What do “interpersonally sensitive” supervisors do and how do supervisees experience a relational approach to supervision?

Abstract

The identification of specific in-session supervision behaviors that explain one way in which a strong alliance contributes to trainees' positive experiences of their supervisors has implications for supervision theory, research, and practice.

The Supervisory Relationship: A Conceptual and Psychometric Review of Measures

“…Measures had to be (a) focused on the supervisory relationship, (b) publicly available (i.e., published in peer‐reviewed journals, accessible online, or available from the author), (c) written in English, and (d) written for individual (as opposed to group) supervision. With regard to the first criterion, many of the measures we found included attention to the supervisory relationship as part of their focus on other constructs; however, because the relationship did not appear to be the main focus, they were not included in this review (e.g., Supervisory Styles Inventory [Friedlander & Ward, ]; Supervisee Attachment Strategies Scale [Menefee, Day, Lopez, & McPherson, ]; Collaborative Supervision Behaviors Scale [Rousmaniere & Ellis, ]; Psychotherapy Supervisory Inventory [Shanfield, Mohl, Matthews, & Hetherly, ]; Multicultural Supervision Competencies Questionnaire [Wong & Wong, as cited in Bernard & Goodyear, ]; Questionnaire to Evaluate Supervision [Zarbock et al, ]; Relational Behavior Scale [Shaffer & Friedlander, ]). Another measure, Woo's () Supervisory Relationship Scale, appeared promising but was written in Chinese.…”

Transitional Dynamics of Three Supervisory Styles Using Markov Chain Analysis

“…When supervisees in this study perceived their supervisors as having high levels of interpersonal sensitivity, these supervisory dyads were less likely to work on furthering professional development compared with those in the medium and low subgroups. Because interpersonally sensitive supervisors most resemble the counselor in Bernard's (1979, 1997) discrimination model, they tend to be perceptive, invested, and therapeutic (Ladany et al, 2001), which are characteristic of relational behavior (Shaffer & Friedlander, 2017). As a result, these “therapeutic” supervisors may prioritize enhancing the supervisory relationship with their supervisees or addressing the counseling relationship between their supervisees and supervisees' clients over the concrete professional development issues in supervision.…”

“…Psychodynamic and humanistic supervisors tended to perceive themselves as more interpersonally sensitive, whereas cognitive behavior supervisors tended to view themselves as task oriented; nevertheless, the attractive style was similarly rated across different theoretical orientations. In addition to these correlational studies, Shaffer and Friedlander (2017) investigated what interpersonally sensitive supervisors do and how supervisees experienced a relational approach to supervision.…”

The Impact of Supervisory Styles on Satisfaction of Undergraduate Counselling Interns in Malaysia

“…Ghazali et al (2018) previously examined the fact that supervisory styles (attractive, interpersonally sensitive, and taskoriented) contributed to supervisory satisfaction. Shaffer and Friedlander (2017) defined supervisory style as the different approaches that supervisors use, combining their unique manner in responding to trainees. Tangen and Borders (2016) utilized three supervisory styles: attractive, interpersonally sensitive, and task-oriented.…”