especially if you've got supervisees with extremely high caseloads or they're in a sit a setting where it's an extremely difficult type of client. And yes, would it be sad? And would you know if you had to give up a supervisee? Of course it would. But again, we can't, if you can't make all three of those things work, and something's got to give, we do not want it to be the client, right? We do not want client care to suffer, and then we do not want your supervisee to fall through the cracks, and then for you to fear, feel terrible because you thought you were in a situation where you had no choices. Okay. You do, you do have some choices.

SPEAKER_01 19:05

Yep.

Collaborative Supervision And Shared Coverage

SPEAKER_01 19:06

Yeah. And I really like the idea of um, I haven't done it, but this is one of the things I've been seeing more recently is this idea of like collaborative supervision where there's a team of like two or three supervisors that all, you know, if I go on vacation, everything's covered because there was another supervisor on deck. And this like sharing, you know, if there is a somebody that you know, maybe I'll take the course at the same time or whatever, buddy up and say, you know, we have similar, uh, you know, maybe we work in schools together and we could really team up. So if there is something going on with me this week and I can't take the reins, here you go, and vice versa. So, you know, it's just like therapy is like having all of this on one person's shoulders sometimes feels like a lot. But there's nothing that says if it's okay in your state rules that that people can have more than one supervisor. Most of the states I'm in, that's the case. As as many as needed to get the job done, that can be a way for you to, you know, avoid some burnout in this work and and make sure that you're taking care of yourself too. Get a friend. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_00 20:13

You can't do this alone. You have to have community, you have to have support.

The One To Five Self Audit

SPEAKER_00 20:18

And so think of on a scale of one to five, where five, you are just knocking it out of the park. It's absolutely wonderful. And one, you're struggling, okay, on a scale of one to five. How would you rate your ability to go over and review every person on your supervisees? That's plural S caseload. So that if you have five supervisees, all of their caseload, okay, on a scale of one to five. Next question. On a scale of one to five, how would you rate yourself as far as covering the rules in your state each supervision session? I'll even ease up every other supervision session. How about that? On a scale of one to five, how do you rate yourself on letting your supervisee run the agenda every single time? So this sort of laissez-faire. Well, what do you want to talk about today? Well, what's what's what's new? What's on the caseload? What's on your mind? On a scale of one to five, how would you rate yourself on whether or not you do that? On a scale of one to five, accountability. Do you hold your supervisees accountable for the homework you assign them or the training you told them to get, or um the directive you gave them to change jobs and lower their caseload? Do you hold them accountable for the directives you give them that will keep them safe and their clients safe? And there was another one on a scale of one to five. Note keeping and meetings. Okay, as as Ashley and I peruse the rules, we see states where there are a ton of rules and a state in states where there just aren't that many. Rules that pertain to supervision, that is. But across the board, you have to meet with your supervisee, and there has to be a note. If you find yourself on a scale of one to five, edging toward one on those two things, meeting regularly and keeping good documentation, just put the other stuff on standby. Start with that. Fix that this week. Fix this week your note-taking system and meet with your supervisee regularly.

SPEAKER_01 22:43

Yeah. We believe in you. You're awesome. This state needs you. This country needs you. It's only going to get harder to find good quality supervisors as the Department of Education squeezes our professions in in some ways from that level. But again, we say it to the supervisees: like you're worth having a good supervision process. And you, as a supervisor, are worth having an amazingly fun, passionate, joyful time in providing supervision. It just doesn't negate all of the other things, too. So find a way to do both. Be passionate and engaged with the supervisees and also protecting your butt and knowing that you are doing good work by protecting our profession.

SPEAKER_00 23:29

Yes.

Fix Notes And Meeting Cadence First

SPEAKER_00 23:30

And go to KateWalkertraining.com. Maybe we have a support group for you. Maybe we have a resource for you. There is a lot in the Kate Walker Training world that's free, and we just want to be there to support, just kind of like this podcast, right? We want to be there to support you. We want you to be able to hit play or hit download and get the resources and do the thing so that you're doing the absolute best you can. And nobody expects you to be perfect, but man, you are in an important profession. So fix something this week. All right. Love it. All right. Have a great week. See ya. If this episode got you thinking seriously about your practice or your supervision setup, the free summer practice audit at KateWalkertraining.com slash bonus is a great next step. Pick three areas, get a checklist for each. And if you're ready to build this out fully, the supervisor training is at KateWalkertraining.com. Links are in the description. See you next week. If you loved today's episode, be sure to leave a five-star review. It helps other Batmas therapists find the show and build practices that provide. Big thanks to Ridgley Walker for our original fun facts and podcast intro, and to Carl Diamella for editing this episode and making us sound amazing. See you next week.