Social workers are expected to build effective working relationships often in a context of substantial caseloads and tight timescales. Occupying the space between the service user and the organisation, and transmitting information between the two, social workers use their relational knowledge and skill to assess, support, inform, advise and report on their work. Meanwhile supervision is often focused on caseloads, deadlines and the production of written records.

There is an emphasis on doing and getting things done, yet social work is freighted with feeling. This workshop aims to create space for listening to ourselves and attuning to others, using Yvonne Agazarian’s Theory of Living Human Systems and the Systems-Centered (SCT®) methods that arise from it. The theoretical model provides a container for understanding our human experiences while the methods support authentic connection with ourselves and others.

The workshop will be both serious and fun, theoretical and practical, and provide a space for slowing down – for being rather than doing.

This workshop is suitable for social workers and social work students working with service users, and for managers engaged in supervision.

A vegetarian lunch and refreshments will be provided

Presenter:

Juliet Koprowska is author of Communication and Interpersonal Skills in Social Work (2020, 5th edition), and taught on social work programmes at the University of York from 1995-2018. She is a Licensed Systems-Centered practitioner, co-ordinates an annual SCT training week held in York and leads training groups in SCT. Juliet is Chair of GAPS.