Supervision Essentials for Cognitive-behavioral Therapy

Book excerpt: Cognitive-behavioural therapies are the most popular form of mental health services offered today. But with this popularity comes an urgent need for standardized training and education for emerging cognitive-behavioural therapy (CBT) clinicians. This handy guide offers an evidence-based approach to supervision of emerging CBT practitioners. The authors' approach is based on two key concepts: feedback that is geared toward strengths as well as weaknesses, and stimulates problem-solving and growth; and demonstration, by which a supervisor takes part in role-playing exercises and even shows videos of his or her own work with clients, in order to model the experiential knowledge that trainees need to succeed. Using a wealth of case examples, including material from a supervision session with a real trainee (from the DVD Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy Supervision, also available from the American Psychological Association), Newman and Kaplan demonstrate how trainees can learn to think like effective CBT practitioners, from conceptualizing cases and matching interventions to the individual needs of each client, to the comprehensive and subtle understandings of cultural competency and professional ethics.