Five Pieces of Advice Transcript

Video Transcript

What are the best approaches to entering field?

I have 5 pieces of advice I would encourage you to remember that will help make field a successful learning experience.

Own Your Learning and Manage Your Expectations:

As you participate in field, I would encourage you to embrace what you are learning, even though it will likely be different from what you expect. To be successful, you will need to be open-minded, adaptable, flexible, patient, and willing to seek out opportunities for your growth and development. Be active and curious in your learning: the more YOU put into every field experience, even if it is different than what you expected, the more you will get out it.

Learn to Function with Discomfort and Anxiety:

Dealing with difficult situations and circumstances is the nature of our profession. It’s important for you to be aware that you’ll encounter situations where you will experience a range of emotions, including frustration and anxiety. Please know that this is normal and expected. A critical aspect of becoming a social worker is developing the skills and ability to function effectively in your social work role, even when you are triggered and your emotions are high. Learning how to lean into this discomfort, asking for help when needed, and self-reflection, are essential skills that you must develop and will use throughout your social work career.

Take Risks and Be Willing to Make Mistakes:

A phrase I like to use is “the Perfect is the Enemy of the Possible.” Your best learning will occur if you are willing to take some risks and understand that you’re going to make mistakes. You’ll never be perfect and expecting this from yourself and others will only create unnecessary frustration and can actually lead to burn-out. Social work is a field of grey, where every situation is unique. Your professors and field instructors won’t be able to provide a script for you to follow, but rather you will need to be able to use critical thinking in the moment, and integrate learning and your previous experiences to be optimally effective. Please understand, this takes time. So even if you are uncertain of exactly what to do, we encourage you to not hang back, but rather take risks and say “yes” to opportunities and new challenges.

Be Patient with All You have To Learn:

To be frank, there’s no way for us to teach you everything there is to know about social work during the 12 or 16 months you will be in the program. Our hope is that when you graduate, you will be an excellent BEGINNING social worker. After graduation, you will need two years of additional supervised experience in order to become a fully licensed social worker and practice independently. Remember this is a lifelong learning profession. Please understand that it’s expected that learning in field progresses over time from exposure, to immersion, to supervised independence. You need to be patient with this process. We encourage you to have open dialogue with your field instruction team to understand the pace and approaches that best fit your learning and the needs of the field site, and the clients and communities you are serving.

Want, Seek and Use Feedback:

I think all of you would say you want our faculty and your field instructors to give you feedback if they have concerns about how you’re doing. Yet when you receive this type of feedback, it doesn’t always feel good, but please don’t shy away from it. In fact, you should ask for feedback often, be thankful when you get it, and always be willing to self-reflect and use this feedback to enhance your learning and the development of social work skills. Explore early in your relationship with your field instructor and your field faculty how you best receive feedback. I would also encourage you to discuss with them the best way for you to be able give feedback to them, especially if you have concerns.

As you begin the MSW program and field, please know that the faculty and staff in our office are dedicated to supporting you as you develop the fundamental skills and competencies of the social work profession. In addition to your field placement, we offer a foundation seminar course, workshops, mentoring meetings, and individual drop-in opportunities to further this goal. We look forward to working with you, and we are excited to welcome you to the University of Michigan School of Social Work and the social work profession.

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