Social work podcasts to support you through and beyond Covid-19

Advice on conducting remote visits and supervision, tackling domestic abuse and loneliness and caring for yourself available in Community Care Inform's podcast series

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Updated 13 May 2021

We know that social workers have worked harder than ever in the difficult conditions caused by the Covid-19 pandemic. Remote working became the norm, legislation and guidance were subject to change and the complex issues families face were heightened by financial insecurity and the stresses of lockdown.

As we come out of the pandemic, many of these issues will continue to shape practice. The Community Care Inform team has produced a podcast series, Learn on the Go, to support social workers and ensure that you get the information and advice you need. These are free to listen to and are typically under 20 minutes long, to help you fit them into your working day.

You can listen to the episodes below, or you can subscribe to the series. Just search for ‘Learn on the Go’ on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google or wherever you normally listen to podcasts.

Home and online visits

Expert guest Claudia Megele, former chair of the principal child and family social worker network, discusses when it’s appropriate to conduct an online visit, rather than a home visit. Claudia also shares some best practice in conducting visits online, including different ideas for virtual direct work.

Contextual safeguarding

What is contextual safeguarding, and what does it look like in practice? Discussing these questions are Dr Carlene Firmin, who developed the contextual safeguarding framework and leads the contextual safeguarding and peer-on-peer abuse research programmes at the University of Bedfordshire, and Samantha Roper, team manager for the multi-agency safeguarding hub (MASH) at Knowsley Council. Carlene and Samantha also talk about how work with young people has been affected by the pandemic.

Remote supervision

Our expert guest for this episode was Dr David Wilkins, senior lecturer at Cardiff University. David discusses how remote supervision can be effective, talking about emotions, and different ideas for holding group supervision sessions online.

Loneliness and isolation

Dr Sue Cook, lecturer in social work at the University of Plymouth, shares advice on how social workers can support people experiencing loneliness or isolation, whatever stage of life they’re at. She also talks about why practitioners need to creative to find solutions when working with service users online or in person.

Self-care

The expert guest on this episode is Sass Boucher, research director of training provider Self Care Psychology, and a counsellor and psychotherapist in private practice. Sass discusses the small things social workers can do to practise self-care, as well as ways to support colleagues when you’re not seeing each other in person.

Domestic abuse

In this episode, Donna Covey, director of domestic abuse charity AVA (Against Violence and Abuse), talks about how social workers can continue to support vulnerable children and adults during lockdowns.

Community Care Inform subscribers can find additional resources and written transcripts of the episodes on the Inform Children and Inform Adults sites.

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