Publications from ODSW Social Insights: Letters by DSW (Vol 2) | Page 18

Fundamentals of Social Work
Even among the human services, social work is a more recent discipline
compared with the doctors, dentists and nurses. Social work is demanding and
affects the lives of individuals and families directly. This heavy responsibility
should challenge us to attain a high standard of professionalism in the field
- to tread where it is most difficult and challenging.

Aspiring social work graduates
As an aspiring social work graduate, one might ask what would make a
student hold his or her stand as a social worker ready to work with clients on
graduation and with a self-directed professional development plan. There
might be some useful reference points from the competency framework.
It is also important for the graduate to ensure that he or she has good
supervision in practice and to be aware of how the individual’s strengths
and professional development fit a career structure for social work. It is
useful in the initial years of practice to draw consciously on professional
standards and competency at different levels of practice. One must also be
conscious about values and ethics which is how one would apply social work
ethical principles and values to guide professional practice. One has to be
conscious about diversity which is about respecting cultural sensitivities and
working with diversity in clients and contexts and being anti-discriminatory
in service delivery. Furthermore, one must also be able to apply critical
reflection and analysis to inform and provide a rationale for professional
decision making. By far the most challenging might well be how to apply
the skills, knowledge and values to promote independence and safety while
balancing rights and risks, protection, control and choice for those whom
social workers work with.

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