What does it mean to have a ‘clean’ space in the Supervision relationship?

Firstly, it is important to define the aspect of ‘clean’ I will be referring to for the purpose of this article as I am not necessarily speaking to David Groves’ explanation. Traditionally we understand clean coaching or clean facilitation to reflect behaviour, how we may use the physical space and demonstrate our mindfulness of speech used when with a client. The approach encourages little interruption and close mirroring of client language to gently aid their self-navigation to insight and learning. While some may choose to adopt this coaching technique in the Supervision space, we understand that the role of Supervisor is at once mentor, coach, challenger, and support etc which can be more intrusive by comparison.

Colloquially, ‘keeping it clean’ in the Supervision space generally equates to transparency of contracting and the reassurance that we are adhering to the global code of ethics. Clean in this respect denotes everything being above board and comes with the comfort of knowing where we stand.

To echo De Hanns utility room metaphor, Supervisees come to sessions with the understanding that they can wipe their boots clean from working the grounds of their client’s landscape and enter a cathartic, developmental and insightful space for themselves. Logically, boots remain muddy when wiped on muddy mats, so there is a distinct responsibly inferred that Supervisors provide that clean space but what does that really mean?

This question is posed specifically from the vantage point of the Supervisor and addresses what may be happening in their internal world and thinking. It’s the general expectation that we don’t approach our sessions with preconceived ideas, judgements, or expectations on the client to be a certain way. That we facilitate free of agenda, unattached to an outcome and unblemished by previous challenging sessions that may have come before. This is hailed as important to not limit the possibilities of the client sat in front of you.  While in awareness of a multitude of thoughts, experiences and potential biases, there is an almost saint-like expectation that every session will be a blank canvas in which the client and supervisor will choose the thinking partnership colours to paint with. Essentially starting from a ‘clean’ space. This concept certainly has a mellifluous Kumbaya sentiment in which we collectively intend to sing from the same hymn sheet. This is supposed to be the epitome of professionalism and in best service to the client but if we dare to unplug from the matrix for a moment and venture into the rabbit hole, we discover the deep Supervisor Shadows. These shadows ink the ‘clean’.  How, as Supervisors, do we unwittingly compromise our spaces by genuinely thinking we are clean but our practice is muddier and stickier that a hog on a hot day!

With greater awareness a Supervisor will identify just how much ink colours the relationship but pondering a handful of questions. Just how often are we asking ourselves:

• What might I be assuming about this client?

• How does this influence my intuitive questioning?

• Where have I placed limitations on our interactions which may pose as a barrier to progress?

• Where do I hold back in by mentoring of the supervisee?

• Do I lean into a particular style based on biases I may hold about the Supervisee?

Being human means that by default we all wear glasses. We are born into positions and therefore have a semblance of a blueprint. We see life and each other through the lens of our paradigms. Some of us may name our glasses through a religious identity, a political leaning or perhaps a social economic perspective. In this respect, and to stay short of exhausting the metaphor, the prescription is often complex. However, sometimes it is those who believe themselves wholly free thinkers, uninfluenced by the status quo, outside of the box and spec saver rebellious that can be the most blind to their lens. Just because your lens does not have a name, it doesn’t mean you are not wearing glasses. That being established, how non-judgemental is your non-judgemental when we are hardwired to make judgements? Now things are a little less clean than first thought. Perhaps even a little less comfortable.

So, lets scale down from the Macro of human existence and sit in the micro of the Supervisors potential thinking space. Good practice encourages us to book end our sessions with pre-flections and reflections as this allows for the possibility of a wider narrative that may reveal undercurrents that were less obvious than when the session was in flow. Arguably this bookend approach may well make the activities or journey of that specific experience clearer, but does that mean its cleaner?

Having reflected on what maybe lurking in my supervisor shadow, I considered how I naturally relate to men and women. Attending an all-girls school had a huge impact. My experiences have meant that I form friendships and co-working relationships with women easily. The relationships have tended to be rather nurturing, comforting and much of the time there is a silent knowing and understanding. In the corporate setting, my world has been mostly male dominated in which there was a real no nonsense, ‘speak in 5 words of less’ environment.  It is not to say that men aren’t nurturing, and women aren’t assertive however, I had observed what was valued and the broad-brush strokes of my associations had informed my interactions. In Supervision reflections I was more likely to be prescriptive, informative, and confronting with men favouring an authoritative style, whereas with women I was more likely to adopt the facilitative approach of being supportive, catalytic, and cathartic. It was not that I was consciously shifting my style according to whether the client was male or female however, when noting a loose pattern in my reflections, it was helpful to connect the dots and explore the origin. This discovery helped me to keep the space cleaner more consciously now it was on my radar.

Kenneth and Mammie Clarke were psychologists in the early 20th Century who carried out the famous baby doll experiment. When presenting a white doll and a black doll to children aged between 3-7 years old, they asked a series of simple questions such as: Which is the good doll? Which is the bad doll? Which is the pretty doll? Which is the ugly doll? With each question, the child was invited to point to the doll that believed that statement was true for. Over 70% of the test group of children associated positive attributes with the white doll and negative attributes to the black doll. While many may argue that these experiments took place in the 1940s and therefore times have changed since then, these same experiments were reconducted across Europe in the early 2000’s with similar results.  Well, how is this relevant to the Supervision space and staying clean? While this particular example relates to ethnicity, the point to highlight here is that we absorb much of our understanding of the world in our formative years after which it simply slips into unawareness. Race, age, education, height, sex, weight, hair colour, whatever it may be, each of us has a mini jackanory at work attempting to make sense of the world. While we are certainly in a climate that continuously strives to challenge our thinking one fact remains true. We all hold bias. It is natural. What we choose to do with it is a different question but if we can first name that it is present, then we can begin to mitigate it in life and more pointedly in the Supervisor space. We are now one chess board move away from idealism and heading towards realism. Tick and tick!

We understand from Alfred Kadushin in ‘Games People Play in Supervision’, that we are to remain astute to the TA strategic moves that clients may make to massage the interaction overtly or covertly according to their desire. In the rules of engagement, there are psychological parameters both explicit and implicit. Boundaries spoken and unspoken. The implicit and unspoken is often where it is less ‘clean’ and is fertile ground for created narrative. This is where shadows take root but not necessarily surface unless something significant happens like there is a breach of trust which potentially results in broken rapport. When throwing a ball to your client, you will naturally have a predicted expectation for a sharp catch, a fumbled clambering, or for the ball to be dropped. If the response is in line with your estimation, this alignment may form some sense of you knowing your client in a predictable way. When your assumptions are continuously confirmed you risk unintentionally creating an avatar of them. We can almost white noise their experience and disregard anything that doesn’t quite fit the equation of our assumptions. Conversely, if the client responds in an unexpected way to a ball being thrown, our minds are inclined to search for the meaning of this. A dropped ball may signify a lack of investment or direct challenge. Fudging the catch may, from your perspective, represent lack of skill, confidence, or general awareness. We are by default story tellers with no pause button. To live is to think and yet how much of this backdrop are we really sharing in the Supervision space. Is disclosing your shadow thought as the Supervisor polluting the interaction and impacting the dynamics of the relationship? Or does disclosure allow for authenticity all round to reign? Which version of clean is clean?

Is it cleaner to reserve your judgement or to share your gut instinct?

Recapping on what we have explored so far, we understand that:

• It is an expected professional standard to provide a clean helpful space to the supervisee

• We are influenced by an internal world which began with a distinct position and loose blueprint

• With awareness, we are capable of mitigating our judgements or preconceived ideas.

Perhaps being clean means acknowledging and accepting that we cannot fully be. In other words, coming clean is to admit that you are not. There is no one size fits all clean. Having done the awareness ‘work’, we then must trust ourselves as Supervisors as to define clean as we journey with our clients. To speak and share is a ‘nothing to declare’ clean. In contrast, an internal pause to not pollute the Supervisees stream of conscious is also clean. Clean therefore maybe simplified to two key components- Awareness and intuition. We choose what we think works for the space and trust that the relationship is transparent enough to dialogue when things do not feel as clean as they ought.