Supervisee Incompatibility and Its Influence on Triadic Supervision: An Examination of Doctoral Student Supervisors' Perspectives

Abstract

A qualitative study was conducted to explore supervisors' experiences of supervisee incompatibility in triadic supervision. In‐depth interviews were completed with 9 doctoral student supervisors in a counselor education program, and a whole‐text analysis generated 3 categories. Supervisee incompatibility took a wide variety of forms and negatively affected the content of supervision, including its progress and productivity. It also negatively influenced the process of supervision, including the feedback and support offered by either the supervisor or the supervisees and the general atmosphere of supervision meetings. Implications of the findings for counseling supervision and for further research are also addressed.

Learning to Be Supervisors: A Qualitative Investigation of Difficulties Experienced by Supervisors-in-Training

“…While supervision is considered the signature pedagogy for counselorsin-training (Bernard & Goodyear, 2013;Hein, Lawson, & Rodriguez, 2011;Scott, Ingram, Vitanza, & Smith, 2000) and most practitioners eventually engage in supervision, formal supervision training is a very recent phenomenon. Until recently, few supervisors were formally trained for this influential and critical role (Peake et al, 2002) and it was suggested that many supervisors operate from a "seat of the pants" approach (Blocher, 1983), relying on their own experiences, good and bad, to guide them.…”

Supervisee Incompatibility and Its Influence on Supervisee and Supervisor Outcomes in Triadic Supervision: An Investigation of Supervisors' Perspectives

“…Several studies have stressed the importance of matching supervisees in triadic supervision (Hein et al, 2011;Stinchfield et al, 2007), but the present findings make clear that supervisee incompatibility can manifest in a wide variety of ways that supervisors may not always be able to anticipate. Similarly, the participants expressed a wide variety of perspectives on the type of compatibility that is most critical to consider when matching supervisees.…”

“…The forms of supervisee incompatibility that emerge in any given triad are likely to vary, and the more of these that can be eliminated before supervision begins, the more effective that triadic supervision is likely to be. Helping supervisors to detect supervisee incompatibility early in the supervision process and to address it in effective ways should also be a key aspect of their training (see Hein et al, 2011), and this seems particularly important for doctoral-student supervisors. Such training could occur during the weekly group supervision discussed earlier, a clinical supervision course, or another context, and could consist of direct instruction from a faculty member or other clinician, feedback from a faculty member and other triadic supervisors about videotaped supervision meetings, discussion and problem-solving activities, or various role-play activities, for example.…”

“…An important facet of triadic supervision that has only recently received systematic research attention, however, is supervisee incompatibility. Thus far, research on this topic has revealed ways in which supervisee incompatibility can impact the process and content of triadic supervision (Hein, Lawson, & Rodriguez, 2011), but its influence on another critical aspect of supervision, supervisor and supervisee outcomes, has not been examined. The aim of the present study was therefore to examine supervisors' experiences of their own outcomes and those of their supervisees when supervisee incompatibility (i.e., incompatibility between both supervisees rather than incompatibility between the supervisor and one or both supervisees) is present in triadic supervision.…”

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“…Indeed, clinical supervision is viewed as one of the most integral components of developing essential counseling skills among counselors-in-training (Hein, Lawson, & Rodriguez, 2011). Traditional models are consistently reviewed for efficiency and effectiveness.…”