CONCLUDING REMARKS: Clinical Supervision in the 21^st Century: Revisiting Pressing Needs and Impressing Possibilities

Introduction

Where there is psychological treatment, there is need for psychological treatment supervision. As the practice of psychotherapy and counseling has become increasingly globalized (Hohenshil, Amundson, & Niles, 2013), the practice of clinical supervision has been accordingly challenged to become increasingly globalized as well. Affirming evidence to that effect can now be seen on a number of fronts, including the organization of important international supervision conferences (e.g., the Advances in Clinical Supervision conference recently held in Sydney, Australia), the conduct of cross-continent supervision research (e.g., Son & Ellis, 2013), and the creation of new publication outlets (e.g., Journal of International Counselor Education) that highlight such contributions from around the world. At the recent International Interdisciplinary Conference on Clinical Supervision that international flavor was also nicely displayed, with attention being given to supervision in Botswana, Bulgaria, Cyprus, Denmark, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Korea, Macedonia, Portugal, Romania, and Venezuela (e.g., Szilagyi, 2013). We are fast becoming a world awash in commitment to supervision, and all indications point to further continuation and enhancement of that emphasis in the future (Milne, Gonsalvez, & Watkins, 2013). As Gonsalvez and Milne (2010) have rightly stated, “… international trends suggest a movement from clinical supervision being an optional competency … to it being [professional] essential …” (Gonsalvez & Milne, 2010, p. 238).

In surveying the current supervision scene, what might we identify as some of its most pressing needs and impressing possibilities? In two papers appearing near last century’s end, I (1995, 1998) examined the then current status of clinical supervision and identified several needs that did indeed press for attention at that time. Those identified needs focused on pointed deficits that were clearly evident in the areas of supervision measurement, research, and education (e.g., need for more valid, reliable supervision measures and longitudinal research). If supervision then is compared with supervision now, how has it advanced? And what seem to be supervision needs that still press for attention? In this paper, I would like to consider those questions; it seems most timely to do so. While changes over the course of supervision’s history have typically been far more gradual and slowly evolving than otherwise, that does not in any way appear to have been the case for supervision scholarship and practice across the last 15 years. Some sweeping changes—unprecedented in supervision’s 100-year plus history—have certainly occurred (e.g., casting supervision training and practice within a competency-based framework) and are seemingly of such magnitude that they will affect its trajectory forevermore. As we push boldly forward into the new millennium, I would like to look more closely at the benefits of those changes for supervision and to identify areas in which further change is needed if supervision is to advance most profitably.

In taking that closer look here, I would like to cast my supervision net wider than was done in my earlier papers. In those two 1990s efforts while needs of potential international import were identified, only supervision work that had been done (and was then occurring) in the United States was taken into account. I would like to look more broadly in this paper—considering the current scene, pressing needs, and impressing possibilities of clinical supervision in international perspective. As Bernard and Goodyear (2014) have indicated, clinical supervision is “robustly international” in nature. In what follows, I hope to capture some of that robustly international feel.

Supervision Around the World: Current Status, Needs, and Possibilities

In effort to better contrast supervision then with supervision now, I will first provide a brief summary statement about the status of clinical supervision in the 1990s for each topic area. I will then follow up each summary statement with a report about the status of clinical supervision now for each identified topic area. Attention will be given to four core matters: (a) supervision training and practice; (b) measurement; (c) difference and diversity; and (d) research. While by no means all inclusive or exhaustive of critical topics of concern, those four matters seemingly are most central and foundational to any consideration of supervision and its advancement.

Supervision Training and Practice

The 1990S

Need 1 In the earlier reviews, I (1995, 1998) indicated that more attention to establishing standards for supervision education and practice was needed. As stated, “the potential value of … standards seems clear: they can provide a consensual guide to what critical areas must be addressed in … supervision training and the basic standards of behavior to which … supervisors must adhere in practice” (Watkins, 1998, p. 99).

Need 2 Also noted was a virtual absence of any type of supervisor training experiences, and the sore need for more attention to providing such educational opportunities. The argument was framed as follows: “Something does not compute. We would never dream of turning [unsupervised] untrained therapists loose on needy patients, so why would we turn those untrained supervisors loose on those untrained therapists who help those needy patients? Just as becoming a therapist is a labor-intensive endeavor for which training and supervision are needed, so too can the same be said about becoming a supervisor” (Watkins, 1997, p. 604).

The 2010S

As we consider the issues of standards and supervisor training, where is supervision now? Let us first take up the issue of standards.

Need 1 From my perspective, the issue of standards is being most convincingly and compellingly addressed by means of the competency movement, which has been sweeping across the supervision landscape with gale-like force. Never has a singular shift had such a rapid, and all-pervasive impact on the entirety of the supervision enterprise. Competence, while always a concern of supervisory significance, has increasingly come into razor-sharp focus internationally in a way unthinkable two decades ago. And the advances that have been made in rendering supervision a competency based affair are largely a product of this past decade alone. As Holloway (2012) has aptly indicated, competencies have well become the Zeitgeist of contemporary clinical supervision.

The three most substantial and comprehensive supervision competency frameworks have emerged from Australia, the United Kingdom, and the United States (Falender et al., 2004; Psychology Board of Australia, 2013; Roth & Pilling, 2008). While each framework has some distinctive elements, they all are highly similar in intent and content—providing specifics about the knowledge, skills/abilities, and attitudes that are expected for adequate supervision practice. Regardless of country of origin, six fundamental competency areas are given emphasis across all frameworks:

Each of the six broad, fundamental areas is composed of a host of more specific competencies that give definition to practical implementation. For example, some of those more specific competencies include ability to: form and maintain a good supervisory alliance (Roth & Pilling, 2008); provide accurate and constructive feedback (Roth & Pilling, 2008); establish supervision goals and objectives (Psychology Board of Australia, 2013); attend to diversity and its impact (Psychology Board of Australia, 2013); assess supervisee learning and developmental needs (Falender et al., 2004); and set appropriate boundaries (Falender et al., 2004). Those three frameworks have provided and continue to provide useful structure for conceptualizing and conducting supervision practice and training; they also each serve as eminently useful prototypes for other countries where competency framework development is being considered (cf. Bang & Park, 2009; Young, 2013).

What is vastly different now in supervision as opposed to the 1990s is the unrelenting, unapologetic accentuation of accountability. This push for accountability is evident across all supervision competency frameworks. Falender and Shafranske (2012) captured the crux of this matter as follows:

While Falender and Shafranske were specifically referring to doctoral education, their words about accountability and competence assessment also have relevance for supervision post qualification (cf. Turpin & Wheeler, 2011). A stepped model of competency-based supervision, emphasizing assessment and accountability, is provided in Figure 1. This stepped model seems to reflect the spirit of accountability that inheres in the Australian, United Kingdom, and United States competency frameworks, as well as other substantial competency initiatives now underway (e.g., the European Association for Psychotherapy’s ambitious 10-year project, The Professional Competencies of a European Psychotherapist [see Domain 9 for supervision competencies]; Young, Schulthess, Szysz-kowitx, Oudijks, & Stabingis, 2013; http://www.europsyche.org/contents/13541/the-professional-competencies-of-a-european-psychotherapist).

But as these valuable frameworks continue to transform the supervision landscape, it seems vitally important that their novelty not be forgotten. The reality is that, while these frameworks offer much useful guidance, they are at most a decade old and by no means finished product. Any good supervision competency framework must be sufficiently comprehensive in scope, yet its practical economy is equally important in determining the extent to which it gets embraced and implemented (Watkins & Milne, 2014). Does the framework combine the best of practicality and parsimony and does it avoid being so onerous in design that it implodes from its own weight? And is the framework user friendly, accurately reflecting the realities of practice and being highly implementable across supervisors and settings? Those intertwined questions have yet to be answered definitively, but they are at the forefront of consideration. Some evidence can be seen in more recent efforts: (a) to economize upon existing frameworks and render them less wieldy, increasingly practical, and more user friendly (Hatcher, Fouad, Grus, Campbell, McCutcheon, & Leahy, 2013; Rodolfa et al., 2013; Schaffer, Rodolfa, Hatcher, & Fouad, 2013); and (b) to evaluate their in-the-field utility and acceptability to practitioners (Owen-Pugh & Symons, 2013).

While all these recent efforts provide good foundation on which to build, more such work will clearly be required if the competency agenda is to most viably move forward. As Gonsalvez and Crowe (this issue) have indicated, “these frameworks have been arrived at through expert consensus and do not, at the current time, have empirical support, and are yet to demonstrate adequate predictive and construct validity” (cf. Gonsalvez et al., 2013). Those are not small matters. For now, though still offering some instructive direction and guidance, available supervision competency frameworks might best be thought of as unfinished works in progress that require further evaluation: “a resource that may need to be modified as our understanding of best practice improves” (Owen-Pugh & Symons, 2013).

Need 2 Let us next turn our attention to supervisor training. Perhaps the greatest difference now in contrast to the 1990s is that there appears to be far wider international recognition and acceptance of the notion that if the most effective supervision services are to be provided, then supervisors need training in how to supervise. International evidence to that effect can be found in continued calls about the importance of such training (Borders, 2010; Szecsody, 2012, in press), the specification of supervisor competencies and best practice behaviors that can be used for structuring training experiences (Borders, this issue; Falender et al., 2004; Psychology Board of Australia, 2013; Roth & Pilling, 2008), the growing number of training publications about educating supervisors (Bernard, this issue; Gonsalvez & Milne, 2010; Watkins & Wang, 2014), and the slowly (but surely) developing body of research about the impact of supervisor training (Milne, Sheikh, Pattison, & Wilkinson, 2011; Sundin, Ogren, & Boethius, 2008; Watkins, 2012a).

But acceptance of educational importance does not instantaneously translate into educational reality. As Borders (2010) has rightly opined: “… [while] need for supervisor training is widely accepted … the practice of requiring, even offering, supervisor training in academic programs continues to vary rather substantially across disciplines …” (p. 130); her statement would also seem to apply when considering supervisor training offerings post qualification. However, that state of affairs has been changing across the last 15 years and continues to do so, with (a) supervisor training opportunities becoming more readily and widely available internationally and (b) required supervisor training even emerging as the new norm in some places. For example, beginning July 1, 2013, mandatory supervisor training went into effect for psychologists in Australia (Psychology Board of Australia, 2013). Mandatory, ongoing supervision of supervision has long been a requirement in the British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy; it also now plays a role in the ethical guidelines of the United Kingdom Council of Psychotherapy and Psychotherapy and Counselling Federation of Australia. As Wheeler (2007) has aptly stated, “Career long supervision is high on the agendas of some organisations but not others” (p. 1). Yet based on evolving trends, I believe that safe prediction could be made that: The crucial importance of supervisor training and supervision of supervision will continue to be increasingly embraced worldwide, an ever growing number of supervisor training opportunities will become even more widely available internationally, career-long supervision will continue to slowly rise on the agendas of a growing number of professional associations and eventually become more established practice, and supervisor education will become a far more widely and increasingly researched topic around the globe. Indeed, in contrast to decades past, this last decade has seen ground-breaking attention given to and substantive direction provided for clinical supervisor training, and all indications point to much more of the same in the years ahead.

Yet with that highly positive shift noted, the supervisor training area remains much in need of careful scrutiny and far more substantive examination. Some particularly pressing needs that have been identified are (a) beginning to establish a more solid empirical or evidence base for supervisor training (e.g., through manual-driven education; Milne, 2010, 2014), (b) studying transfer of training to actual practice (Milne et al., 2011), and (c) giving attention to the much neglected supervision of supervision process (Fleming, 2012). Supervisor training research thus far has been plagued by small sample sizes, primary reliance on self-report measures, and failure to employ control groups; unsurprisingly, researchers have uniformly embraced the need for more rigor in future investigations (Watkins, 2012a; Watkins & Wang, 2014). Correcting those deficiencies and “raising the bar’ on the rigor, relevance, and replicability of future supervisor training research” (Watkins, 2012a, p. 301) seems to be the next step in most profitably advancing this vital area of inquiry.

Measurement

The 1990s

As the dawn of the new millennium approached, problems with measurement in supervision loomed large (see Ellis & Ladany, 1997; Lambert & Ogles, 1997). An earlier review stated that “Research is only as good as the measurement tools and procedures that are used in assessment and evaluation. In recent years, several supervision publications have emphasized one point vigorously: more valid, reliable, supervision-specific measures are needed to advance research” (Watkins, 1998, p. 94). But what improvements have been made in supervision measurement over the last 15 to 20 years? What improvements need to be made?

The 2010s

In their excellent 1997 review, Ellis and Ladany identified only two supervision measures—Role Conflict and Role Ambiguity Inventory (Olk & Friedlander, 1992) and Relationship Inventory (Schact, Howe, & Berman, 1988)—as ready for research use. In a follow up measurement review in 2008, Ellis, D’Iuso, and Ladany (2008) recommended only one new measure—Evaluation Process within Supervision Inventory (Lehrman-Waterman & Ladany, 2001)—for research use. They summarized the core measurement problem as follows: “… researchers … continue to use or endorse substandard procedures to construct and test the validity of new and existing measures for clinical supervision” (p. 496). It has long been lamented that supervision measures have too often been: (a) one-time, homemade constructions that have lacked for any psychometric validation (e.g., being created solely for use in a dissertation study) or (b) instantaneous wonders, where a therapy measure instantly becomes transformed into a research-ready supervision measure by merely replacing the words “therapist” and “client” with “supervisor” and “supervisee” (cf. Ellis & Ladany, 1997; Lambert & Ogles, 1997). Unfortunately, neither approach works well in providing strong, sound data from which conclusions about the supervision experience can be confidently drawn. The development of more valid, reliable supervision-specific measures remains a pressing need and would seem most crucial for supervision’s profitable advance (Bernard & Goodyear, 2014).

But with that pressing need recognized, it also is important to add that we have not been wholly devoid of progress in the measurement area: In the past decade alone, some significant advances have been made and merit at least countervailing mention here. For example, three newly developed tools—SAGE (Supervision: Adherence and Guidance Evaluation; Milne & Reiser, 2014), the Supervisory Relationship Questionnaire (SRQ; Palomo, Beinart, & Cooper, 2010), and Supervisory Relationship Measure (SRM; Pearce, Palomo, Beinart, Clohessy, & Cooper, 2013)—show considerable promise in respectively measuring competence in supervision and tapping supervisee (SRQ) and supervisor (SRM) perspective on the supervisory relationship. Those measurement tools are the products of two high-quality programmatic research efforts carried out in the United Kingdom—SAGE resulting from Derek Milne’s campaign to construct an evidence-based approach to clinical supervision (Milne, 2009, 2014; Milne & Reiser, 2012, 2014); the SRQ and SRM resulting from Helen Beinart and colleagues’ campaign at the Oxford Institute to develop sound supervisory relationship measures (Beinart, 2014).

Alongside those three measures, two psychometric achievements from the area of nursing—the Manchester Clinical Supervision Scale-26 (MCSS-26; Winstanley & White, 2011) and Clinical Learning Environment Scale, Supervision and Nurse Teacher (CLES+T)—bear particular accentuation because of the stellar work involved in their construction and validation. Originally developed by Julie Winstanley (2000) as part of a United Kingdom clinical supervision initiative, the MCSS and its now tighter, re-modelled version, the MCSS-26, are widely researched and well validated tools for assessing the formative, normative, and restorative dimensions of supervision (after Proctor’s [1986] conceptualization). As Winstanley and White (2014) have indicated, the MCSS “has since been used as a quantitative outcome measure in upwards of 100 licensed studies, in 13 countries worldwide, and translated into seven languages other than English” (p. 391). Because of the considerable and ongoing work poured into validating and refining this scale, it has clearly emerged as a solid clinical supervision outcome measure par excellence. The same can also be said of Saarikoski’s superb work in Finland, where he has developed and validated a scale to measure the clinical learning environment for nurses in training; as a crucial part of measuring the clinical learning environment, the supervisory relationship is given particular emphasis (Saarikoski, 2014; Saarikoski, Isoaho, Warne, & Leino-Kilpi, 2008; Saarikoski, Warne, Kaila, & Leino-Kilpi, 2009; Saarikoski, Kaila, Lambrinou, Pérez Cañaveras, Tichelaar, Tomietto, & Warne, 2013). Saarikoski (2014) has indicated that “there are 26 language versions of the CLES or CLES+T scales, and more than 60 researcher links in 45 countries” (p. 418). Clinical Learning Environment Scale, Supervision or CLES+T data have been collected in a host of varied countries, including Cyprus, Belgium, England, Finland, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain and Sweden. Both the CLES/CLES+T and MCSS-26 provide robust examples of supervision validation research at its best and serve as prototypical exemplars of how the development of more valid, reliable supervision-specific measures can be moved from the drawing board to practical reality.

Difference and Diversity

The 1990S

Over the course of supervision’s last generation, matters of difference and diversity have been increasingly recognized as critical to its training and practice. But in the 1990s such attention was still at an early stage and had yet to take far more comprehensive and substantive form. I (1995, 1998) then stated that important diversity variables, while being increasingly addressed conceptually, had received minimal empirical attention in supervision and that marked deficit was sorely in need of correction. Difference and diversity variables, or multicultural factors, can now be considered to include “gender, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, disability, socioeconomic status, age, and religion, as well as their intersections” (Ancis & Ladany, 2010, p. 54). International status has also been added as an important matter of supervisory diversity. From the vantage points of research and practice, where do difference and diversity stand vis-à-vis clinical supervision now?

The 2010S

With regard to practice and training, difference and diversity are now prominently featured in current supervision competency frameworks (Falender et al., 2004; Psychology Board of Australia, 2013; Roth & Pilling, 2008). That prominent featuring seemingly will forevermore be the case when future frameworks are developed (Watkins, 2013): Whatever the country of origin, acquiring multicultural competence appears to now be internationally considered to be a supremely significant, integral aspect of supervision practice. In considering current wisdom about the multicultural dimension of supervision, what do we know or strongly believe to be so? In answer to that question, the following three ideas have been consistently identified as being of high practical importance (e.g., Ancis & Ladany, 2010; Bernard & Goodyear, 2014; Corey, Haynes, Moulton, & Muratori, 2010; Hawkins & Shohet, 2012; Russell-Chapin & Chapin, 2012): Effective multicultural supervision foremost requires (a) conviction about the critical importance of difference and diversity for supervision and ongoing commitment to forever work toward multicultural awareness and knowledge enhancement (cf. Falender et al., 2013; Tsui, O’Donoghue, & Ng, 2014); (b) establishing and maintaining a safe learning environment and strong working alliance that ultimately serves as the foundational core of the supervisor-supervisee relationship (cf. Dressel, Consoli, Kim, & Atkinson, 2007; Wong, Wong, & Ishiyama, 2013); and (c) supervisor willingness to introduce and address multicultural matters throughout the supervision process and make them a regular part of the ongoing supervisory dialogue (cf. Gatmon, Jackson, Koshkarian, Martos-Perry, Molina, Patel, & Rodolfa, 2001; Yu, 2013). While those three practice-informed and research-informed ideas are by no means exhaustive, they capture some of the most conventional wisdom about multicultural supervision that appears to now be widely accepted.

And what about multicultural supervision research relative to the 1990s? As Inman, Hutman, Pendse, Devdas, Luu, and Ellis (2014) have pointed out, the literature on supervision multicultural issues has grown considerably over the last 20 years (e.g., see recent issue of The Counseling Psychologist; Falender et al., 2013) and contributed to a better understanding about its practice and limitations. Particular efforts to create models or theoretical visions about multicultural factors and their import and impact on supervision have also been evident across the last two decades (Inman & Kreider, 2013). But the reality remains that multicultural supervision is still “one of the newest kids on the multicultural block, and as such, many of the emerging models and research are yet to be clearly programmatic and interrelated” (Inman & Ladany, 2014, p. 654). The old, well-worn statement—“More research is needed”—unfortunately still applies as much now as before (if not more). The sparseness of supervision research on gender, sexual minority concerns, and religion have been noted by Nilsson, Barazanji, Schal, & Bahner (2008) and Bernard and Goodyear (2014).

Further emphasizing the acuteness of this need for more and better research, Inman et al. (2014)—in their recent comprehensive review of 231 supervision studies—concluded the following about multicultural supervision now:

As multicultural supervision research has increasingly accumulated, the complexity of the multicultural arena has been increasingly recognized. For example, in contrast to past research involving race or sex matching, researchers are now far more apt to recommend studying such variables as racial identity, ethnic identity, and gender identity for their potential interactive effects on supervisory process and outcome (Bernard & Goodyear, 2014; Inman et al., 2014; Inman & Ladany, 2014). Need to better understand the “complex nuances” of multicultural practice has come to be acknowledged, and the pursuit of multifactorial investigations has also come to be recommended (Inman & Ladany, 2008). Looking forward, some other pressing multicultural supervision research needs have been identified: (a) conducting cross-cultural investigations in which both etic and emic measures are used; (b) developing measures of multicultural competence that are theoretically and conceptually linked; and (c) working to make multicultural supervision models and research more programmatic and interrelated (Inman & Ladany, 2014). Those are all vitally important desiderata that, to be realized, will require sustained, studious pursuit in the years ahead. Work done over the last two decades has clearly charted the way forward, but that much remains to be done in the multicultural supervision arena cannot be overstated.

Research

The 1990s

In many respects, research in supervision was still in an early, formative period the 1990s. While recognizing the evolving sophistication of supervision research, I identified (1995; 1998) several fundamental, acute research needs that required redress: (a) more rigorous, multi-method, multi-rater, longitudinal studies, (b) more focus on mediating and moderating variables, (c) more attention to follow up and replication studies, and (d) more substantial focus on supervision outcome. In examining contemporary supervision research, what progress has been made in addressing those needs? In what important ways has supervision research changed?

The 2010s

The number of supervision studies produced each year still tends to be somewhat limited. Estimates have indicated that approximately 10 supervision investigations appear annually (Inman & Ladany, 2008; Ladany & Inman, 2008). That limited output can be seen as potentially constraining research advancement. Furthermore, Milne and colleagues (Milne et al., 2012) have pointed out that the current state of supervision research—in which grappling with issues of measurement and effectiveness remain fundamental—can be compared to psychotherapy research in the 1950s and ’60s: “… we are currently about ‘half-way there’, working on the ‘search for scientific rigour’ …” (p. 144). The stark reality is: Most supervision research needs that were pressing in the 1990s remain every bit as pressing in the 2010s. But how specifically might that be the case? And if we are to move beyond being about “halfway there,” how might we begin to set that process in motion?

Recent supervision research reviews provide some answers to those questions (Ellis et al., 2008; Hill, 2012; Hill & Knox, 2013; Inman et al., 2014; Inman & Ladany, 2008; Watkins, 2011, 2014). While those reviews reflect some reason for optimism, they also provide information about supervision research deficiencies. For instance, then as now, one-shot, correlational, ex post facto designs tend to preponderate, and supervision process studies continue to be limited. In a critical review of 40 supervision alliance studies, I (Watkins, 2014) found that only five process investigations since the beginnings of alliance research had been conducted; the number of sessions followed was typically quite limited; and any study of alliance rupture and repair was virtually non-existent. Because the super-visor-supervisee alliance may well be our most robust and significant supervision variable, that lack of data on the “alliance in action” was identified as a critical need that begs for empirical attention now. But the lack of “in action” supervision data extends beyond alliance study and appears far more the norm. Other recent criticisms that have been made about supervision research include: (a) its continued lack of sufficient rigor; (b) utilization of small sample sizes; (c) primary reliance on selfreport data; (d) lack of a multi-rater observational approach; (e) lack of random assignment and utilization of control conditions; (f) lack of follow up and replication studies; (g) absence of any programmatic, longitudinal supervision research; (h) failure to tap client perspective as part of supervision studies; and (i) failure to adequately address the matter of supervision impact on client outcome (Ellis et al., 2008; Hill, 2012; Hill & Knox, 2013; Inman et al., 2014; Inman & Ladany, 2008; Watkins, 2011, 2012a, 2014). Admittedly, conducting sound supervision research can be a highly challenging process, and that reality has been long recognized (e.g., Russell, Crimmings, & Lent, 1984); it is certainly no different today. But those varied deficiencies, while not easily overcome, are not insurmountable and can indeed be better addressed with creative effort (e.g., through design of multi-site investigations; Hill & Knox, 2013; Russell et al., 1984). If a more solid empirical base is to be built, then chipping away at those deficiencies will have to become the prime objective and directive for supervision research in the decades ahead.

But have there been any positive strides made in supervision research that merit comment? The evolving supervision research scene has been far from bleak: Some most notable advances and exciting proposals have occurred during the last decades. Let me mention three such positive strides: (a) using a core battery in supervision research; (b) using the fidelity framework to anchor supervision research; and (c) the forceful emergence of qualitative supervision research.

First, a chief advance would certainly be the recent development of a core battery for use in supervision research. Under the auspices of the British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy, the Supervision Research Practice Network (SuPReNet) was established in 2009, and a core battery or common toolkit of supervision measures was collated and launched for research purposes (Wheeler, Aveline, & Barkham, 2011; Wheeler & Barkham, 2014). As Wheeler and Barkham (2014) have stated, “the core battery—toolkit—for supervision was developed in response to a context in which there is a lack of a clear, coherent, collective, and cumulative research agenda for supervision that is built on the use of a common measurement approach. Our aspiration is that practitioners will use the toolkit to aid their selection of instruments and thereby provide greater opportunity for building a cumulative evidence-base for supervision.” This well-grounded, practice-based initiative shows particular promise, seemingly provides clear direction for the creation of more substantial, programmatic supervision research efforts on a national and international scale, and offers a way to begin more effectively addressing some of our most pressing research needs (e.g., conducting replication and follow up studies). The SuPReNet and like networks (that ideally will follow in other countries) may be the wave of the future, and Wheeler and Barkham’s valuable work provides a robust prototypical design that can be readily emulated in similar future efforts.

Second, complementing this core battery contribution is Milne’s (this issue; Milne et al., 2012) intriguing proposal for reconceptualizing the outcome issue in supervision via the fidelity framework. Presented as one means by which the problematic matters of poor conceptualization and insensitive measurement can be countered, the fidelity framework provides a rich structure within which supervision research can be contained—“a supervision-specific agenda for evaluating clinical supervision” (Milne, this issue). Informed by guiding evaluation concepts from such fields as staff development and service evaluation, the fidelity framework hinges upon six nuclear dimensions: (a) evaluation design (e.g., specifying objectives); (b) standardized supervision training (e.g., manual-driven in nature); (c) delivery of supervision (monitoring delivery and adherence); (d) receipt of supervision (evaluating session impact of supervision); (e) enactment of supervision (evaluating supervisee competence in treatment delivery); and (f) effects of therapy (evaluating supervision effects on clients). In a recent pilot test, Culloty, Milne, and Sheikh (2010) evaluated the impact of two supervisor training workshops by means of the fidelity framework and found it to be “a systematic, feasible and coherent rationale for the evaluation of supervisor training” (p. 141). While the fidelity framework provides a useful structure that has been drawn from, tested, and proven in other fields, any evaluation of its applicability for supervision has only just begun. Yet Milne’s reconceptualization of the outcome problem and according recommendation for research action also appear to hold much promise. As we look to the future of supervision research, the fidelity framework seems well worth much closer scrutiny and far more rigorous test.

Third, the embrace of methodological pluralism in supervision research, particularly the emergence of qualitative methodologies, is a final cause for optimism that bears mention here. At the time of my papers in the 1990s, qualitative study in supervision was a real novelty, with only a few such investigations having been conducted. But since that time, qualitative studies have exponentially escalated in number and now become standard fare in supervision research. While being subject to some of the very same criticisms as quantitative research (e.g., lack of sufficient rigor, failure to adequately detail method and procedure), high-quality qualitative studies provide a different type of investigative result—allowing for the rich illumination of personal perspective and individual meaning across research participants. Such results in supervision research present a complementary form of data that privileges the respective phenomenology of supervisee and supervisor alike (and even clients should they be included). Since the dawn of the new millennium, some of our most interesting and instructive supervision research studies have been qualitative in nature (e.g., Grant, Schofield, & Crawford, 2012; Nelson, Barnes, Evans, & Triggiano, 2008). Qualitative study has quickly moved to being ensconced in the investigative armament of supervision research. That addition reflects a change in our research culture that would have been virtually unthinkable two decades ago.

As we work to build the most comprehensive empirical foundation for supervision, being able to draw on a plurality of research methods—from randomized controlled trials to qualitative investigations to case studies—will clearly serve us best. Placed in evidence-based perspective, we want to know: What particular research method can be used to best answer the supervision question under study? In working to provide answer, Hill and Knox (2013) have emphasized the vital importance of utilizing both qualitative and quantitative methods in future supervision studies (e.g., so that meta-analyses can ultimately be performed). My 1990s-to-now comparisons also accentuate the need to uphold standards of rigor, conceptual clarity, and measurement integrity in all that we do. Our scientific move forward in supervision will involve an unending, meticulous process of building on and improving upon what has been done thus far and is being done now (Hill & Knox, 2013). While not an easily pursued objective, relentlessly and studiously taking up that empirical challenge seems vital necessity if supervision is to most profitably advance.

Conclusion

Current accounts indicate that counseling/psychotherapy is offered throughout our globe—from countries across Africa, Asia, Europe, the Middle East, North America, Oceania, and Central and South America (Hohenshil et al., 2013). Where there is psychological treatment, there is need for psychological treatment supervision. Current accounts indicate that clinical supervision is being offered increasingly throughout our globe as well. In this paper, I wanted to examine where clinical supervision is now relative to where it was in the 1990s, giving particular attention to four areas: (a) supervision training and practice; (b) measurement; (c) difference and diversity; and (d) research. I hoped to show advances have been made (e.g., development of competency frameworks, advent of qualitative research), yet other areas of progress have been limited to non-existent.

Based on their relatively recent review, Inman and Ladany (2008) stated that the “strongest conclusion that we can make about … supervision is that it continues to be a path less traveled” (p. 511). While that may still be the case in many respects, it has become decreasingly so, with supervision’s particularly fast maturation over the last generation of practice and scholarship. More serious attention and fervent interest are now being directed toward supervision than at any other time in its 100-year plus history. And as Bernard and Goodyear (2014) have rightly indicated, that focus on supervision has truly become “robustly international” in nature. From Slovenia to Sweden, South Korea to South Africa, the United Kingdom to United States, and beyond, the globalization of supervision has been increasingly put on display, and its relevance and reach show no evidence of subsiding (e.g., Bomba, 2012; Long & Eagle, 2014; Gonsalvez, 2014; Ogren & Boalt Boethius, 2014; Son & Ellis, 2013; Vec, Vec, & Zorga, 2014; Watkins, 2012b). In supervision’s continued advance, the varied needs considered here call for, even demand, our studious attention and action in the years and decades ahead; through their being better addressed, the immense promise and possibility of clinical supervision stand to be more fully realized, and the hope of building a better supervision internationally moves ever closer to becoming more solidly grounded, concrete reality. Though there is clearly much work to be done, these are indeed exciting times for supervision, and in my view, its vast and untold promise readily beckons for and awaits fulfillment.