Evaluating the impact of supervision training for health and human services workers in Victoria: translating education into practice?

Introduction/background:
Effective supervision training is beneficial across all levels of an organisation. As part of a state-wide supervision training program for 7900 health and human services (HHS) workers across Victoria (2017-2020), we evaluated the impact of the program on participants’ knowledge, skills and confidence, plus the extent to which learning is translated into supervision.
Aim/objectives:
Our study aimed to: (a) evaluate, for quality improvement purposes, the impact of half-day introductory supervision workshops on participants’ self-reported knowledge, skills and confidence in supervision and (b) ascertain whether learning resulted in perceived translation back into practice.
Methods:
Participants were surveyed at three time-points: before (T1), immediately after (T2) and at least 3 months post-training (T3).
Results:
Self-reported knowledge, skills and confidence improved with time: At T1, scores for 2723 participants were 4.3, 4.3, 4.3 (out of 8) respectively, while T2 scores with 1511 participants were 5.4, 5.2, 5.3, and T3 scores for 396 participants were 5.8, 5.6, and 5.6. 269 (68%) of T3 participants stated that they had translated workshop learnings back into practice with a further 67 (17%) planning to translate.
Discussion:
Evaluation showed an increase in knowledge, skills and confidence over time. Many of the participants had, or planned to, translate their learnings into supervision practice post-training. Translating learning into practice centred on supervisors employing strategies (e.g. reflective practice, feedback, action learning sets, etc.) advocated in the workshops.
Conclusions:
Supervision training received as part of this program appears beneficial to participants and shows translation back into supervision practice.