Introduction
The role of a supervisor is essential in the mental health industry and counseling, as it provides a competent external perspective on interventions and the relationship between a client and a counselor. Moreover, it is through supervision that a counselor might obtain consultation, support, professional guidance, and vicarious trauma healing. This paper is designed to address the different roles a supervisor might take when conducting their professional duties. The roles will be addressed within the context of Bernard’s discrimination model to investigate how these roles might be assumed when providing care for vicarious trauma and how a supervisee might respond to a supervisor in each role. It is claimed that each role applies to different cases and requires appropriate behavior from both actors in the supervision process.
Supervisor Roles
The novel approach to categorizing the roles of a supervisor in counseling has emerged from a new practice focus. Indeed, as Bernard (1979) stated, the primary emphasis is not on a counselor’s personality but on their performance in the counseling setting. For that matter, supervision might take different forms depending on the challenges a supervisee faces and the skills they are struggling with. For that matter, the discrimination model implies three distinct roles for a supervisor: an educator or teacher, a counselor, and a consultant (Bernard, 1979). In this manner, insight into a supervisee’s work process might provide relevant context for choosing which role to take and for conducting a supervision intervention with a trainee.
The first role of a supervisor is that of a teacher, whose primary objective is to educate the trainee. It might be applied when a counselor faces a problematic situation in practice, and a supervisor provides learning materials or guides the practitioner toward a proper solution (Bernard, 1979). The second role is a counselor whose primary motivation for interacting with a trainee is the healing process or the processing of emotional issues encountered in counseling clients (Quitangon & Evces, 2015). In such an interaction, a trainee might be exposed to therapeutic interventions to resolve a crisis or a psychological pattern in patient care. Finally, the third role is that of a consultant. In particular, it implies that a supervisor and a supervisee work in a partnership, with the supervisee sharing their experience and providing professional guidance to the trainee to resolve an issue.
Prioritized Role During Trauma Counseling
When addressing vicarious trauma, a supervisor is expected to act as a counselor in accordance with the discrimination model of supervision. Indeed, the most effective way to handle vicarious trauma is to raise awareness and reinforce self-examination and reporting, as well as encourage seeking help (Skovholt & Trotter-Mathison, 2016). From this role’s standpoint, a supervisee might elicit reflections and address a trainee’s coping mechanisms. As for the other two roles, a good supervisor might use the role of a teacher to inform and educate a trainee about the risks of trauma, while consulting on effective ways to establish and report the problem in the role of a consultant (Skovholt & Trotter-Mathison, 2016). Overall, any interaction in any of these roles should be consensual and voluntary to prevent harm and to facilitate the long-term benefits of supervisor-supervisee and practitioner-client relationships.
As for the proper ways to respond to each of the three roles in the model, a supervisee should be flexible and cooperative to maximize the intended interaction’s effects. Firstly, when exposed to the supervisor’s role as a teacher, a trainee should act as a student and incorporate practical advice to improve and develop skills (Bernard, 1979). Secondly, in response to a counselor, a trainee should behave as a client by allowing a counselor to guide the therapeutic process and establish rapport. Finally, the interaction with a consultant implies a role as a partner for a trainee, where they are expected to follow practical guidance and build their professional experience.
Conclusion
In conclusion, the process of supervision is an essential part of successful counseling and the addressing of vicarious trauma. Since counselors face a variety of situations and concerns, the roles a supervisor should take must be relevant to trainees’ needs. For that matter, as implied by the discrimination model, the three roles of a supervisor include teacher, counselor, and consultant, each focusing on the needs of a trainee. When paying attention to vicarious trauma, a counselor should perform the role of a counselor to help a trainee heal and overcome the traumatic experience healthily. Overall, a supervisor’s acting in different roles requires an appropriate response from a trainee. They should act as a student when interacting with a teacher, as a client when working with a counselor, and as a partner during consultations.
References
Bernard, J. M. (1979). The discrimination model. Counselor Education and Supervision, 19(1), 310-326.
Quitangon, G., & Evces, M. R. (Eds.). (2015). Vicarious trauma and disaster mental health. Routledge.
Skovholt, T. M., & Trotter-Mathison, M. (2016). The resilient practitioner burnout and compassion fatigue prevention and self-care strategies for the helping professions (3rd ed.). Routledge.