Clinical supervision—The missing ingredient

Abstract

Clinical supervision is acknowledged as a distinct professional competence that requires specific education and training. However, it is all too often an inadequately addressed or an entirely missing ingredient in psychology curricula and clinical research, including, for example, clinical trial protocols and evidence-based treatment implementation. It is proposed that clinical supervision training follow the shift to the competence movement that has occurred in psychology education, training, and regulation generally and embrace a systematic and intentional competence model. Groundwork for such a competence model for supervision has been laid in the supervision guidelines from the American Psychological Association and the Association of State and Provincial Psychology Boards, defining parameters for clinical supervision and the requisite supervisor competencies. This article discusses these inadequately addressed or missing ingredients, the insufficiently organized approach to supervision as a distinct competency at the present time, and the assumptions that are obstacles to progress. Strategies are proposed to overcome these obstacles; for example, methods of infusing supervision into existing curricula, the hidden curriculum, and transformational leadership that would guide its implementation. Knowledge, skills, and attitudes would be systematically developed as a critical component of self-reflective competency-based education, a portal to lifelong learning, and an essen…