16 - Liz Cummings

Title

“Just Imagine that...”: A solution focused approach to Doctoral research supervision in health and social care

Author(s)

Kenneth Walsh*, School of Health Sciences, Faculty of Health and Tasmanian Health Service, Hobart
Patrick Crookes, School of Nursing, Midwifery and Paramedicine, Australian Catholic University
Karen Ford, School of Health Sciences, Faculty of Health and Australia and Tasmanian Health Service
Kathleen Doherty, Wicking Dementia Research and Education Centre, Faculty of Health
Loretta Andersen, School of Health Sciences, Faculty of Health
Sharon Bingham, School of Health Sciences, Faculty of Health
Robert McSherry, School of Nursing, Teesside University
Elizabeth Cummings*, School of Health Sciences, Faculty of Health

Subtheme

Supervision as Pedagogy

Presentation Type

Spotlight on Practice

Room

Meeting Room

Time

14.20-15.20

Abstract

Effective supervision in doctoral research is critical to successful and timely completion. However, supervision is a complex undertaking with structural as well as relational challenges for both students and supervisors.
This presentation describes an internationally applicable approach to supervision in the health and social care disciplines that offers structure, but is also dynamic and responsive to the needs of students and supervisors and aims to develop the research competency of students. Our approach called Solution Focused Research Supervision (SFRS) is based on solution focused approaches, adapted from Solution Focused Brief Therapy (Lethem, 2002; de Shazer, 1988) and questioning techniques derived from coaching. It is used to help people identify specific goals and preferred outcomes and find ways to achieve them (Grant, 2013).
Key strategies in SFRS include:
* Look for what works and do more of it
* Highlight and build on strengths
* Cease doing what doesn’t work
* Use creativity and imagination to imagine a better future and work towards it. (Grant, 2013)
Our experience in supervision is that there is a tendency to focus on deficits and what is not going well or not right – reflective of the problem-oriented approach for supervision (Hemer, 2012) which can demotivate students and have major impact upon progression.
Employing the SFRS approach has enabled our supervision teams to effectively develop focused research questions and decide on appropriate research methodologies and methods. In addition SFRS establishes a way of working that recognises and builds upon strengths, fosters engagement, openness to learning and trust between students and supervisors. The authors are supervisors and students who have developed the approach and will provide practical examples of its application.
References
Lethem, J. (2002). Brief solution-focused therapy. Child and Adolescent Mental Health, 7 (4), 189–92.
de Shazer, S. (1988). Clues; Investigating Solutions in Brief Therapy. New York: Norton.
Grant, A. (2013). Steps to solutions: A process for putting solution-focused coaching principles into practice. The coaching psychologist, 9 (1): 36-44.
Hemer, S. (2012) Informality, power and relationships in postgraduate supervision: supervising PhD candidates over coffee. Higher Education Research & Development, 31:6, 827-839.

Resource

Download presentation (requires University of Tasmania login) (PDF)