Part I- Personnel Supervision and Management
I-1: State the Reasons for Using Behaviour-Analytic Supervision and the Potential Risks of Ineffective Supervision (e.g., poor client outcomes, poor supervisee performance)
See Section 4 of the Ethics Code for Behavior Analysts- Responsibility to Supervisees and Trainees
Prior to providing supervision, BCBAs should be aware of all supervisory requirements.
Behaviour-Analytic Supervision: When conducting supervision, BCBA’s are to provide training in the therapeutic setting/practicum opportunities to effectively influence their supervisees to adopt, implement, and disseminate effective behavioural programming.
Reasons to Use Behaviour-Analytic Supervision
Determines quality of intervention
Continued professional development of the supervisee
Continued growth for the supervisor
Development of the ABA field as a whole
Risks of Ineffective Supervision
Supervisee may miss out on gaining important skills
Supervisee may leave the field of ABA
The supervisory relationship may be strained
Perception of ABA may also be affected
I-2: Establish Clear Performance Expectations for the Supervisor and Supervisee
After completing and discussing all the topics listed in the checklist above, the supervisee should ask questions to clarify. Once the discussion is complete, the supervisor and supervisee should sign the contract. If either party is not following the contract, a discussion should be had regarding how to overcome the challenge.
I-3: Select Supervision Goals Based on an Assessment of the Supervisee’s Skills
When deciding on supervision goals, supervisors should identify areas of strength and weakness for their supervisees. Just as we would do for our learners. This is so that the supervisor can set up performance-based or competency-based goals for the supervisee.
Performance-based goals are typically taught through using Behaviour Skills Training (BST), where an instruction is provided, then the skill is modelled, then the skill is rehearsed, and finally feedback is provided.
Competency-based goals means that a skill is taught until the supervisee can independently and confidently complete a skill.
I-4: Train Personnel to Competently Perform Assessment and Intervention Procedures
Perform Assessments
Supervisors should teach their supervisees how to perform all parts of an assessment- including indirect assessment, selecting an assessment, implementing an assessment, analyzing assessment results, displaying assessment results, sharing assessment results, and finally, how to write intervention programs based on assessment results. Supervisors can do this through using BST, sharing resources, and modeling.
Perform Intervention Procedures
Supervisors should teach supervisees how to write intervention procedures, implement interventions, support with revising programs when required, and displaying intervention data. Supervisors can do this through using BST, sharing resources, and modeling.
I-5: Use Performance Monitoring, Feedback, and Reinforcement Systems
Just as we use monitor the performance of our clients, we need to do that for our supervisees as well. If you do not monitor performance, you can’t judge if the supervisee has improved, stayed the same, or declined in their approaches.
When monitoring performance, we also need to provide feedback on how the supervisee can improve their skills, as well as outlining in great detail about what they did well.
Reinforcement goes hand-in-hand with feedback. Just as it is critical to provide individuals that we support with lots of reinforcement, it’s just as important to do that for supervisees. Remember, we want specific behaviours to be increased in supervisees, so how would we do that without reinforcement!?
I-6: Use a Functional Assessment Approach (e.g., performance diagnostics) to Identify Variables Affecting Personnel Performance
It’s important to remember performance diagnostics when determining where the challenges lie for a supervisee/staff member.
One of the tools that I was taught how to use during my Masters was the Assessment of Interprofessional Team Collaboration Scale II (AITCS-II). This tool assesses collaboration within a team, based on partnership, cooperation, and coordination.
Another tool that I was taught to use for individual supervisees/staff members was The Performance Diagnostic Checklist. This tool assesses individuals based on training, task clarification & prompting, resources, materials, and processes, performance consequences, effort, & compeletion, and intervention planning.
I-7: Use Function-Based Strategies to Improve Personnel Performance
Once you have completed Functional Assessments and identified the variables affecting performance, you should use function-based strategies to improve performance.
Example: If an employee is not completing documentation on time due to caseload requirements. The supervisor may conduct a session on behalf of the employee so the employee can have a chance to complete documentation.
I-8: Evaluate the Effects of Supervision (e.g., on client outcomes, on supervisee repertoires)
Supervisors should self-reflect on their own supervision practices by receiving (preferably anonymously) feedback from the individuals that they support (e.g. clients and supervisees). It will help the supervisor better support the clients and supervisees in the future and provide more training/implement interventions if needed.
