Supervising and Supporting Your Staff

How to ...
Use a supervisor's session plan

Use a supervisor's session plan

The supervisor's session plan can be useful before, during, and after a supervisory session. As this page suggests, it can be used for a session of any duration and involving any number of people.

A Brief, One-Hour Visit

Before: Use the list of Items for Selective Supervision to help you identify and select the activities or program components you want to look at. If this is not the first visit, the forms used during the previous visit may indicate what needs to be looked at (for example, an educational session, an IUD insertion, provider-client relations, or a particular problem).

During: Put the supervisory plan away if you are looking at skill performance. It makes the people you observe nervous. However, use the plan if you are checking equipment and stocks, as it will keep you from overlooking things.

After making your observations, sit down with the people you supervise or with the clinic manager. Go over the part of the plan that is relevant to what you looked at. Discuss both the good things you observed and those that need improvement, using the plan to make sure that you do not neglect to mention the things that go well. (Without a list of activities to supervise, we tend to focus only on the things that don't go well.)

After: Review your notes and make sure you carry out all the actions you had promised during the session. Make a note of anything that needs to be followed up in your next visit.

A Group Supervisory Session

Before: Review the record of previous sessions to set the agenda and identify issues that need special attention at this level.

During: Consult the supervisor's session plan to make sure that important issues are not overlooked.

After: Make notes on what decisions were made and on who will take what action when.

A Full-Day Supervisory Visit

Before: Use the Items for Selective Supervision for a thorough review of performance, progress, and problems at the site you are planning to visit, and identify issues that need special attention.

During: Use the plan as described under a one-hour visit. Fill in the supervisory plan or relevant sections of the plan in consultation with relevant personnel. Make notes on decisions and actions need to be taken before the next visit.

After: Review your notes and make sure you carry out all the actions you had promised during the session. Make a note of anything that needs to be followed up in your next visit.

Tools and Techniques - Items for Selective Supervision

Example from Zimbabwe - A Selective Approach to Supportive Supervision

Departure from the visit

The atmosphere at the end of a supervisory visit will affect the attitude of the staff members and the quality of the work in that clinic in the future. Therefore, the supervisor should leave the meeting having created a friendly, positive atmosphere, and the staff member should feel that something has been gained as a result of the visit. Before the visit is over, the supervisor should:

Review the actions both the supervisor and the staff members have agreed to take and make a note;
Avoid making promises that cannot be fulfilled;
Set a date for the next visit;
Send messages to staff who are absent;
Have a pleasant word for the waiting clients;
Observe any necessary protocol, such as meeting with the head of the facility;
Thank all the staff members for their cooperation and leave them with words of encouragement.

Remember that the main purpose of the supervisory visit is to guide, assist, and support the staff being supervised. Focus all of your attention on that. Do not carry your own problems and anxieties into the supervisory sessions. Make a conscious effort to clear your mind of everything except the staff and the situation you are about to engage in.

Supervisor's Self-Assessment Checklist