September 2020 Clinical Supervision Topic: Eliciting Feedback
Nothing like a group of pecking hens to represent eliciting feedback!
If you’ve been with me long enough, you’ve definitely heard me say,
The best clinicians get the most amount of negative feedback. . .
…because they are asking for it!
When I first learned about eliciting feedback and all the research around it, it made a lasting impression on the way I formulated treatment. Finally, I could do my own session-by-session qualitative research on what was actually helping my clients. I could cut out a lot of the guesswork. I changed my practice and approach immediately. You can read this post from last year to get a good write-up on it and see an article with research explaining the value and the best process for it.
Bottom line: eliciting feedback is necessary if you want to do effective work as a social worker, professional counselor or marriage and family therapist.
This 3 minute video does a great overview.
Please go over these questions and come ready to discuss:
How am I currently eliciting feedback?
What feedback do I most pay attention to?
Which feedback do I not want to hear?
What do I do with the feedback I am given?
And in settings in which you’ve been a recipient of services, or the person in the relationship with less power (think: doctor’s office, a professor in grad school, your administrator at work, as a therapy client):
What did the other person do to either elicit or not elicit feedback?
What made it easier or harder to share what you really felt and thought about them, about the experience of working with them?
What helps you feel comfortable giving people honest feedback?
Lastly, here is a handout, created by my dear mentor Susie Snyder, LCSW. It is pure gold, and i have referred to it so often in developing my own skills to elicit feedback. Feel free to download, print and keep it somewhere easily accessible. Eliciting feedback is a muscle, just like any other skill. Time, intention and practice make it strong.
