Alisa Houseknecht Ph.D., NCC, CRC

Philosophy of Supervision

The purpose of supervision is to provide a supportive and educational environment that facilitates counselor trainee’s personal and

professional growth. My model of supervision integrates the theoretical foundations of person-centered supervision (Rogers, 1957), the developmental levels of the Integrative Developmental Model (IDM) (Stoltenberg & McNeill, 2010), and the supervisory roles of the Discrimination Model (Bernard, 1997).

My view of the practice and process of supervision closely mirrors my understanding of human growth and development in

counseling. I believe increasing experiential awareness through a supportive relationship is central to promoting the development of a counselor’s professional competence. In supervision, I aim to (a) develop a warm empathic relationship to increase supervisees’ capacity for self-exploration, (b) provide unconditional positive regard to foster self-efficacy, and (c) maintain a genuine and supportive working alliance. Additionally, I strive to establish a collaborative working alliance through mutual agreement of goals and tasks of each member (Bordin, 1983). Based on Bernard’s Discrimination Model (1997), the three roles I embody as a supervisor include: teacher, counselor, and consultant. The role I adopt in supervision is influenced by the developmental level of the supervisee and serves to achieve the specific goals of each session.

The IDM informs my conceptualization of the process of counselor development and helps me determine which strategies to use to

facilitate supervisees’ counseling competency. I assess a counselor trainee’s developmental level in terms of three primary dimensions: (a) awareness of self and others, (b) motivation toward the developmental process, and (c) degree of dependency and autonomy (Stoltenberg & McNeill, 2010). Furthermore, I aim to evaluate my supervisees’ level of development based on three counseling meta domains as identified by Stoltenberg and McNeill (2010): (a) individual differences, (b) theory, and (c) ethics. The IDM levels of counselor development guide my supervision process and allow me to tailor my supervision interventions to the unique developmental needs of supervisees.

In conclusion, my philosophy of supervision is an integration of three evidence-based theories: (a) person-centered supervision

(Rogers, 1957), (b) the Integrative Developmental Model (IDM) (Stoltenberg & McNeill, 2010), and (c) the Discrimination Model (Bernard, 1997). My theoretical orientation draws me to focus on the process of supervision, while maintaining a supervisory alliance intended to help my supervisee grow personally and professionally. My philosophy of supervision is grounded in evidence-based methods and aims to meet the unique  needs of supervisees.

References

Bernard, J.M., (1997). The discrimination model. In C. E. Watkins, Handbook of psychotherapy supervision (pp. 310-327). New York, NY:

Wiley.

Bernard, J. M., & Goodyear, R. K. (2014). Fundamentals of clinical supervision (5th ed.). Boston: Allyn & Bacon.

Bordin, E. S. (1983). A working alliance based model of supervision. The Counseling Psychologist, 11, 35-42.

doi:10.1177/0011000083111007

Rogers, C.R. (1957). The necessary and sufficient conditions of therapeutic personality change. Journal of Consulting Psychology, 21, 95–

103.

Stoltenberg, C. D., & McNeill, B. (2010). IDM supervision: An integrative developmental model for supervising counselors and therapists.

New York: Brunner-Routledge.