Supporting Isolated Workers in their Work with Families in Rural and Remote Australia: Exploring Peer Group Supervision

Abstract

Social workers face unique challenges in working with families, young people and children in rural and remote communities. Simultaneously, workers juggle dual relationships, personal boundaries and high visibility. Social work practise in rural Australia also faces high staff turnover, burnout and difficulties with recruitment, retention and available professional supervision. A lack of professional supervision has been identified as directly contributing to decreased worker retention in rural and remote areas. This paper reports on emerging themes from a qualitative research study on peer supervision in virtual teams in rural and remote Australia. Data collection consisted of pre- and post-trial individual interviews, monthly group supervision sessions, online evaluations and focus groups. A key conclusion from the study is that peer group supervision worked in supporting rural and remote workers to perform their everyday professional roles. The ease and access afforded by the use of simple technology was noteworthy. Whilst the research was conducted with social workers in rural and remote areas, the use of peer group supervision could be applicable for other professionals who work with families and communities in rural and remote Australia.

A systematic review of the factors that influence the quality and effectiveness of telesupervision for health professionals

“…Of the articles reviewed, 36 papers were subject to full-text examination independently by two reviewers (PM and LL) to determine if they met the inclusion criteria. Subsequent to the full-text retrieval and examination process, 11 studies (nine qualitative 23,[31][32][33][34][35][36][37][38] and two quantitative 39,40 ) met the inclusion criteria. The search results, screening results and the final numbers of studies included are presented in Figure 1.…”

“…Most studies included in this review reported technological issues and found them to hamper the supervision experience. 33,34,36,[38][39][40] It is essential that technological issues are proactively managed. It is also useful for the supervisee and supervisor to undertake training in the use of technology relevant to supervision.…”

“…Seven studies reviewed reported a variety of technological issues that were experienced by participants. [33][34][35][36][38][39][40] Some issues reported were background noise, auditory distractions, 34 audio lags 36,38 and use of old or incorrect equipment. 34,39 Such technological issues were found to hamper supervision experience by taking away supervision time, 40 affecting spontaneity 33,39,40 and hampering ethical practice in supervision.…”

“…39 While a number of barriers were found related to the use of technology in supervision, comfort with using technology for supervision was found to increase over time. [37][38][39] One study recommended that firewalls and virus protection on computers remain up-to-date. 35 Furthermore, some studies recommended that open acknowledgement of prejudices about technology was essential while commencing telesupervision.…”

Services to young people with complex support needs in rural and regional Australia: Beyond a metro-centric response

“…The often vast distance from cities, and the large geographical service areas agencies are required to cover lead to rural and regional populations, including young people, being underserved in welfare provision (Darracott & Lonne, 2017;Pugh & Cheers, 2010). Closely tied to these resource inadequacies are difficulties in recruiting and retaining health and welfare professionals in non-metropolitan contexts (Nickson, Gair, & Miles, 2016). Outreach and fly-in services may be offered in some more remote areas, but 1 This definition is based on the Australian Statistical Geography Standard (ASGS) which makes distinctions between metropolitan and non-metropolitan areas.…”