IJSP Number 5, 2023

12 found that my job as a supervisor is to determine whether inadequate therapy is the result of lack of skill that requires further teaching, simply the lack of confidence that comes through successful experiences, a personal therapy problem, or some combination of these. Since the primary focus at this skill development phase is on increasing the trainee’s level of information on how to do psychotherapy, I generally do not focus on any possible countertransference unless such counter-transference is interfering with the supervisee’s capacity to be fully present and therapeutic. At this phase of professional development, it is often best to encourage the supervisee to engage in their own psychotherapy. Confidence building. Once the supervisee has acquired an understanding of personality theory and has mastered the capacity to be fully in relationship with their clients, the aim of supervision is on facilitating the supervisee’s sense of ease in using their various skills as well as a general sense of confidence and well-being as a psychotherapist. The supervisee may have acquired sufficient information and therapeutic acumen but may lack the confidence to use it, so the supervisor’s task is to help the supervisee appreciate and use what they have already learned. In this phase the supervisor provides approval and support for that which the supervisee has done well. The advantage of this confidence-building approach is that it minimizes the supervisee’s possible inhibition of their own potential. Sometimes I have chosen to temporarily ignore what has not been done well with the purpose of diminishing any self-rebuke or sense of inadequacy that the supervisee may have. With some of these supervisees I have had to reteach skills or concepts that the supervisee has not assimilated. As in the previous phase of supervision, I find it desirable at this phase to identify the supervisee’s self-rebuke, inhibition, shame, or over-exuberance and to then encourage them to address it in their own psychotherapy. Usually, I do not attend to these types of personal issues in this confidence-building phase of the supervision. These two phases, skill-development and confidence-building, are not necessarily sequential; I tend to shuttle between these two phases in accordance with what the supervisee presents. In this confidence-building phase I guide the supervisee to use the concept of an “inward eye” — to take whatever occurs in therapeutic situation and to look inward — to be in contact with their own affect, memories, beliefs and fantasies. And simultaneously be able to observe the client’s behavior, to inquire about the client’s phenomenological experience, and to understand what is being communicated within a theoretical context. It is this ability to be in contact with one’s own internal experience and the uniqueness of the client’s experience that is the basis for empathy and the creation of a healing relationship. 3. INTERMEDIATE PHASE Thinking Theoretically and Skill Refinement. After the trainee is confidently using the psychotherapy skills learned previously, supervision is geared to building an identity as a therapist and refining the supervisee’s approach to psychotherapy. Here the supervisor focuses on enhancing