
Professionalism
Identify and behave as a professional social worker, committed to professional development.
Social workers are members of an internationally recognised profession, a title protected in UK law. Social workers demonstrate professional commitment by taking responsibility for their conduct, practice and learning, with support through supervision. As representatives of the social work profession they safeguard its reputation and are accountable to the professional regulator.
Practitioners at this level should:
- Be able to meet the requirements of the professional regulator.
- Model the social work role, set expectations for others and contribute to the public face of the organisation.
- Expect supervision that covers practice, organisational and management aspects of role, applying critical reflection throughout.
- Model and help others to demonstrate professionalism.
- Model and help others with effective workload management skills.
- Model and help others to maintain professional/personal boundaries and skilled use of self.
- Maintain awareness of own professional limitations and knowledge gaps. Establish a network of internal and external colleagues from whom to seek advice and expertise.
- Contribute to a learning environment for self, team and, colleagues.
- Recognise and seek ways to promote well-being for team and colleagues.
- Promote up to date expectations about practice norms, identifying and helping resolve poor practice issues.
Evidencing your capabilities:
At the Experienced Social Worker level you will need to show that you embody professionalism in all that you do, modelling appropriate behaviour and setting expectations for how others should behave. You are more likely to be working independently, taking responsibility for your work, although under supervision, and showing others how to progress their knowledge and skills.
Your evidence should concentrate on your behaviour and, where possible, incorporate feedback from others about how you practice. It is important that you are able to draw on evidence which reflects well on you as a role model for others. You should also be clear about how you draw on evidence and how you recognise the limits of your competence.