IJSP Number 5, 2023

13 the knowledge that has been assimilated and stimulating thinking about therapy from new perspectives. One way is to ask the trainee for self-evaluation, either directly or through two-chair work where they become the supervisor and give their self feedback about the quality of their involvement with their client. Some of the advantages of this approach are that it stimulates thinking; the supervisor gets further understanding of the supervisee’s process of reasoning; it disarms seeing the supervisor’s comments as criticism; and, it avoids having the supervisor on a pedestal as the person who knows everything. The disadvantages include the trainee being too harsh in the evaluation or not thorough enough in self-confrontation— however, both provide the supervisor with significant information. Another important approach at this level of training is to contract with the supervisee for what they want in the supervision. The advantage of this approach is that the supervisee feels in control of the supervisory process by defining their own professional goals; however, it may also carry the disadvantage of leading the supervisor away from other important areas. Contracts for supervision can be made either before or after the supervisor has watched or heard the recorded work or listened to an entire case presentation. The supervisor needs to avoid too tight of a contract so there is the flexibility to comment on other relevant observations for which the trainee may not have asked for feedback. A question that helps to refine the therapist’s approach is, “What would you do differently if you could do this therapy over?” Or alternatively, “What will you do next time you work with this client?” Here the aim is in planning treatment and exploring with the supervisee options for treatment interventions. This is a time when supervisors could insist that trainees bring recordings of their “worst” therapy sessions for supervision. The supervisor’s task is to work with the supervisee to learn from their mistakes and to develop new options in the psychotherapy. Often the problem at this skill-refinement phase is not in the actual interventions used but in the sequence of interventions. A concept borrowed from parametric statistics of “Type A - Type B errors” may be useful in setting priorities for what is said or done therapeutically. When the therapist makes interventions to correct Problem A, they may reinforce Problem B. For example, if someone’s script beliefs are, “I’m helpless” and “No one understands me”, the therapist may temporarily not address the client’s sense of helplessness while instead creating the quality of relationship that dissolves the client’s belief that “no one understands me.” The trainee thus learns how to evaluate which problem can be held in abeyance while another problem receives immediate focus. The supervisee’s psychotherapy approach can also be expanded by encouraging a discussion of the theoretical basis for interventions used. This can help solidify the frame of reference and develop facility in putting theory into practice. Once the supervisee can adequately explain what is being done from a specific theoretical position then it may be profitable to have them explain how they might work with the same client using a different theoretical concept, leading eventually to the ability to explain the work from multiple frames of reference. In this way the trainee can be stimulated to make use of what was learned in earlier training and supervision while providing the supervisor with information as to what areas of theory or practice need further concentration in teaching or reading assignments.