In this episode I am joined by social worker and colleague Andy Black, and we reflect on some key learning from John Burnham who attended a recent conference in BANES.
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In this episode I am joined by social worker and colleague Andy Black, and we reflect on some key learning from John Burnham who attended a recent conference in BANES.
Any questions please contact me on richdevinesocialwork@gmail.com
Connect with me on: https://twitter.com/RichardDevineSW
Follow my blog, where you can be sent fortnightly blogs on topics covered on this podcast: https://richarddevinesocialwork.com/about/
If you enjoyed this episode, please share with your friends, and leave a review - positive, or negative, all feedback welcome.
Episode is Live
Published: Nov. 08, 2022 @11AM Edit
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Welcome to rich divine social work, practice podcast. I am rich and I am a social worker. This podcast is about practice related issues, self development and transformation. It will give you knowledge, ideas and practical tools for being an effective social worker, supporting you with assessment skills, direct work, dealing with conflict. And importantly, helping you make a positive difference in the lives of children and families. Today, I'm going to be talking about a conference that we recently had Banes Baffin. Northeast Somerset council. In particular, some learning from the systemic legend. And renowned systemic therapist, John Burnham. Before I get into that, I just wanted to give an acknowledgement and a shout out of appreciation to. A few people who've said some really lovely things on Twitter. In particular, Rebecca K from Stockport. Does Holmes from research in practice, Carmen who's appear. Versus researcher at Cardiff and carry on Rafferty. It really means a lot to get such lovely, positive, encouraging. Feedback. Joining me today. I've got Andy black, who is a colleague and a social worker at battens. And do want to introduce yourself and say a little bit about your practice experience before we jump into. Our learning from John. Our mate, John Burnham. Great. Yeah. Thanks for edge. So yeah, I've been a social worker for almost five years now, first time podcast to the home. So it's good to be hopefully. Hopefully you can share some interesting things. They also enter the conference. And so yeah, first off is already impressive. Speaker says great to be able to talk about him a bit more. So I have had a bit experienced work in all around children's services, really and adoption and fostering frontline child protection. And now taking a bit of a step back. To doing community based parenting assessment, so kind of a variety of roles. And I'd say generally my experience social work has been really good so far. I've learned a huge amount in the time that I've spent there. And now at the point where really just getting into. How we're helping families and thinking more creatively about new ways of practice. So, yeah, really good to be here today. Thinking. So we'll jump straight into John Burnham. And I arrive at Twitter, Fred, just to kind of encapsulate some of the key ideas. I mean, there was probably about 40 good ideas that he shared with us. And I've just managed to write down a few of them. So the first one is. Called adopt as if I know nothing perspective. And what he was highlighting is that even if you look the same or you have shared similar experiences, What he was inviting us to do was to adopt a position of rigorous curiosity. So in other words, not assuming that just because we grew up, for example, with a parent who's misused, drugs and alcohol, that we would do automatically have some insight or relate-ability to some. So to a child or another parent who might have had similar experiences. Yeah, it's pretty interesting. Isn't it? We often find ourselves. When there's people there. Very different to us. I definitely find myself asking a lot more questions and a lot more curious about their experience of life, their experience of services of relationships. Then if I'm that someone that I identified with more myself, Yeah, I suppose it's like Charmin gin. Your presumptions about what somebody might have experienced or actually how they've made sense of what those experiences. Would have been one of the things that's fascinating about doing adult attachment interviews with parents is that you can have two to two children who grew up in the same family who ended up with two very different ideas about what their family experiences were. And they developed two different ways of coping with the same experiences. So there is something about the experience in of itself. Doesn't tell you that much about. What a person has been through, because the mean, and that somebody attributes can vary from person to person. Oh, yeah. Tristan and especially, especially with trauma and traumatic events. I think we can. You know, read something on paper, about an individual. And then make assumptions about how they experienced that event. And for me yet particularly stands out when there's been trauma. And I have a reaction to that and make a judgment about how they must have experienced that event. And, and you kind of take that into the session with them. And take away though. But don't worry from, from given them that freedom of expression about that experience. I think it's reminded me of. One of the key. Ideas. I learned when I was doing my masters in attachment studies around looking at when somebody has experienced a traumatic event. It's not the event per se, that would constitute it being traumatic rather. It's the event and the degree to which they were protected even before and after. The level of comfort they received during and after, and whether they were supported to make sense of it. During the time that the incident occurred. Yeah. It always reminds me of, of the situation where, you know, family there's been a big domestic incident. And actually one of the key memories that the child's remembered from it was the hot chocolate they had from the mother after the event happened. And that was one of the defining moments of the experience. And I think I've kind of bummed thought in there and made assumptions about what that experience was and would. I would have never have kind of helped them express that. Yeah, that actually touches upon seminars talking about last week. Which is in cases where you've had domestic abuse occur and often the mums would engage in protective behavior towards the, towards the child. That to compensate for the effects of the child. Witnessing or hearing some of the domestic abuse. And by recognizing that the parent. Board of. Support the child or gone out of their way to help them make sense of what just happened is a way of being quite strengths-based in what was otherwise sometimes a difficult situation. Okay. So that was the first point. John made. The second point frameworks offer temporary clarity. Life moves on and they don't contain absolute truth. So I think he was pointing to that. You can have good ideas and good, good fairies. And then you're going to use them in practice, but you have to recognize that people wouldn't circumstances evolve probably quicker than the theory and the set of ideas. Do. He then goes on to say, and this was probably one of my favorite point in other words, use ferry, but don't rely on theory. Also think about times you've been effective, then find theory that supports that. I love that. I love that. It reminds me a lot. Of uni when I would write essays and write. Point and then find theory that supported the point I made is. But I think often I'm inclined to look at, sometimes I'll get caught up in finding the theory and then seeing how the theory fits. The parent or the child. And what he said actually is think about ways that you'll practice it and especially ways that you think like you've been helpful or you've been especially effective. And then find the theory that supports you in that endeavor, because it might be that you have a pretty good way of dealing with a certain situation. And if you find the theory that aligns with that, you might be able to just improve or be able to pawn it. In a meaningful way. Yeah, absolutely. And I think that, I think it's situated in and how practice based, especially those first few years in social worker about. But, you know, you come from uni with, with some understanding of the different theories that influence our practice. Actually when you get to practice and you start going, and some of that isn't consistent and, and perhaps there's a bit of a drift away from theory, more towards emerging practice knowledge. And so an idea of bringing that practice knowledge back to theory and saying what works in terms of, how am I going to understand what I'm experiencing and countering and practice. And yeah, that's really insightful. So he's basically saying the practice and theory is reciprocal, which is just a really cool point. Moving on to the third point. Ask people about their story. And I think he was saying this in the context of. Some parents might say that they feel like they've already told that story multiple times already. But there's a level of intention and listening that you can bring such that the story. Unfolds in a new way. A new meaning can be made of it. But he was also cautioning against. Recognizing that it might not be their story. It might be someone else's story. And one of the questions he proposed was to ask them whose story is that? So I think. There's some children who develop certain ideas about themselves. The actually might have been given or provided to them by their parents. They might've been labeled in a certain way. They then internalize that label or that belief. And construct a story that fits with that. Idea or belief that's been handed to them. Yeah, there's definitely something. There's definitely something about labeling in there. Isn't there and about how we weave narratives from the concepts and ideas that we hold about ourself, which are often. Now for a lot of people, myself included quite externally generates the pat a lot of attention to the external narrative that people have of me and how that would then influence the story that I have about myself. We've been thinking about this a lot, actually, in terms of life story work. And narrative intervention. And there is a risk with life story work that we impose. Our narrative or our understanding of the child's experience onto the child. That in a way that doesn't fully account for what that, what their lived experiences were and what their memories and recollections were. For example, The example you gave of the, the boy with the hot chocolate after the incident, that's his defining memory of what happened. And so there is a risk that we can sometimes impose a certain hour, a TIFF on tilt and especially Tilton who I suppose have been in care. Yeah, it's born out is I think for me, it was definitely born out of an agenda that I had to try and support the child to come to terms with their experiences and probably quite an optimistic, hopeful, and maybe a bit idealistic way. So the fourth point is. There is a temptation to abuse abusers. An entitlement critique and abused concrete Pinto. Practice. We need to treat them how we want them to treat others. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know if there's much more to add than that. Really. It reminds me a lot of some of the principles of the dynamic maturation, a model of attachment. Adaptation. I think In. Wanting to be. Supportive to parents. I'm the way that we work with parents wanting that too. Encapsulate how the M the aims and ambitions we have for how they parent their children. The compassion, the kindness, the understanding. The generosity, the openness, all of those, all of those things that comes with understanding that quite often, the behavior that's on the surface. Is as a symptom of, of intergenerational trauma, intergenerational difficulties. Well, there's a, there's a challenge when you're involved with a family as a children's social worker. With the intention to support, safeguard and protect them. And the parent is acting in a way that's harmful towards their children. And sometimes I think social workers can be led to believe that you can't hold empathy for what the child plus empathy for the parent. It's almost like we fall into a trap off. We need to condone, criticize and judge the power and in our pursuit of feeling empathy and developing an understanding of what's going on for the child. And actually it is possible to hold those two positions in mind. That the parent is acting in a way that's harmful towards the child, but also we can be empathic in attempting to understand. What's the underlying function of that behavior that's causing themselves and their children difficulty. Yeah. It's so easily done though. Isn't it? I think, you know, social workers. Human beings when we see When we see harm being caused, when we see people's effects of people's actions, the consequences of a behavior, and that harming others, particularly children, it's highly emotive. And I think that emotion drives particular views. But I think what he's saying there is, is it's is counter-intuitive to what our aim is, which is to. Protect children. To support parents. Yeah. And it's making me. Thinking about the value of trying to understand. What contributes to the development of behaviors that. On the face of it seen destructive. Or count counter counterproductive in terms of the healthy, happy life. And I think in my experience, a lot of the difficulties that parents have in relation to issues that were on the social care involvement. When you trace it back to their childhood experiences. You can see that there's some, the necessity to develop a way of coping in that childhood because they were facing adverse circumstances and situations. And then they've taken that coping strategy and carried it forward into adulthood. In ways that are now causing them difficulty. Perhaps harm to people around them. An example might be. For a perpetrator of domestic abuse. May have been brought up in an environment where his parents were highly unpredictable, inconsistent. And at times quite dangerous. And as a way of coping with that, he or she becomes incredibly fearful, anxious about the availability of his parent. Incredibly needy, quite demand. And there's a way of trying to make an unpredictable parent more predictable. And then using violence or aggression to communicate his desire or wish for. Some affection or love or. Predictability and that strategy then gets carried forward into adulthood. Without awareness and it plays itself out in intimate relationships and really destructive ways. And if we just go in and judge them and criticize them, It's unlikely to help them, but we can think about. We can think about, they need to find ways to improve the way in which they communicate their feelings of love and affection towards their partner. And recognize that that was a strategy that wants serve them. And it was a strength that they developed our strategy. But now it's not serving them as well as it used to. I think. And it says it in the grazing parents that when she reads the transcript of someone's adult attachment interview, it's hard to not empathize with them and their life. It's so true. Yeah. So that one was 0.4, there's a temptation to abuse, abusers and entitlement critique abuse can creep into our practice. We need to treat them how we want them to treat others. Step five. We can easily think that every person who has been abused need Farrah needs therapy, but lots of people recover. With our therapy. And we need to speak to them and understand what helped. Hmm, that's really interesting point. Isn't it. I do think. We didn't care proceedings often when parents have a psychological assessment. The inevitable outcome of that is that the parent is recommended psychological therapy in almost all instances. And I do wonder if that's. A reflection of, or a consequence of just narrowly focusing in on somebody's psychological functioning, independent of the developmental experiences and social context. I think fundamentally there's two ways that you could help a family and a parent one is that you focus in on the individual and you expect them to change in a way that. Immediately rates or lessens the risk that their behavior presents. Or secondly, the. Parent doesn't change and you adapt and alter the system around the power and such that the level of harm is reduced or ameliorated, or we've increased the level of protective factors to offset against some of the risks imposed by. Some of the parents difficulties. It's it's interesting because I think. What I think is alluding to is, is about. Perhaps a bit of a human in nature needs that we have, especially as people in the helping profession to try and fix and resolve people's difficulties we, you know, the. The complex trauma and presentation that, that, that we often encounter with the parents that we work with. I think I've had times last times in my career where I've not known how to approach that. And I'm thinking all this person, you know, they need someone who's able to respond to them in a therapeutic way, but I think it's rooted in this drive that I have, or we have to try and fix things rather than necessarily sitting with them. Now of course, you know, that has to be seen in the context of child protection, where we also do have a job of trying to fix things. In other words, try to ensure that the Charles his ex is reasonably safe and. The experiences are Ben responded. So. But I think what he's saying is that there are lots of people where, you know, they don't have that. And those that we need to look at what's in their lives. What's helped them. What spend protective for them and how have they experienced. That. You know, the trauma. Most of them in that life. Yeah. It's reminded me. Actually sometimes this. There's families who I've worked with. Where you look at the chronology and it might be that they have a few years of lots of involvement, lots of concerns that the school contacted social care. We get involved as a child protection plan, and then suddenly the concerns lasted number juice, and then there's no involvement for free for five years. And then suddenly we're back involved again, and there's an escalation of the concerns. And that is. Called an exception, essentially. It's like, you're looking for exceptions in the family's history and social circumstances to find out what was happening within the family system. During that time. And it might be the mum was in a reasonably healthy relationship with a partner. And now that relationship has disintegrated. She's struggling again with loneliness and that's causing her to. Okay. Back to misusing drugs or alcohol. And so that gives an indication maybe. That that that parent would benefit from someone who provides her with emotional comfort. And company. And so that's the, some of the ideas that can be generated when we think about what's happening in the life of parents who are doing relatively well, despite difficult experiences. Yeah, absolutely. And then the final point is we are change makers. So John. Felt like that was placing too much responsibility on the individual. Too. Support individuals or parents make change. But we can create and be part of a culture of contribution. So he's saying you can't empower someone, but you can create a context where someone can feel empowered. It's paradoxical, isn't it? That notion that we, we sort of. Introduced that word into our repertoire of skills and tools that were empowers. But the very nature of us empowering someone else is not empowering. Yeah. I think within child protection, there's a lot of pressure. And we have limited time and resources. To support. Children and families. And so there is an impulse. To go into the family and tell them very quickly what's wrong. With the hope that that will then lead them to make the changes that they need to make in motivational interviewing, they call that the telling the parent what to do trap. And it's apparently when they've researched interviews and made observations of social work is quite a frequent tactic of social workers. And. I completely get it because we are under pressure. We can see that the child has been hurt by certain behavior. And then we want to see. Change positive change happen. And we think that just simply pointing that out to parents will enable that to happen. But I think what John is suggesting is that's too much for burden to place upon ourselves. That we can't create or make anybody change, but we can create a cold culture or create contact. Or create a relationship that will maximize the probability that the parent will change when they're ready to change. Yeah. I mean, I've been there so many times is, you know, late in the afternoon and you're a as at someone's house and I'm seeing something and I know that this is part of the plan. This is what I'm here to support with. And the temptation and I've given him so many times is to point out and say, this is what you need to do. And I can't even remember a time that has ever been effective at helping someone. Actually change in their behavior, improve the parenting or improve the child's experience. And I think I'm a perfectionist because it's coming from my cognitive framework. It's coming from my. Perception is external perception of the relationships of, of what life is like in this house. And, and. And of course, you're not going to be able to, to just completely integrate someone else's perspective in that way immediately. And so the way that you unconsciously function is it's not going to happen. It's unrealistic. And, but it is really tempting when you're there. I can't even get myself to do the things that I want. If I say right rich, you need to stop. Staying up late and looking at social media. I can't follow through with that. On my own terms and that's with me wanting to make that change. And so it's about applying the same. Perspective. To how we change and how we have changed in the past. To the parents that we work with. And a lot of my healthy habits are because I create a contact or I work in an organization that massively props up and facilitates and advocates for me to be. And behave in a certain way. Well, I really like about that language, the culture of, of contribution, and that we're, that we are just one part of that. And, and I think it really embraces this systemic. Idea and the direction that we're taking more and more these days about the family network and bringing in the family to also be part of that culture of contribution that isn't actually just the responsibility of the social worker. Even though sometimes we feel like that is the case. It's a, and I think that would be helpful to socialists. It'd be helpful for me to have thought of actually, you know, we share this and actually I'm part of a culture of contribution for this family rather. Rather than the instigator of change. Cause then I'm not going to leave every day. You're feeling. Like I've failed. Yeah. Okay. So that is the end of John's. Contribution to our. Conference. So just to recap, One adopt a as if I know nothing perspective. Even if you look the same or shared similar experiences, adopt a position of Ricky rigorous curiosity. Number two frameworks offer temporary clarity life moves on and they don't contain absolute truth. In other words, use ferry, but don't rely on theory. Also think about times you've been effective, then find theory that supports that. Practice and theory is reciprocal. Number three, ask about. Parent or child story, but keep in mind that sometimes it's not their story. It might be someone else's story. You can ask them whose story is that? Number four, there is a temptation to abuse, abusers, and entitlement critique and abuse can creep into our practice. We need to treat them how we want them to treat others. Number five. We can easily think that every person who has been abused need Farrah needs therapy, but lots of people recover. From difficult experiences and abuse without therapy, and we need to speak to them and understand them. From them, what helped. And number six, we aren't change-makers that place too much individual responsibility on us. But we can create and be part of a culture of contribution. And can I just say he's such an incredible speaker. He is enigmatic. So intelligent and very funny. And if anyone has the opportunity to go see one of his talks or a lecture or something, I'd really recommend it. Yeah, he was brilliant. And thanks to our principal social worker. I'm forgetting to come to veins. Yeah, absolutely. Any final thoughts or reflections and. No, I think the concepts and you know, your first and it's called and I'm going to. And I really do think they are, that they're really challenge and offer alternative views on the routines and ways that we find ourselves practicing. And it certainly was really thought provoking for me. There's a lot. I want to take forward into my practice. I think. I think increasingly I'm beginning to realize that as humans, we have default mechanisms for how we relate and understand other people. And we need systems and ideas that help us out. T to develop an understanding. That's not reliant on those default mechanisms. What I mean by that is. Cognitive biases. The influence our opinion and our judgment and our relationships. And cognitive biases are innate that built in. We don't choose to use them. They kind of use themselves automatically. And I say have an ideas from people like John and thinking systemically, developmentally is necessary to overcome the limitations of ordinary. Thinking and understanding other people's behavior. Yeah, I definitely wouldn't be able to do that on my own. You need someone like John to be there and healthy. Okay. So Manny, thanks for listening to this episode. And many thanks to Andy for joining me. If you haven't already, then please consider subscribing follow in or sharing with your colleagues. And please leave a comment positive or negative or feedback is very welcome. And finally, if you have any questions, please do get in touch. I say this every week and I've yet to have a question, but I would love to have a segment at the end where I answer practitioners questions. So if there's any topics or questions that you'd have, have that you'd like me to explore. Please do get in touch.