Worker-client Relationship Research Articles

The Virtuous Social Worker: The Role of “Thirdness” in Ethical Decision Making

The meaning of the term empathy has been refined in the last few decades. The updated understanding of the term impacts the understanding of the social worker–client relationship. The nature and meaning of relationship may impact one's ethical decision making. For some, ethical practice is premised upon being able to enter into a relationship with the client that is based on empathy as it is currently defined. Practice implications follow from the relationship between empathy and ethics. These include clarification of methods to support the clients agency the nature of boundaries, and the use of self. All of the practice suggestions flow from the notion that we must critically analyze our orientation toward relationship in social work practice.

Caring, Mutuality and Reciprocity in Social Worker—Client Relationships

• Summary: In this article we report the findings of a qualitative study of social workers' experiences of receiving care from their clients to present a case for a re-examination of the social worker—client relationship. • Findings: Participating social workers describe their awareness of the mutuality within their relationships with clients, including an awareness of the care their clients have and express towards them. However, participants report that this openness to mutuality and reciprocity in their relationships with clients is subversive of social work practice norms, which warn against dual relationships. These findings indicate that there is a serious disconnection between social work training and standards, and the ways social workers practice in the field. This puts workers in a potentially untenable position caught between ideals of professional behaviour and their relationships with their clients. • Application: The findings of this study suggest the need for potentially radical shifts in how we conceptualize worker—client relationships within social work practice. We suggest that the accommodation of a theoretical orientation that incorporates an understanding of mutuality of care and the interdependency of identity and human development within all interpersonal relationships provides a significant opportunity to our profession to reexamine how we interact with our clients.

Solution-Based Casework in Child Welfare: Preliminary Evaluation Research

ABSTRACT The purpose of this research was to evaluate the effectiveness of the Solution-Based Casework (SBC) model for child welfare practice. Method: Two case review studies were conducted. The first study compared 48 cases from two worker groups differing in degree of training and implementation of the SBC model. The second study compared the outcomes of 100 high-risk cases based on implementation level of the SBC model. Results: These two studies found that SBC can be implemented across cases differing in type of maltreatment, comorbid factors, and other demographic variables. Results indicated that workers were more actively involved in case planning and service acquisition for families when SBC was implemented. Families were significantly more compliant with casework requirements and achieved more case goals and objectives. The model was particularly effective for families with a history of chronic involvement with the child welfare system. Conclusions: This research supports the effectiveness of SBC for promoting the worker–client relationship and goal achievement for complex child welfare cases.

Looming Threats to the Intimate Bond in Hospice Care? Economic and Organizational Pressures in the Case Study of a Hospice

Hospice organizations are assailed by stiff competition, ever-rising costs, limited funding, and policy changes. Do such pressures stifle the high quality of care these organizations strive to provide? As a case-in-point, we draw from the mid-1990s accounts of caregivers at a nonprofit hospice in a Midwestern city in the United States. We maintain that economic pressures drive organizational restructuring, which then weakens working conditions and, thereby, weakens the staff-client relationship. We discuss effects upon worker behaviors, the worker-client relationship, and client care. This ethnographic case study signals the need to closely examine the threats that current economic and organizational pressures in the United States may pose to the quality of hospice care.

Strengthening Social Worker-Client Relationships in Child Protective Services

Few researchers have set out to explore parents’ feelings about their experiences with Child Protective Services (CPS) particularly as they relate to the relationship between workers and parents who come to the attention of CPS. Yet the worker-client relationship is a central aspect of social work intervention, contributing to positive case resolutions. Understanding aspects of this relationship can contribute to improved CPS. This article reports findings from a qualitative study that used in-depth interviews to explore the experiences of 61 parents who had involvement with CPS.1 Parents appreciated workers who were caring, genuine, empathetic, exceptionally helpful, non-judgmental, and accepting. Negative qualities of workers identified by parents were being judgmental, cold and uncaring, poor listeners, critical, and insincere. Child protection interventions can result in greater actual and/or perceived power imbalances between the client and the worker compared to other social work interventions. Our findings, however, suggest that a positive alliance can be achieved within the context of the adversarial and complex nature of CPS. Possible ways to maintain relationships or rebuild ‘ruptured’ relationships are suggested.

Asking the Customer: Exploring Consumers’ Views in the Generation of Social Work Practice Standards

The present paper reports on the application of consumer participation principles in the development of social work practice standards. The Australian Association of Social Workers Practice Standards Committee consulted with 48 consumers of social work services from four different practice areas about aspects of social work practice. Participants were asked their expectations of social workers. Their responses emphasised the importance of the social worker–client relationship, confidentiality, practical support and client-empowering practice. The consultations contributed to the development of the Standards and the attributes cited were incorporated and are explicit in sections dealing with areas such as mutual engagement and good communication skills. The process of developing a relationship, and its importance, remains integral to the Standards and all outcomes specified are dependent on forming good social worker–client relationships. The consultations were useful in developing the Standards, but they were restricted in number because of a commitment to paying participants while having limited resources and they used opportunistic rather than representative sampling.

The Quiet Remedy: A Dialogue on Reshaping Professional Relationships

This article begins with an overview of the current context for the delivery of social/welfare services and goes on to consider client–worker relationship boundaries that fall within and outside conventional ethical parameters in professional practice. Alternative interpretations of “relationship” are discussed, noting in particular what consumers of services have identified as being beneficial qualities demonstrated by professional “helpers.” Using touch and adopting notions of compassion, love, and reciprocity are discussed, noting how these ideas collide with the current ethical thinking commonly used to guide Western social work practice. Finally, a reexamination of “professionalism” is proposed, including ways to facilitate worker–client connectivity. Throughout, the complex tensions between balancing ethical considerations with ideas relating to trust, risk, and authenticity are articulated.

Dual Relationships: The Challenges for Social Workers in Recovery

ABSTRACT Over the last ten years there is increasing focus in social work literature about non-sexual dual relationships. This has included consideration of different types of dual relationships that occur primarily during or after the establishment of professional social worker-client relationship. However, the specific concerns facing social workers who are themselves in recovery from substance use disorders remain absent from these discussions. This article identifies challenges facing social workers in recovery from substance use disorders who also work with clients dealing with these disorders. Recommended actions and policies that can assist professionals and agencies in balancing personal and practice issues are presented.

Rethinking Self-Awareness in Cultural Competence: Toward a Dialogic Self in Cross-Cultural Social Work

The cultural competence approach has grown significantly in the North American human service professions. The reliance of social workers on cultural awareness to block the influence of their own culture in the helping process entails three problematic and conflicting assumptions, namely, the notion of human being as cultural artifact, the use of self as a technique for transcending cultural bias, and the subject-object dichotomy as a defining structure of the worker-client relationship. The authors contend that there are conceptual incoherencies within the cultural competence model's standard notion of self-awareness. The conceptualization of a dialogic self may unsettle the hierarchical worker-client relationship and de-essentialize the concept of culture. Cross-cultural social work thus becomes a site where client and worker negotiate and communicate to cocreate new meanings and relationships.

Myth and ceremony in workfare: rights, contracts, and client satisfaction

Throughout Western Europe, the ideology of workfare has been adopted for the “workless.” Social citizenship has been changed from status to contract. The change is justified in terms of “contracts of inclusion” between welfare agencies and recipients. Recipients are empowered and have “rights” to work or training and obligations to participate. Contracts of inclusion, however, necessarily exclude. The paper examines the concepts of rights, contracts, and client satisfaction in terms of the U.S. workfare experience. The evidence so far from Europe indicates similar problems in administering workfare for the most vulnerable. I conclude that the administrative failure is an additional reason to support a basic income guarantee. By providing an exit option, the worker–client relationship changes from vertical to horizontal.

The Preliminary Evaluation of a New Approach to Arrest Referral in Birmingham (UK)

Arrest referral has been identified as a key point of intervention for offenders who have a drug problem and who have been arrested. Previous research has however raised concerns from both service users and professionals surrounding the need for independence of arrest referral schemes from the police. Given that arrest referral workers in Birmingham are police-employed and that the arrest referral process has its own dedicated NHS-based treatment team, the current article looks at the potential of this new approach in contacting, referring and treating problematic drug users. A retrospective analysis of referrals made to treatment by arrest referral workers and treatment engagement was conducted. Within a six-month period 394 referrals were made to treatment, with 33.2% of those referred making a treatment demand. Offending and drug expenditure among the group was high. As with other schemes, ethnic minorities and women were under-represented in the numbers of both those referred and those engaging in treatment. The current article argues that, given the need for arrest referral schemes to work closely with the police in order to access and refer service users, arrest referral schemes are more reliant on good worker-client relationships and con-fidentiality than independence.

Rethinking Boundaries

Many factors influence concerns about boundaries in social workerclient relationships, including personal and professional ethics and values, legal regulations, theories of practice, and litigation. In response to these concerns, social work has embraced structures of professional relationships that may disempower our clients. In this article, we discuss the historical and theoretical origins of the concept of boundaries and review factors leading to current concerns about boundary violations. We then examine boundaries in the context of the patriarchal “distance model” of social workerclient relationships (Greenspan, 1995), contrasting it with a feminist “relational” model. We conclude with two brief case illustrations and issues for further reflection.

Is the Client-Worker Relationship Associated with Better Outcomes in Mandated Child Abuse Cases?

Objective: The purpose of this research was to (a) find if there were associations between child welfare outcomes and the client-worker relationship and (b) learn what are the predictors of a positive client-worker relationship. Method: 100 (55 Family Maintenance [FM] and 45 Family Preservation [FP]) clients were interviewed in English and Spanish. Pearson’s r, t tests, chi-squares, and a regression analysis were conducted. Results: A majority of the participants were Latino single mothers. Higher scores on the Relationship with Worker Instrument were correlated with better outcomes in discipline and emotional care of children (p < .01). FP clients were more satisfied with their workers than routine FM participants (p < .01). Ability to openly communicate (p < .001), frequency of visits (p < .05), and receipt of public assistance (p < .05) were found to be predictors of good client-worker relationships. Conclusions: This assessment indicates that client-worker relationships and open communication matter.

Effective relationship-based practice: A theoretical exploration

This paper looks at the importance of a relationship-based approach within social work. It explores past writings on the social worker-client relationship, why the relationship was seen to be central to effectiveness and good practice, and why this perspective fell out of favour. It revisits the importance of a relationship-based approach, within a psychosocial perspective, in relation to eight areas of practice. These include the assessment task and process; relationship difficulties; people who are vulnerable or reliant on others for their well-being; situations that require practitioners to be able to hold and contain anxiety; the relationship as a foundation for capacity building, empowerment and developing people's potential; and in relation to disadvantaged and marginalised sectors of the population, how social workers can use the 'front-line' knowledge they have gained through the relationships they have created in political ways--to bear witness and report on 'social ills' as they impact on the lives of service users. A final section looks briefly at how the service user-social worker relationship is perceived and described in the Benchmarking Statement, National Occupational Standards and the General Social Care Council's Rules and Requirements and their implications in terms of the new social work degree.

Social Citizenship and Workfare in the US and Western Europe: From Status to Contract

A major goal in workfare policies is to re-integrate the socially excluded into full citizenship. I examine the experience in the US and compare the current reforms in selected Western European countries. I argue that current policies of inclusion necessarily exclude. Workfare contemplates an individual `contract' between the agency and the client. I concentrate on the implementation issues - the characteristics and constraints on the welfare worker-client relationship. While there are positive achievements, there is disturbing evidence that the most vulnerable are still being excluded. I suggest reforms for those who remain - separating benefits from services, re-designing incentives for service workers, and eliminating sanctions.

Racial Difference and Human Commonality: The Worker-Client Relationship

(2003). Racial Difference and Human Commonality: The Worker-Client Relationship. Social Work with Groups: Vol. 25, No. 1-2, pp. 113-118.

Violence and Aggression Directed toward Human Service Workers: An Exploratory Study

This study examined the type and extent of psychological aggression and physical violence experienced by 171 human service workers in four Midwestern rural communities and an in urban children services agency. Worker interviewing skills were also studied since the authors believed that appropriate interviewing skills could influence worker–client relationships in a positive manner, thus reducing the potential for violence. Data showed that there were some differences in the amount and intensity of client violence between rural and urban settings, although all workers were routinely subjected to psychological aggression. In addition, some workers were physically assaulted. In spite of constant threats, workers displayed professional demeanor that may diminish threats and reduce violence. Implications for policy and training concerning workplace violence in social service agencies are discussed.

Psycho-Analytic Insight and Relationships revisited

In this paper I discuss the main theoretical ideas in the book and the way in which the author applies them to social casework. I consider the relevance of these ideas to contemporary social work in terms of their contribution to the knowledge base of social work and social work methods. I argue that Kleinian ideas can make an important contribution to understanding the interpsychic and intrapsychic aspects of human experience with which social workers come into contact. I suggest that the author writes about the casework relationship with little regard to the social and political contexts in which social work is undertaken and that in contemporary social work, there needs to be a relationship between three different elements, namely: the client--as an individual within their social context; the emotional dynamics of the client-worker relationship; and the integration of theory, social policy and the legal framework.

In the Firing Line: Violence and Power in Child Protection Work

Children and Workers in the Firing Line: Messages from the Case Files and Interviews The Shifting Foundations of Child Protection: The Context of the Victorian Study The Failure to Protect: Child Deaths due to Familial Assault or Neglect The Failure to Protect: Repeated Abuse The Social Worker-Client Relationship: From Love to Violence and Beyond Protective Workers in the Firing Line: The True Extent of Violence and Isolation Hostage Theory Child Protection Workers as Hostages Beyond the Firing Line: The Broad Perspective Supervision: From Part of the Problem to Part of the Solution The Firing Line Revisited Appendix: The Victorian Study References

The social worker-client relationship -- a Sartrean approach

Several theorists argue that a close and mutual relationship between social worker and client is the 'core' of social work practice. However, this relationship is not examined in a profound way. In the article, the assumption of the essential relationship between social worker and client is scrutinized, using Jean-Paul Sartre's phenomenological, existential philosophy. The aim is to see what Sartre's theory can bring to the discourse about this relationship as a central aspect of social work as a field of knowledge. Ultimately this is of importance for intervention as well as evaluation.