Competency 1: Demonstrate Ethical and Professional Behavior
Social workers understand the value base of the profession and its ethical standards, as well as relevant policies, laws, and regulations that may affect practice with individuals, families, groups, organizations, and communities. Social workers understand that ethics are informed by principles of human rights and apply them toward realizing social, racial, economic, and environmental justice in their practice. Social workers understand frameworks of ethical decision making and apply principles of critical thinking to those frameworks in practice, research, and policy arenas. Social workers recognize and manage personal values and the distinction between personal and professional values. Social workers understand how their evolving worldview, personal experiences, and affective reactions influence their professional judgment and behavior. Social workers take measures to care for themselves professionally and personally, understanding that self-care is paramount for competent and ethical social work practice. Social workers use rights-based, antiracist, and anti-oppressive lenses to understand and critique the profession’s history, mission, roles, and responsibilities and recognize historical and current contexts of oppression in shaping institutions and social work. Social workers understand the role of other professionals when engaged in interprofessional practice. Social workers recognize the importance of lifelong learning and are committed to continually updating their skills to ensure relevant and effective method. Social workers understand digital technology and the ethical use of technology in social work practice.
Social workers:
a. make ethical decisions by applying the standards of the National Association of Social Workers Code of Ethics, relevant laws and regulations, models for ethical decision making, ethical conduct of research, and additional codes of ethics within the profession as appropriate to the context; The Nine Social Work Competencies
b. demonstrate professional behavior; appearance; and oral, written, and electronic communication;
c. use technology ethically and appropriately to facilitate practice outcomes; and
d. use supervision and consultation to guide professional judgment and behavior.
Competency #1 In Practice
Competency one lays an ethical foundation for social work practice and describes the lenses through which we approach our work. An ethical foundation is critical to our profession as we face ethical dilemmas on a regular basis. We hold ourselves accountable to competent practice by providing a consistent ethical standard. This competency challenges me as a social worker as it calls me to evaluate the ethicality of the systems I am outside of and seek to change within the social work profession. While I will describe below how I have demonstrated professionalism and ethicality in my program so far, this is only the beginning of my journey to integrate competency one into my practice. I will remain committed to staying ethical in my practice by practicing self-care and maintaining a separation of my personal and professional values. By seeking out material to continue to learn about oppression around me, I can endeavor to stay informed and do my duty as an ethical social worker.
Evidence from class work:
This Flower assignment is from the Networking and Career Development class and demonstrates my ability to evaluate myself, my skills, and my preferences in a work environment. By evaluating my areas of knowledge, I demonstrate an ability to recognize areas I am competent. This is important because as I continue to grow in my competencies, I need to ensure that I am not overstepping my expertise in the field. Self-care is another important aspect of being competent. By knowing what matters most to me in the workplace and intentionally creating an emotionally supportive and collaborative professional community in my workplace, I demonstrate an ability to maintain ethicality in my practice by taking care of myself professionally. This assignment helped me develop mastery in understanding, synthesizing, and presenting my professional self.
Evidence from field:
I received this certificate for completing a Trust-based Relational Intervention Training course put on by OrphanWise. This course was put on for professionals working in collaboration with the Bradley and Polk County courthouses and how we can be trauma-informed in our practice. This course was not required for me as an intern, but I intentionally made arrangements to intend because I want to continually learn about the most effective methods in my area of practice. This training helped me develop mastery of what specific engagement strategies are most helpful in working with clients who have experienced trauma and developed coping strategies to deal with their environment. An additional part of the training included the documentary All Rise for the Good of the Children. It was inspiring to see a court system implementing an effective approach and then to take that knowledge and brainstorm with local court personnel on how to implement it in our practice. I was able to demonstrate this in my practicum by integrating ethical engagement strategies with clients who have experienced trauma.
Other evidence:
This CITI Certificate demonstrates my completion of the Responsible Conduct of Research course and my commitment to ethical research practices. I chose this assignment because it demonstrates an understanding of the importance of ethics when researching and an understanding of what those ethics are and how to abide by them. By applying the ethics I learned and was tested on in my certification completion in the formation of my research proposal to not put participants at harm through my mixed-methods study, I increased my understanding of ethics in a professional research setting. I demonstrated ethical practice throughout the data collection process and followed the procedures we outlined in our proposal, getting us approval from our Institutional Review Board.
(Also, read how I integrated NASW ethics throughout my internship at the Austin Hatcher Foundation.)