Social Work Spotlight - Episode 48: Haylee

Episode Date: January 7, 2022

In this episode I speak with Haylee, an early career social worker who graduated from UNSW with a double degree in social work and criminology. Haylee has spent most of her career working with survivors of sexual assault for both NSW Health and a non-government organisation. In 2021 Haylee made the move to ward-based social work in a metropolitan hospital which has seen her working in the COVID ICU.Links to resources mentioned in this week’s episode:The No More Project - https://nomore.org/National Redress Scheme for people who have experienced institutional child sexual abuse - https://www.nationalredress.gov.au/NSW Victims Services - https://www.victimsservices.justice.nsw.gov.au/Grace Tame - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grace_TameAuthor Jess Hill - https://www.jesshill.net/Mates, Dates and Everything in Between podcast - https://open.spotify.com/show/4AZSWYF8EirBWfwoAXB07c?si=d13760a0477b4171The Dulwich Centre (Narrative Therapy resources) - https://dulwichcentre.com.au/Education Centre Against Violence - https://www.ecav.health.nsw.gov.au/Survivors & Mates Support Network - https://www.samsn.org.au/This episode's transcript can be viewed here:https://docs.google.com/document/d/1XZ8vObubfPtbSD6AqXa1hiaV143L5OLKL2fTsW9J5Ng/edit?usp=sharingThanks to Kevin Macleod of incompetech.com for our theme music.

Hi and welcome to Social Work Spotlight where I showcase different areas of the profession each episode. I'm your host, Yasmin Mickey Wright, and today's guest is Haley, an early career social worker who graduated from UNSW with a double degree in social work and criminology. Haley has spent most of her career working with survivors of sexual assault for both New South Wales Health and a non-government organization. In 2021, Haley made the move to ward-based social work in a metropolitan, hospital, which has seen her working in the COVID ICU. Thanks so much, Haley, for coming on to the podcast. Really excited and really happy that you've spent this time having to chat with me about

your career so far. That's all right. Thanks so much for having me. I'm really excited. Yeah. Can I ask you firstly when you began as a social worker and what drew you to the profession? Yeah, so I finished uni at the end of 2018. So I've only been out for two and a bit of a year.

I came into the profession by chance. I did my nursing certificate actually through HSC, and that's kind of the pathway that I thought I wanted to go down. But I was getting to my last placement, and I was like, oh, I'm not too sure if I want to do a degree in this. Like there's certain things that I couldn't quite do. And then in walks the social worker onto the rehab ward, and she had fabulous shoes and amazing purple,

top and I was like, damn, that's the person that I want to be. And then I kind of started researching a bit more about it and kind of learning the social aspect of it. And that was really the bits that I loved about nursing, being able to care for people, being able to sit down and have a conversation about what's going on in their lives. And that's what I thought, great. Social works for me. It's kind of the best of both worlds. Did you have a chance to speak with that social worker about? what they did or what they enjoyed. Honestly, I had never spoken to a social worker before I started doing the degree.

Yeah. So it was really lovely. I'm glad that you found your passion and obviously it's a good fit for you. You're happy doing what you're doing. What's then led to this point? How did you get to working where you are now? Yeah. So at the moment I'm currently working in the COVID ICU in one of the metro hospitals.

I really ended up where I am kind of by chance. I've always been a person to kind of take on any opportunity. So straight out of uni, I went straight into a community organisation working with male survivors of sexual abuse. And then from there I went into another health organisation working in sexual assault. And I kind of got that two-year itch and then thought, I've really got to try hospital social work. So I took this current role and COVID kind of just threw that all for a loop and everyone was moving around. People were swapping teens and wards and yeah, I just ended up in ICU. So it was kind of an unexpected challenge.

Yeah. Never worked in ice. I mean, I worked a little bit on placement. But to me, ICU has been this real senior role. you know, and protected space that people work a lot, you know, a long time in their career to be comfortable in that space and to be kind of thrown in in a middle of a pandemic, having no idea what's going on. It's been really interesting and kind of really, I was very nervous at first and I think I'm

starting to now somewhat find my feet in that area. And what's your substantive? Is it in ICU or you've just kind of been hijacked from your regular permanent position? Completely hijacked. So my substantive position is in our Mao surgical team. Right. And our Mao ward got turned into a COVID ward. So then I was covering, we've got two COVID wards and a COVID ICU.

So then I was covering the hot zones. And then because we closed down our rehab to make kind of, more of a surge capacity at our hospital, then we had a new kind of division and we could allocate one person per ward. So I just happened to end up in ICU. And how long were you in Mao before all that happened? Three weeks. Three four weeks. It was, every time I've changed social work roles, it's been in the middle of a COVID pandemic and it's really escalated. Wow. And just for context, for people who aren't familiar, Mao is the medical assessment unit and normally it would be initially when someone presents to hospital needs that

intensive assessment period to figure out do they need to be admitted do they need to go for surgery do they need more investigation or can they go home and be followed up by the community so it's usually a very fast-paced service where you are doing intervention really really quickly whereas now you've probably got people for a lot longer in the intensive care unit so completely back flipped in terms of what your expectation was going to be. Yeah, and kind of I was in an intake role in one of the sexual assault services, so very much used to that kind of assessment, you know, you're triaging, you're kind of working out where people need to go and what support you need to put in place.

So that's why I took that kind of male role because I thought it's a nice, gentle ease into hospital social work. You know, you can try everything. I'm good at assessment, I think, and documentation. that didn't really work the way that it was meant to. Yeah. Those assessment skills would have come in handy in your previous roles, though, because I imagine you would have had that intake responsibility

in being able to really understand or identify what people's main concerns were, see all the other nuances around that, and then be able to direct them to the most appropriate service. Yeah, yeah. So when you said you got a two-year itch, what was it about hospital work that appealed to you, do you think? So when I went into uni, I always kind of thought I'm going to work in a hospital. I really like that medical model, I think.

There's something about it. I like being around a lot of people. I like connecting with different team members and kind of problem solving together. So it was really strange coming out of uni and going into community and not having the kind of structure that hospital work brings and kind of, you know, I found community work amazing, but also quite challenging, figuring out where your boundaries are as a professional where there is no boundaries. So I slowly kind of moved into that hospital-based sexual assault work and just thought,

you know what, I haven't really tried it, you know, committing to that hospital model and kind of that medical work. And I always kind of thought that maybe I wanted to end up in ED and I thought, well, if you continue down this path of just working in such a specialized field, are you going to be boxing yourself in for later on in life? Not that I thought that was a problem because I really, I still work in a sexual assault service one day a week. I still really enjoy that work. But I just thought, you know, you've got to try something before you fully commit to one thing. And do you enjoy having that split? It feels to me as though having the opportunity to step out of your normal role every now and then would actually give a good balance.

Yeah, honestly, it's the best of both worlds. When I actually applied for my current role, I did kind of sneakily ask if they could take me for three days and still keep that sass role for two. And unfortunately, it was declined, but I really enjoy having that split. It's kind of, if you're overwhelmed in one space, you're stepping out the next day into another completely different role with a completely different team. and it's kind of really lovely in terms of managing that stress and overwhelm. Yeah.

So do your job share in ICU? Yeah. So at the moment in COVID, I guess I kind of share with the weekend social worker. So she's there Friday to Monday. So we cross over on Monday. She kind of covers Mao as well. So we're kind of still a team but not a team, which is really lovely because normally on the weekend, yeah, there wouldn't be that ICU kind of.

cover outside of on call. Yeah. I guess one positive of COVID is it has ensured that kind of consistency of care. Yeah. And I can imagine it's very good practice to have someone that you share a role with because it's kind of forcing you to reflect on what your intervention has been and be able to really succinctly communicate that with someone. So if you couldn't get to something or if the time wasn't right because the families

couldn't come in for whatever it was, a family meeting, for instance, it was easy enough to then hand it over in a way that isn't interrupting that care too much? Yeah, definitely, definitely. I think, you know, has been such a challenge in COVID as well? Like, a lot of our work has been really remote, which has meant that our communication has to be so much better than what it previously was between social worker to social worker and then kind of with the rest of the MDT. Yeah.

If we can go back to your previous sexual assault roles, did you work with a lot of social workers or was it kind of that multidisciplinary approach as well? So when I started in community, my first role was kind of that split of professionals and survivors. So it was actually a survivor-run organisation, which is completely different to most services. And actually was male-dominated. I was one of two female social workers. there and then kind of seeing that organization changed that team was very much multidisciplinary was a split between social workers people with diplomas of community services we had a clinical psych we had you know a real diverse team because they were focusing on people's kind of lived

experiences and then moving into that health sexual assault role that was mainly social workers but we also did have, you know, that medical arm as well. So we have two doctors and a sane, so a nurse that specialises in sexual assault. And then they've got a clinical psych as well. So it's kind of a good mix, but definitely draws more on that social work experience. It's really interesting to come out of university into a role where potentially you're the only social worker or there aren't very many I almost feel like you would have had to work a little bit harder to cement the integrity of the profession. So almost being able to really demonstrate why a social work role is needed.

What do you think put yourself apart from the other professionals in that space? Yeah. So I was really quite fortunate in that role. Our clinical lead was a social worker. But kind of seeing, so when I started in that organization, there was only five of us. So he was tiny. And by the time that I left, they were at 12 or 13 plus external staff. And kind of just reinforcing what social work was and what we could offer.

So that service was very much kind of that case management, phone counseling role. They covered all of Australia, which was just insane. Why the phone was such a small team. And, you know, drawing on that social work knowledge. of looking at the different systems, what's around people, what other support can we draw on and kind of pulling everyone together and using those advocacy skills, which are just so, so important, particularly when you're not seeing people face to face and trying to get, like, local supports involved. Yeah. It was such an interesting role and just, you know, stepping in as a new grad and

just kind of, in some ways, being given like a free reign and just going, okay. okay, what do I do with this power that I have and how can I use this in a safe way to support our clients and kind of, you know, where do we draw the line about what we can offer, people was just, yeah, very difficult as a new grad. And particularly, you know, a service that was going through so much change. It was at the time where the Royal Commission was just ending and a lot of the funding for the National Redress was being dished out and working out how as a service we were going to support male survivors in navigating those systems.

Sure. And just for anyone who's not aware, the National Redress Scheme provided quite a bit of support and assistance to people who were victims or who were affected by childhood sexual assault. But are you able to very briefly give people a bit of context or history around that? Yeah, so it came after, I guess, the finalisation of the Royal Commission, which it looked into institutions' response to child sexual assault or child sexual abuse. And from that, they, I guess, established the National Redress Scheme,

which has been approved for, I believe, 10 years, something like that. The rules keep changing. Yeah. And it basically offered, I guess, three key supports, so people could access redress, so their financial recognition of the harm and on the trauma that they did survive, so that's up to 150,000, I believe, still. So they could apply for that. They could apply for an apology from the institution or institutions in many cases,

so an acknowledgement of the harm that was caused. And basically, the institution would then have to say how they have now worked to address that. so that harm is not going to be caused to future generations. And the last bit of it is that counselling support as well. So it is a positive thing overall. There's a lot of, they're still kind of teasing that out three years, what three, four years after it's been established.

There's constantly things being changed, things being added, things being taken away. It's a step in the right direction, I think, and particularly with all the media at the moment, I think that sexual assault, CSA space is changing every day. Yeah. Which is really kind of positive to say that finally it's getting the recognition that it deserves. And trauma as a whole is starting to be acknowledged as well.

Absolutely. And it sounds as though that change and the adaptation has come about as a result of feedback that they're then getting from people, which is really good. Again, it demonstrates that there's a. acknowledgement of that lived experience and they can't just treat everyone the same or assume their experience has been the same. Definitely, definitely. How do they then, because I've not worked in that space, how do they then safeguard people through the application process to try to mitigate

any further trauma in having to retell and go through those stories? Yeah, so they had done a lot of work on that. So it was part of the establishment of the redress scheme of specific funding was handed out to different organisations in different states to assist people in completing their applications. So a range of different government services and non-government services were given that funding. And then also No More, which is the national free legal service for CSA survivors. who can help people in completing their application. It's not an easy application. If you've ever done victim services before,

so the New South Wales State scheme, it's very similar to that. Yeah, so those services have been put in place to assist survivors in applying for the scheme. I think the benefit of the scheme running for 10 years means that people can take their time. There's no rush to, complete it. It's very different to say somebody pursuing a civil claim, so often survivors need to

decide whether or not they want to pursue these matters in a civil case or if they want to go down the redress path. So in order to be, I guess, approve for redress, it needs to be on the balance of probabilities. So it's quite a low threshold. So people don't need to provide the level of details that they would need to do if they were going to go down a civil or a criminal case. And what would be the benefit in your mind of going through the redress scheme instead of a civil complaint? I think people have to weigh that individually for themselves and that's why using resources such as No More is really important so people can decide whether or not it is worth their time and their energy to go through that civil matter, I think the benefit of redress

is the time it takes to be approved. It's a lot shorter. You know, civil cases are long and drawn out. They're also really costly as well. So survivors need to decide where they want to devote their energy to. And also, the evidence needed is a lot lower. Records weren't the best kept back then. Yeah. So often, you know, people can't even buy. records of them being in such institutions. You know, also, I guess the institutions need to have that financial backing to even warrant a civil matter. And, you know, ultimately that rests with the firm that you go to. There's a lot of waiting. I think regardless of which, which avenue you choose, it's a lot of waiting around and waiting for somebody to give you a call and let you know

what's happening or if you've got to provide more information. And that's kind of where those support services come in. So being that point of call that you can ring up and be like, I haven't heard anything for they've asked me to do this. I think another positive that the redress screen has introduced. So it's headed up, I believe, by the DHS, so services Australia. So now once they receive the application, everyone's allocated to their own kind of case manager within that that manages their application process. So it's one point. point of call, which is really quite different to what it used to be, where it was just kind of sent off into the ether and you would kind of hear little bits of information, but you

would be getting those kind of regular updates. So it sounds as though they've been able to really take a bit more of a personal and flexible approach in creating this scheme and creating the opportunity for people to go through the process. Is there a cost associated with going through the scheme? it shouldn't cost anything. There's definitely been things out in the media and obviously there are other people that I guess they're providing a fee charge for doing those redress applications. It definitely shouldn't cost anybody. Right. Anything to do that. Which is quite different if someone were to go down the civil path. Yeah. And that's why people need to weigh up their options. And, you know, their support out there

regardless for what people choose and that was kind of the benefit of the organization that I worked in. You didn't have to pick to go down redress. You didn't have to, you know, lodge a civil claim. You could just kind of show up and give them a call. And that was kind of really the beauty of working in that organization. Yeah. Because it was a survivor-led program, was there an opportunity to do much group work or sort of any other interesting projects as part of that? Yeah, so they actually run these eight-week groups for male survivors. They run it in New South Wales and in Adelaide at the moment. So it was really amazing doing that group coordination. Obviously, being a female, I couldn't be a part of it because it is very much that protected male space,

but doing all the coordination behind the scenes, making sure survivors were prepared to step into that group model. it's very different than one-to-one counseling. Yeah. And, you know, it can be really hard because many survivors are led to believe that it's only them. You know, nobody else has been through what they've been through, which, you know, no two stories are the same. But it's amazing seeing these guys come into the room and look across and be like, just amazed.

They're quite small groups. They're only a maximum of 12 people in each one. And it's just so lovely to see people at the end of those. eight weeks. I mean, that kind of change is really great. Yeah. So if we fast forward to the ICU work, yeah. I know that you don't have really any frame of reference, but from what your colleagues tell you, how does the ICU differ from what the ICU used to be pre-COVID? Yeah. The hospital that I'm working out now has gone through a big major redevelopment. So the ICU where I work now is kind of a mix between ICU and a high Pendency unit because we are a smaller hospital.

Typically, you know, normally out of 12 beds, you probably would use half on a normal run-of-the-mill outside of a pandemic. Yeah. You know, really kind of those post-operative patients that need those intensive monitoring, we might have people that have rapidly deteriorated on the wards or somebody that's come in through the emergency department. But given we're not a major hospital. in the area, any kind of big traumas are going to those tertiary hospitals. So we wouldn't always have people ventilated, which is really quite different to now when we're using 8, 10 beds at any given day, which is completely different to what it normally was.

And 90% of them are currently ventilated at the moment, so they're unable to communicate, which is not something, I guess, that this hospital is. hospital has dealt with in the past. It's not that they haven't had the capability. It's just they're not that trauma hospital. So it's definitely very, very, very different. Yeah. Are there changes to visiting as well?

Yeah. So we, like everyone else in the state at the moment, there's no visitors allowed in. We're quite fortunate in the district that we are in. We will allow a few visitors to come in if people are active. dying, which is very different to a lot of the other hospitals. Of course, different districts. We're very fortunate that we will allow some people in, which means the world to people. And, you know, we are quite good at facilitating those Zoom calls as well. So trying to make people feel as connected as possible to their loved ones at the moment, which is just, you know, heartbreaking

to see when they're ventilated. And often these patients have other family members at home that are also COVID positive at the moment or they might have family members in different hospitals that are also ventilated. So kind of doing that, you know, whole system coordination that we've never had to do in the past. It's just, yeah, it's really quite amazing kind of how the hospital has changed in the COVID situation. Yeah. I was speaking with Scarlett in episode 39 and she works in an intensive care unit as well.

and she was saying that sometimes she's actually had to create video calls for people when they're passing away, when they're actively dying. And that's kind of the family member being able to say goodbye and just thought, oh, it's a hard enough thing to be going through, let alone having to do it virtually. I just couldn't even imagine. Yeah, look, it's just stepping into an ICU space at the moment is just, it's a huge challenge to kind of, you know, particularly for me, never worked in this space before and to kind of try and make family members feel as connected as possible has been, you know, something that I've actively worked on every day that I show up, you know, how can I contact these families? How can I make them feel like they know what's going on every day, even though they might not be getting those calls from the doctors all the time?

I'm inviting them to send in photos, so we've got photos laminated on patients, rooms, which is really quite nice for the nursing stuff and the doctors, you know, when patients are ventilated, it's hard to remember that they're actually human beings sometimes. Yeah. And having that connection to the outside world is really important. The patient themselves probably, they might not be able to see it just, yeah,

while they're currently ventilated, but still it's really nice to have in there. You know, we've arranged for one patient, the Korans being played in their room every day through YouTube. Like, we've done some really crazy things. just to make family members feel connected. And we have at the moment this COVID group of all these different social workers working across Sydney, I've been kind of drawing on the support of people that, you know,

have been doing this work for a long time. The hospital that I work at wasn't really affected in the first wave back in March 2020. So this is all kind of different to them. Yeah. But, you know, other hospitals in Western Sydney, your Sydney district hospitals, they've been doing this for a while. So drawing on their knowledge and kind of learning what they did that's work for them and kind of trying to implement it where we are as being really good.

Yeah. And I'm also reflecting on my experience in hospital settings where there's a lot of death and dying going on. And there's a whole process that goes on behind the scenes that a lot of people don't realize. And part of that is giving families an opportunity to say goodbye. And sometimes we'd take them down to the morgue. and we'd do a viewing and we'd have sort of an opportunity for them to say a few things or just

to be there as a family. I can imagine you can't do more viewings anymore, even just something as simple as that and, you know, touching someone's hand and saying goodbye, it's just such a removed process now. Yeah, definitely. And that's why, you know, so thankful that our hospital at the moment, you know, people in that ICU, I can't speak to other wards in the hospital, but definitely in the ICU will allow some family members in it, will be maybe one at a time. But for them to kind of have that time to say goodbye, although fully pee-p-ed, to be able to kind of be close to their loved one is just, it's amazing. And also, you know, selfishly, it takes a lot of the pressure of us as workers as well

because we're still dealing with that complex grief, but people have still had that kind of right to say goodbye. I, which is such a privileged position to be in at the moment. I can imagine wearing PPE all day, that level of protection would be exhausting as well. Do you get more regular breaks? How do you negotiate all that? Yeah, been very interesting. So we are in full PPE.

I come in in my hospital scrubs and then we get dressed in the surgical scrubs once we arrive. So you're not leaving work in the same uniform that you've been wearing. throughout the day. We are quite lucky we have an office out the back of ICU so we can doff there and kind of feel somewhat of a normal human being putting on the surgical mask rather than the N95, which I never thought I would say that I love a surgical mask. Yeah, and just making sure definitely taking regular breaks, making sure that we get lunch. My team leader is very good at kind of texting our team to say, you need to go have

lunch now you need to walk out. Great. And we catch up for a coffee once or twice a week to just do that informal supervision and making sure that we're off the wards for a period of time, which has been really great. Do you get an opportunity for group supervision like you would normally now or you can't have that many people together in a room? Yeah. So a lot of it is via Zoom now. And I guess that's the benefit of, you know, not spending all of my time in ICU and having that one day in that vast role. as well because that it's in a different hospital, it's in a community health building. That's kind of my rest time, although it's still a really busy role and job and particularly being on intake.

That's kind of my break once a week as well, but I can kind of meet people face to face and sit down and have a conversation that isn't directly related to COVID and, you know, the death and dying space is really quite lovely. Yeah. I'm also thinking from the patient's perspective, it must just be really horrific, let alone waking up in an intensive care unit, which would be scary anyway. But you'd wake up, you'd be groggy or in pain or both, you'd be looking up at bright lights. And then all of a sudden, it's almost like an alien invasion. You'd have people coming towards you with the full get-up. It must just be so terrifying for them, not knowing what was going on, especially if they

weren't planning on having surgery or they've just had a very acute incident. happen and they've wound up there. Definitely, look, I could only imagine that experience. And I think that's why, you know, I try to make the rooms as comfortable as possible with like the family photos because lost-dem patients have rapidly deteriorated or particularly with the hospital that I'm working at at the moment. They've come from other districts. They've probably never been to this suburb before in their lives.

So trying to kind of make them feel as connected as possible to their normal. lives in this strange situation is, you know, a real big challenge at the moment. In the SAS role, do you find it difficult to keep good barriers and keep good sort of emotional distance to what you're dealing with? And are there any gender expectations there if it's mostly a male led or male run program? Yeah. So now being in that health-based SAS role, it's actually been flipped. So now it's all just females now in this. the role. I definitely think with anything with social work, it's hard to kind of maintain that separation

between work and private life. It's a challenge for anyone regardless of what role you're doing and then also to kind of separate that client to client, you know, when you're working out of one counselling session and into another, it's hard to kind of park that at the door. I've got two really amazing teams behind me and slowly as I go throughout, my career, although only two and a half years in, have really learned to kind of be vulnerable and kind of if I'm not feeling good, to kind of feel okay enough to voice that and have a conversation about what's sitting behind that and kind of what can we do to support each other as a team, I think, has been really, really great and just kind of acknowledging that the last phone call

was really kind of crappy or you've had a crappy day the day before or, you know, at the moment, being in a pandemic, it's not great. Yeah. And that's okay. Yeah. I definitely think working in SaaS and working with clients that are, you know, mostly women now is there's a gendered expectation on females that you're kind, caring and supportive and all the time.

And we're not always bad. You can't be. Yeah, no. and we're not always functioning at 100% and I can't always drop everything to be with everyone all the time and I think that's okay. Yeah. It's interesting you talk about holding an issue

because obviously we try to record, we try to keep notes contemporaneously, but the majority of the time, we have to go from one thing to another thing to another thing and you just kind of building up on all the things that are in your head that you're carrying or holding through from one scenario to the next. So, yeah, that would definitely weigh on you. Yeah.

And then you know what? That's the same for our clients as well. They can compartmentalise just as well as we can most of the time. So, you know, to try and kind of for the hour that you're meeting people often in that space if you are doing a counselling session. And just to try and for yourself to be present, but also encourage the client to be present is an achievement enough in itself sometimes. Absolutely.

Are there any other challenges other than, you know, COVID and holding those issues and probably phone service, all that can be a good thing and a bad thing, being able to be resourceful in having sort of virtual conversations? What else is really difficult about the work you're doing, whether it's in ICU or SAS? I think just being so new in my career, you know, two and a half years, although it feels like a long time, it's not a long time. at all. I think that's been kind of a real challenge, you know, trying not to kind of rush forward and achieve everything and really, you know, have such a pressure and for learning, but also trying to hold back on that as well and just kind of enjoy where I am at this point in my career and not kind of rush to that senior position, which I'm definitely not ready for. It's hard to not kind of wish your career away and, you know, kind of focus on the

the future and what's the next challenge. Although it's great to do just to kind of sit and like relish the moment that you're in has been really a big focus that I've tried to draw attention to at this point in time. Yeah, I find that having a student is a great learning opportunity for you as a worker. And now that you're two and a half years post degree, you've got the capacity to. But is that something that's even possible at the moment for you? Yes, I've just put in my paperwork actually for a you know, which I'm really excited for. One of the reasons also that I wanted to move into that health-based role because I was so thankful for the placements that I got and I had such amazing supervisors

that just really highlighted this passion for social work and really kind of guided my career up until this point that I definitely wanted to take a student and it was just not possible all the time in those community roles or, you know, in those SaaS roles or in a busy service. Not to mention from a physical environmental perspective, often they're much smaller quarters, so you literally don't have an extra chair. Exactly. An extra chair, an extra computer, you know, it's just... I've always shared a computer with my students.

It's always the computers. The computers in the death space, you know? We never quite plan for this at all. No, I'm really excited to take a student. It's going to be this lovely challenge, hopefully. I've heard positive and negative sides of things. That's what I'm excited to kind of get back to that theory-based practice as well. Often when you're working, you kind of, you always have theories sitting there,

but it's not quite front of mind. And I think, you know, that's kind of the positives of having a student. It really kind of makes you reflect and take time. I think sometimes you kind of forget about supervision or you might have had a busy week so you haven't focused too much attention towards reflecting on your practice. So, yeah, I'm hoping that's what a student brings to me. What would you say then is the best thing about the work you're doing? What do you enjoy the most?

I actually really just enjoy showing up every day. Like, social work is such a beautiful profession, and you can kind of take it anywhere. And I really, like, it's such a humbling privilege to be able to kind of meet people, where they're at every day and put your stuff aside and kind of focus your attention on one person or, you know, a series of issues. I think, you know, it's such a great thing to be a part of and, you know, stepping into that ICU space while completely out of my comfort zone and not something that I thought I saw myself doing for at least a number of years. You know, it has been so beautiful to be able to meet people, you know, that I never normally would have crossed

pass with ever before and kind of to be able to stand beside them. It's really difficult time with such a privilege. That's kind of like the best thing about social work. Is there another area of practice that interests you? I know you're very early on in your career and you said you were interested in nursing, but it sounds as though that multidisciplinary problem solving really appeals to you and maybe even something where you can use those group models that you were in some way helping to facilitate in the community. What else interests you? Yeah, I think I've always held the emergency department on this weird pedestal of like I just seems insanely busy, but also kind of just this amazing flex of social work skills and ability. Whether or not it is that, I don't know.

But yeah, look, I'd probably love to at least maybe do a secondment at one point there. I think ultimately, like, I'd love to be in some kind of educator role. And I think, you know, in order to take on a position like that, you really need to try everything. Yeah. And that's kind of where I'm at at the moment, just taking all of these different challenges on and, you know, being on all these different working groups, trying to kind of see where things kind of take me, whether that be that SaaS kind of role, whether that be in ICU at the moment, just kind of, I honestly love to take on any challenge and see where it goes.

I never thought I would be in ICU and here I am today. Yeah. So, yeah. And are there any projects or programs that you have the opportunity to be part of at the moment? Yeah, so one benefit of working with health is there's a lot of different working groups going on all the time. So at the moment I am on a podcast group, I guess, which is a partnership with the Northern Sydney Local Health District, plus a lot of the different council areas and DCJ. So they've employed these lovely young people to run a podcast to talk about their experiences in relationships, which I think is really important at this point in time.

You know, with the appointment of Grace Tame as Australian of the year, all the different changes. in terms of the consent laws and the different things that Jess Hill is doing at the moment. I think there's this really great attention to young people and their relationships at this point and time. And it's really amazing kind of being on a working group and being a young person, but also kind of, you know, being seen as a professional in this space, which is this weird kind of dynamic at the same time. Yeah.

And have any of the episodes been released yet? they still in planning? So they will be released in November, December, so in time with that 16 days of activism as well. Yeah. Lovely. And what's it called? It's called mates and dates. Amazing. Okay. Looking forward to listening to it and by the time this episode comes out, there will at least be one episode released. So people can go check that out. I'll put a link to it in the show notes as well. Definitely. It's been a great challenge. And I think, you know, there's been some really fantastic opportunities that have come my way throughout the year. You know, this definitely being one of them.

And also I have been helping some friends that are putting together a charity as well that will be, you know, for women survivors of sexual abuse, whether it's recent or historical and lending my knowledge to a lot of different projects at the moment, which I just never thought that I would be doing at this point in my career. So kind of like consulting positions. Which is just very, very, very strange to be doing. No, no, no, that's that imposter syndrome coming through. Definitely. And it's interesting that you kind of say that a lot of this year and kind of my knowledge

and learning has been around that, you know, idea of shame and kind of Ben A. Brown's work and kind of learning about that imposter syndrome and that vulnerability and kind of, you know, what sits behind that. as well. I think it's so important for everybody to know that and kind of, you know, speak about shame and speak about that idea of kind of vulnerability and kind of embracing that and particularly as a young worker or like a fresh worker to social work. It's, you know, important to recognize that, that idea of being an imposter and being vulnerable when we meet with clients. Like, we're not experts in their lives so we don't know everything and kind of embracing that and still kind of

stepping into that challenge rather than walking away. I think one of the strongest or most important things that we can do as professionals is just to say I'm not sure. I don't know. I don't have all the answers. I don't have all the experience that perhaps you're hoping that I do. And when you mentioned your role is giving you an opportunity to connect with people that you might not normally have the opportunity to meet with, made me reflect on just even doing

this podcast and the number of people. people that I've had the opportunity to connect with that I would never have normally worked with. So there are a lot of positives to come out of this horrible period in Australia, in the world. But I think the most important thing is that remaining humble like you were mentioning before and just being able to connect with someone in a way that seems really true and genuine and keeping people informed. And that's what all that, you know, I don't know. I will find out I will get back to you just maintaining that integrity and accountability I guess.

Yeah and like you know not avoiding those difficult conversations like particularly like in ICU. Sometimes you know you've got the saying is no news is good news but sometimes news is just news like yeah still picking up the phone and just you know reaching out to people whether or not you've got nothing to tell them in terms of change in somebody's condition but still kind of going hey I'm thinking about you today, I know it's been a while, are you okay? You know, it's a really kind of that different social work kind of perspective that maybe, you know, I don't know, I see you probably wasn't previously and, you know, it wouldn't normally be outside of a pandemic, but still kind of reaching out to people and just going, hey, I'm here if you need anything. I know we have no

change at the moment, but still, if you want to chat, we're here. That's so important because often and people won't know what questions to ask them when. So just knowing that there is someone there that they connect with. And you might be the only person who calls them that day. They might be incredibly isolated. Or other people don't really know how to relate to someone who's grieving. So, yeah, it's so important to maintain that connection. So it's great that you have the opportunity to do that,

especially when you've got more on your caseload than you would normally. So, yeah, good on you for keeping that up. Are there any other resources or, you know, reading, viewing, if anyone wanted to know more about the work that you're doing, where would you send them? I'm thinking even just are there specific counselling approaches that you use in your intervention? So I really love narrative therapy and obviously Dalwood Centre a fantastic resource for that. And, you know, they've got a range of different things from working with people that have experienced trauma to, People that are grieving and that kind of grief and loss perspective as well. They're fantastic.

You've got your e-cabs or your education center against violence is fantastic and run some really great training for people starting off in that band space or the violence abuse and neglect space. So that's really great. I think if you're working in a hospital, your libraries. Google Scholar is your friend. You know, never before we've had information just at our fingertips. So I think there's so many different things that are coming out every day.

And it's kind of overwhelming to stay on top of it. And I think also your greatest resources, your colleague, speak to them about their different experiences. That's kind of how I've navigated my way through my career, speaking to people about, you know, what services they've worked with in the past, you know, what's the team's like. And that's kind of how I've jumped from space to space. Yeah, which is really great. Yeah, and I guess if anyone else is wanting to know more about ECHAV and their disability and sexual violence team, I also spoke with a couple of wonderful social workers in episode 25, Belinda and Rabina. And they're in that team at ECF, but the portfolio funding came about as a result of the Royal Commission

into responses to abuse in institutionalised settings, but specifically to improve responses to people with a disability who experience sexual violence. as well as children and young people who were using problematic and harmful sexualised behaviours. So really good resource and their website is fantastic and I'll put a link up to that as well. But, yeah, just a lot of really good redressing supports and programs coming out of what was a really horrible period for Australia. So it's good that there is that capacity to reflect on things that have not been done very well and to put those resources into things. where at least we're making steps towards supporting people and helping to help people recover and heal from that period of time.

Definitely. And I think, you know, people are really interested in those spaces that, you know, calling up the organisations as well. And particularly in that redress space and working with survivors of childhood, sexual assault, those services are so happy to share their knowledge because, you know, so many great things have come out of the Royal Commission, in terms of, you know, resources being created. You know, we're finally starting to talk about something

that we've never spoken about before or, you know, we've kind of shoved under a rug like these servers. I actually really want to share their knowledge. And a lot of them run, you know, a lot of different workshops. So Samson in particular runs different workshops for professionals working in their space. They run workshops for partners of survivors or family members. So if you call them, and you just want to know more, I'm sure that they would be happy to speak to your set up a time

or even kind of those SaaS spaces as well. Like people want to share the knowledge that they have. It's never kind of a harm to ask for a five-minute conversation. People can always say no. That's the worst you're going to get. Yeah, absolutely. I love that you've been able to share your approach and particularly your focus on keeping people informed through these processes that are normally incredibly foreign, incredibly strange at the best of times,

but maintaining that connection between yourself and the person and the hospital and making sure that people understand where things are at. But it obviously, as you said, takes a lot of stepping outside of your comfort zone and being able to really stand with someone who's going through a traumatic experience or has done. And yeah, I think those working groups that you're talking about are incredibly interesting in terms of guiding. the direction of the profession. So being able to, even at such an early stage in your career, being able to develop something in line with what you're seeing. It's such a good way of formulating your approaches based on what you're seeing. You know, it's very much that

evidence-based practice, whereas a lot of people think, oh, we don't really do research in social work. What you're doing is daily research. You're having a look at what's working and what's not and and what has been done before and trying to develop it in a very challenging space when you kind of got everything working against you at the moment. So yeah, I think it's wonderful. I think it's great that you have the opportunity to do both roles because it obviously is not only good for you professionally but personally in giving yourself that space and balance in some very heavy spaces. But is there anything else before we finish up that you really want to say about the work you're doing or words of advice for people who might want to get into this area.

In terms of people wanting to get into this area, just to give it a shot. Like, one of the beauties of any health role is there's often second second second second that pop up. If you're not sure about an area, you can try and contact your local services and just kind of get involved, particularly in that sexual assault space. It all seems really scary and it's definitely not a space that I saw myself going from a you grad you barely speak about at uni it's not something that you touch on but you know it's such a beautiful role to be in and i think any social work role is such a privilege showing up every day and

you know just sitting people you know wherever they're at in their lives and that's such a humbling thing it's kind of like amazing that people trust you enough with a bit of their story or to help them although sometimes may be difficult at first so lovely so i think it's just important to kind of remember that we're in such a privileged position and to be thankful that we can do this every day, you know, and still love it. Yeah. Thank you so much. It's been wonderful hearing your perspective and your approaches to your work and hopefully, you know, you very much enjoy having a student. I'm sure they're very lucky to be working with you and if anyone's got any questions, please feel free to reach out and I can pass them on. But otherwise, thank you very much.

I hope everyone's gotten just as much out of this as I have. Thank you for your time. I actually really enjoyed it. It's been great to kind of think about, you know, these questions that normally I wouldn't spend time kind of unpacking my career and where it's kind of taken me to this point. So it's been really great. Especially when you feel like you haven't really had much of an opportunity to develop it, but I guess when you think back on it, there really has been quite a lot of development even in a short time. And that's the beauty of the profession. It keeps evolving and changing and developing. Definitely. Hands down, I'm so thankful that I've fixed social work. It's been such an amazing challenge and

really kind of shapes your world for you as a person as well. You know, it's so different from when I started uni to, you know, now, it's just, it's great. Thanks for joining me this week. If you would like to continue this discussion or ask anything of either myself or Haley, please visit my anchor. page at anchor.fm slash social work spotlight. You can find me on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, or you can email SW Spotlight Podcast at gmail.com. I'd love to hear from you. Please also let me know if there is a particular topic you'd like discussed, or if you or another person you know would like to be featured on the show. Next episode's guest is Matt, a social worker who was born and raised

in Darkinjan country in the central coast of New South Wales. Matt has a history of working in not-for-profit organisations that support children and families and was formerly the operations manager of Central Coast Family Support Services. Matt hopes that this conversation about his social work journey and experience helps others who are interested in this line of work. I release a new episode every two weeks. Please subscribe to my podcast so you're notified when this next episode is available. See you next time.