Direct Client Intervention
The predominant focus of this essay is concentrated upon empowering the social workers as well as fostering empowerment of the clients. The difficulties which, both professional social workers as well as the clients face in adverse social context and the possible ways to eradicate their vulnerabilities have been identified and highlighted in this essay. A conceptual structure that defines the working methodology and the traits of difficulties faced by social workers as well as their empowerment opportunities have been designed herein this essay. The ways in which social help organisations perform and the scope of the social workers, therein, have also been highlighted. The strategies that potential social workers undertake in order to include the social workers in the empowerment scenario is also brought in to context, in the course of this essay. In this empowerment process, a variety of strategic analysis and implementation methodologies are necessary, in regard to the various genres social work. This essay emphasizes to analyse the outlook that professional social workers adopt in order to drive major social changes in multiple contexts and empower the clients to become the drivers of social change.
In the context of social work, a proper and synced in flow of work is required. In order to accomplish that, correlated approach with proper co-ordination is required. Again, for a well collaborated work process to emerge, proper knowledge of society and societal developments is urgently required. As Shorkey & Uebel (2014), have put forward, practical applications of social science implies that comprehensive idea of sociology, demographic ethnicity and psychological aspects is of utmost importance. Without them, gaining insight about the social environment where they would be engaged in direct intervention with the client would be very difficult. The Forum for Social Service in Australia, perceives the lack of personality and human adjustments of societal contexts require an in depth analysis. This analysis, according to the perception of Beddoe (2015), require substantial application of conception of biological organism, cultural as well as societal knowledge. In fact, Donaldson et al. (2014), have often pointed out that the general citizens often apprehend social help corporations with subtle ambivalence as suspicion. This is why, Rybakova & Fomina (2015), have identified that in the societal context of Australia, the achievements and purpose of implementations of needs to be validated on everyday basis. However, in sharp contrast, Beddoe (2016), have put forward that social help groups or the individual or the philanthropic groups generally work to improve the living condition for average citizens in the society, besides maintaining the natural balance of the social relationships and thus enable the social institutions to render service to as much people as possible. Preferring this idea, Narey (2014), have also opines the primary responsibility of the social work groups is to develop the co-operation and solidarity among the various societal groups, which would help to maintain amity among the various groups of people in society.
Practical Knowledge of Social Welfare Activities
In fact, the Australian Federation for Social Work have identified social work and highlighted the importance of empowerment through the following lines:
“The practice of social work, promotes societal changes, encourages problem solving in relationships along with liberating and empowering people to act towards general well-being of the human society. Making use of the humanistic behavioural theories and the social frameworks, the social workers intervene at those sections where the citizens interact with their community and environment. Justification of human rights as well as overall social justice are at the heart of social work.”
The serviceability of the social foundations in Australia is based upon a framework of concerning three primary viewpoints:
- Changes in society
- Resolving of complications in human interactions and sore relationships between social foundations.
- Rediscovering individual and group’s potential to foster individual well-being as well as well-being of the society
Working with individuals as well as the groups, the social help groups and the social workers as individual should have practical knowledge regarding practice of social welfare activities. The direct client interaction that the social workers do, help them to realise the deep rooted problems in the context of the society which are actually the source of the social issues. Social workers primarily follow a certain structural pattern to anticipate the social issues that might arise of an evident social crisis. The follow up of this structure is actually helpful in enabling the empowerment of social workers. The intertwined structure is deeply involved and founded upon five basic parameters that delivers immense value towards undertaking of the social activities. These five area of the framework are:
It is essential to analyse why and how the initiatives of social work delivers value towards the smooth running of the human society. In the context, McFadden, Campbell & Taylor (2014), opines that the execution of social workers, in turn emphasises the empowerment of the social individual families as well as the communities so that they can act in a more responsible way towards the fellow members in the society or their household members. The social workers, as put forward by Chonody et al. (2014), who have the executive power of direct client intervention can develop a better understanding of the social pretexts that are often the cause of problems in the society. The social workers directly involve themselves in the social roles like brokers, counsellors, advocates as well as occasion managers. Direct implementation of social help in necessary in resolving, minimising and preventing the re-occurrence of various context of human based problems.
The authorities with direct discretionary rights enables and empowers the social workers in a feasible way. The major enablers of the direct social intervention are government boards, legal heads of the territories, human service agencies as well as the non-governmental agencies like big NGOs.
Conceptual Structure for Empowering Social Workers
The social foundations believe in the innate worth of the human beings as well as give value to the personal dignity of the individuals. Hence there always prevailing a constant realisation of the need to develop a democratic and fundamentally caring social environment.
The transformation of the society is dependent on the commitment to develop a better and sustainable environment. Workers should be able to closely understand the value, limitation and prospects of the social environment where the people who face the maximum social issues are surviving. The workers should engage in working in close quarters with them for understanding their behaviours or the lack of their social goals. Besides, the social workers should also employ their undergoing of the theoretical framework to interpret the diversified working culture they share. In absence of the cognitive analysing skills of the social workers who involve in direct social intervention, it would be difficult for the executive teams to implement the strategies of the social organisations whom they represent. The lack of proper interpretation can lead to failure of the project budget and the resources implemented to help the clients achieve social independence. Hence, (), have opined that in order to gain empowerment, the social workers should make an in-depth interpretation of the social welfare policies and also rehearse evidently beneficial theories and achieve significant outcome in their endeavours.
Generation of values, adaptation to guidance and significant knowledge, and the social helpers undertakes the social activities, within this basic framework in most cases so that they are able to accomplish the social goals while working in unison with the clients directly.
The social workers have the maximum chance of empowerment in the small franchises as well as small Self Help Groups. However, in their cases, the economic aspect of enabling empowerment of the social workers is a major concern as they undertake projects with limited budget and most often cannot afford to violate a schematic outlook in their work (Cui et al. 2018). On the contrary, Greene (2017), opines that the Self Help Groups have sufficient potential to empower the social workers as the small Self-help Groups have the guidance and funding of big philanthropic trusts. Nevertheless, Padgett (2016), highly supports the microfinance model to provide sufficient back up to the social workers for working in direct intervention with the clients. Rubin, & Babbie (2016), also provides practical contexts to support the view that Self Help Groups can actually develop more empowered social workers with a distinct vision. In many parts of the world, various social help groups are actively working towards the emancipation of women. Many small and unorganised work groups have proactively participated in this effort. However, reports show that lack of micro-financing knowledge have led to the crumbling down of the initiatives of the social helpers. In support of Self Help Groups, Dominelli (2017), have stated that for the making of social workers who can comprehensively work in direct client intervention, the capable leaders of social works have to be promoted to execute and lead major social events, by themselves.
Values
The model of Social Groups working is very necessary for the entrepreneur level social workers. The model provides a general scheme to respond to the various on-field issues that the social workers encounter. In this relevance, Shulman (2016), have expressed that the social functioning groups as well as the self-help groups are structurally and functionally different. The former are governmental bodies, however the later are non-governmental embodiments who performs strictly in the periphery of social work. Hence socialisation, motivation and sharp perception are required for leading social group to success. In this social context, the target fulfilment needs a strong moral claim and this forms the core of the social welfare groups.
Among the major avenues of empowerment, giving support to the marginalised section of the society helps the social workers the necessary confidence to implement their personal discretion to engage in direct client intervention. However, there are impediments in the application of the strategies of social help. It is not possible for the social workers to intercept every social issue that they face in their path of implementation of welfare strategies. In this context, Tham & Lynch (2014), states that empowerment of the social workers is only possible if they tends to undertake significant measures to empower the clients, which would in turn make it easier to implement the welfare activities with the help of the intervention and activism of the clients. There are two things, which can be anticipated, according to Hitchcock & Young (2016), during the implementation process of the social workers. The first anticipation is that the social workers have brilliant conception regarding the major theories of social sciences and secondly they have achieved practical competence through working with the clients in direct intervention process where the social workers have actually empowered the clients to become the major driver of change. As per Hogg & Terry (2014), the social workers actually need to eradicate the complexities of clash of interests as well as the unfair accumulation of power in the society that gives birth to a large percentage of social problems in the society. This would in turn help the clients to dispose their own resources and affirmatives and strengths to overcome their current deplorable situations and move towards emancipation.
The social workers should actually implement various successful practices that would help them in gaining an insight of the strengths, dreams, and feasibilities of the clients. Empowerment perspectives from the client’s perception also have various aspects. These are:
- Empowerment of the client as they have a feasibility to work directly with the social worker
- The client, by working in close quarters with the social workers develops the cognitive skills to prevent various social obscurities from penetrating in the course of smoothness in their lives.
- The client have the capability to alleviate the level of knowledge of the social worker so that they can frame more comprehensive and practical solution to the issues that the clients are facing.
Conception and Awareness
However, there is an inter-relationship between the empowerment process of both clients and the social worker as both look up to each other for bringing about the much necessitated social change. Social workers need to play the key role of raising the awareness of the clients regarding their strengths, limitations and resources available to them. In lieu of this empowerment approach, Coady & Lehmann (2016), have professed that:
“Social empowerment is a broad perspective that combines the outlook of both the victim and the social workers for implementing a residual change. The major aim of social work is emancipation from the position of powerlessness and moving towards emancipation means a drawback from the negative vibes that the victims have associated themselves with.”
According to the views of Desyllas & Sinclair (2014), one major step towards restoration of the clients to their respectful position is a prompt identification of the problem. Distribution of books and stationaries to the girl children of a village where the outlook is that only males can study in open schools is not enough. A strategy is required so that the issue can be highlighted and the custom can be banned. However, most important thing in this perspective is that the girls should also understand that they can also achieve success at equal rate if they educate themselves and thus they would not have to remain as the dominated sex, thereafter. Various PR campaigns have to be conducted here and various psychological change theories have to be implemented so that the girls realise how education generates value for them.
The social worker’s role in undoubtedly important for the emancipation and empowerment of the clients. The client undergoes “counselling” under the guidance of the social help groups so that they come to realise and understand the society from a broader perspective. Once they realise the agent that have been dominating them, or the factor that have been preventing their social growth, the clients can implement the change process under the guidance of the social workers and bring about significant improvement in their social condition. Fang et al. (2014), opines that the social groups in to professional practice can easily reduce the risk that the clients face from the direct blocks of power. As per the theory of social psychology, the decentralisation of power helps in the infliction of self-respect and a subtle sense of prestige among dominated groups. Individual will as well as a wholesome demand for positive change drives the philanthropic activities and are also the key agents for empowerment of social workers and clients of social service.
Basic Skills
Conclusion
Within this essay, the empowerment approach in social work have been analysed in depth from the perspective of the social workers as well as the clients in social service. The professional social service agents who are concerned with major philanthropic trusts should take the responsibilities of locating the clientele that is surviving under social obligation and empower them. Analysing the trends in to social service, it is evident that social workers delivers value to the clients by raising them self-respect and basic morale. The clients do not want forced or revolutionary change. It is always necessary to empower them so that they can handle negative situation in life by themselves.
Reference List
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