Tag Archives: social work

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What I Wish I Had Known: Burnout and Self-Care in Our Social Work Profession – SocialWorker.com

The training to become a social worker is arduous, demanding, and complex. What isn’t always stressed enough are the issues of burnout, compassion fatigue, and the need for self care in the profession of social work.

via What I Wish I Had Known: Burnout and Self-Care in Our Social Work Profession – SocialWorker.com.

I saw this article and thought about how applicable it is to my life right now. As someone who works in the field, this has to be one of the best articles I’ve read on the reality of burnout for social workers that is typically ignored. My absolute favorite quote from the author: “In our work, although we are surrounded by people all day long, there is not a balanced give and take. Concentration is on clients, not ourselves. In the truest sense, we are alone—we are the givers, and our fulfillment comes from seeing the growth, hope, and new direction in those with whom we are privileged to work.” I don’t think that truer words have ever been spoken. I’m a huge proponent of self-care but admittedly have a hard time taking my own advice. It’s easier said than done when you are by nature a giver and you put the best interests of others before yours and don’t impose your opinions on others deliberately on a daily basis. Any deviation from this can be self-perceived as selfishness. However, the article brings home the fact that self-care is necessary because it helps you to operate from a place of being okay. Still have a lot to learn in that department.

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MSW/ MBA

This article was super interesting to me. As someone who has an MSW and also knows a lot of people who have MBA’s it struck me as odd that we are just now connecting these two degrees. Personally, I think that the intersection of social work and business would produce more well rounded professionals with better people skills and a better understanding of personality theories. I’ve read other articles that have stated that getting an MBA is becoming so popular that it’s weight has often been disregarded. The truth of the matter is that many business people could use social work skills just like social workers could use more business skills. From my perspective, I think that learning how to start and run a non-profit and having the necessary tools to help it to succeed would be a good thing for social workers. Being in a profession that is thankless and where you rarely actually make the salary that you’re worth, an additional degree could give the needed edge to reach a higher socioeconomic status. As someone who appreciates education that is practical and gives one the skills necessary to succeed in their chosen field, I think that the MSW-MBA degree will become quite popular because it’s the best of both worlds. The combination of the skills sets in these disciplines will be something that will be highly coveted in coming years.

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Give me a reason

Most of us have heard at one point or another is the fact that you can’t change people. Millions of hearts have been unnecessarily broken because their owners did not believe this fact. While I absolutely believe that this is true, I think that there may be some exceptions. The fact of the matter is that people can change each other. The point is that you can’t change someone by trying to do that. It makes absolutely no sense being in a relationship with someone because you think one day they’ll see the light and change for the better. The truth of the matter is that sometimes it’s easy to underestimate the impact that people have on each other. Social psychology teaches that a person is shaped and developed by his or her social interactions with others. We have an impact of people–whether we like it or not. The chain effect of human interaction and friendship is often underestimated. Try to change someone and you’ll fail. Present someone with the opportunity to change in a way that makes them feel as if they aren’t changing–merely evolving, and drop some very subtle motivational hints. Insert some positive reinforcement and you have a much better change of getting them to change. While this example may be a little much (and manipulative), my point is that that there is a way to influence people to change in a way that makes them feel good about it. Winston Churchill said that tact is the ability to tell someone to go to hell and have him look forward to the trip. But I digress. My point is that people need motivation to change and many times their relationships and interactions with others can serve as this motivation. People can change, they just need a reason. 

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The Roles of a Social Worker

So the month of March is Social Work month so I thought that I should post something related to that. To be honest, I didn’t want to be a social worker growing up. I wanted to go to medical school and be an ER doctor. Unfortunately my high school education in the sciences was very skimpy. I took Algebra I and II and Biology. No chemistry whatsoever. Needless to say, I quickly realized after my first Biology class that I was missing a whole lot of the fundamentals. To be honest I had no idea what I wanted my major to be as I began to prepare to move away from home and start college. While I knew that I wanted to go to medical school, I knew that I didn’t want to major in the sciences. I remember standing in the registration line for college and when I got to the counter the registration lady asked what major I wanted to declare. For some reason the words “social work” came out my mouth and I just stuck with it. I did this with the understanding (at least in my head) that I would just take all the classes needed in order to ensure my admission into medical school. However I soon realized that without any reference point in the sciences, I would have a hard time taking the necessary classes and actually passing them. So I did what any person with common sense would do—quickly formulated a plan B. I decided that the social sciences were more suited for me and they held my interest. One of the things that I like about social work is that it’s very person centered and takes the individual, their background, and their environment into consideration. The field is so diverse and there are a lot of opportunities to make a difference in the lives of others. While I love the other social sciences, I’m appreciative of my social work education because it is fairly practice based and while there are mounds of paperwork, many times I get the chance to actually interact with people and implement interventions that improve their quality of life. 

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More to life

I’m not going to lie, as a fairly young adult I don’t think about my mortality on a adult basis. Growing up I went to more funerals than most people have been to in their lives. It was always really sobering. This week on the wake of basking in the achievement of another significant professional stepping stone in my career, I was reminded of how previous life is. One of my jobs entails working the elderly population in a residential setting. This week I lost one of my patients. And by lost I mean that the patient died. As someone who is trained to intervene in situations in order to ensure safety and prevent death, providing emotional support as someone is dying is a new challenge. You find yourself going beyond your job description in order to do small things that might improve quality of life. To experience of starting a shift and seeing a patient alive to hours later when their body is rolled out by the mortuary technician is so sobering. I say all this to say that you never know how your actions can impact someone. Many times we are quick to talk about how we should have done things differently but how it’s too late. Hug your loved ones and tell them you love them. Express love and appreciation while they’re alive.

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Testing Woes

I’ll be honest, I very strongly dislike standardized tests. The source of this dislike can be credited to my mother, who also strongly opposes standardized tests. Growing up, I didn’t have many tests. The homeschooled life afforded me the luxury of learning my way. High school was challenging because I literally had to teach myself subject I knew nothing about with limited internet access and textbooks. Yet, this was not as challenging as it sounds like because all my tests were open book. When I say all, I mean ALL. Because of this experience, I am quite comfortable with open book tests. Partially because I think that it’s reassuring to know that all the answers are contained somewhere in the book and you just have to find them. Piece of cake. Consequently, when it came time in my high school career to take the tests that indicate if you’re smart  and if you’ll go to a decent college, I experienced a high level of anxiety. The results of this anxiety was that I took the SAT three times (yes, three) and the ACT twice. For a grand total of…………a lot of hours spend in a cold room filling in bubbles. I prefer essay tests to filling in bubbles. Eight pages of blank paper and a one sentence question on top of each page? I’m down. I’d much rather give a speech in front of thousands of people than take a timed standardized test. Honestly, one of the things that I liked about graduate school is that I only had ONE test the entire length of my program. It was great. However, my professional goals demand that I take tests for licensure in my field. And, the time has come to start to study and prepare for this test. No, I’m not excited but I am more than ready to get this out the way so that I can move on with my life. I can’t wait.