Supervision and management support

Thinking into, through and out of a concern

You told us that to feel more confident and curious in your practice, good supervision matters. 

Many of you highlighted the need for supervision that is structured, focused on outcomes, and trauma-informed. You value conversations with managers, peers, and colleagues that build trust in your professional judgment, help you frame the right questions in challenging situations, and respond effectively.

We’ve previously shared best practice guidance on delivering high-quality supervision. More recently, senior leaders have recognised that one size doesn’t fit all. Different teams use a range of supervision models, all designed to explore children’s lived experiences.

Reflecting your feedback, our expert practitioner group wanted this resource to include examples of these models. This section is for those already receiving effective supervision, offering ideas for alternative approaches, and for anyone seeking more constructive, structured ways to guide supervision conversations.

Take a look at the examples below:

4x4x4 Model of supervision

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The 4x4x4 Model of Supervision, developed by Tony Morrison, is a widely respected framework for reflective safeguarding supervision. It’s called “4x4x4” because it brings together three sets of four elements:

1. Four Functions of Supervision
   • Management: Ensuring accountability, compliance, and clarity of roles
   • Support: Providing emotional support and resilience for practitioners
   • Development: Building skills, knowledge, and professional growth
   • Mediation: Linking the individual with the wider organisation and its goals
2. Four Stakeholders
   • The supervisee (practitioner)
   • The service user (child or family)
   • The organisation
   • Partners (other agencies involved)
3. Four Stages of the Supervision Cycle
   • Experience: What happened?
   • Reflection: What does it mean?
   • Analysis: Why did it happen? What are the implications?
   • Action Planning: What next?

How to Use the 4x4x4 Model

1. Get Ready for Supervision
   • Bring any case details you want to discuss
   • Think about challenges, decisions, or feelings you need support with
2. Cover the Four Key Functions
   • Management: Check roles, responsibilities, and compliance
   • Support: Talk about emotional impact and ways to stay resilient
   • Development: Identify learning needs and build skills
   • Mediation: Link your work to organisational goals and partner agencies
3. Think About the Four Stakeholders
   • You – Your wellbeing and growth
   • Child/Family – Their experience and safety
   • Organisation – Standards and accountability
   • Partners – Collaboration with other agencies
4. Follow the Four-Step Cycle
   • Experience: What happened?
   • Reflection: How do you feel? What stands out?
   • Analysis: Why did it happen? What are the risks and options?
   • Action: What will you do next? Agree clear steps

This model keeps supervision structured, reflective, and focused on the child, while balancing support, accountability, and learning.

Wannacott's discrepancy matrix

This tool encourages practitioners to reflect on what is known about a case and what is unknown or not yet known – a vital aspect of working with uncertainty. It supports the practitioner to tease out the information they hold into four types: evidence, ambiguous, assumption, and missing. 

Step One: Telling the story

The case-holding practitioner tells their story briefly. 

The supervisor or group members then begin to support the practitioner to sort the information they have been told into each of the boxes. How do you know that…? 

• What other evidence do you have that this is true?
• How often have you felt like that even though you have no evidence it is true?
• When do you feel that most strongly? Why?
• If you had this piece of information what might it make you do differently? 

Step Two: Sorting information 

1. What do I know? For something to go into the ‘evidence’ category: 

• It needs to be proven and verified (in other words, come from more than one source as a fact)
• Evidence also includes knowledge about legal frameworks and roles and responsibilities under the Children Act, as well as research.
• This category provides the strongest factual evidence for analysis and decision making.

2. What is ambiguous? 

• Information that is not properly understood
• is only hearsay
• has more than one meaning dependant on context
• Is hinted at by others but not clarified or owned

3. What I think I know: 

• Allows the practitioner to explore their own practice wisdom and also their own prejudices to see how this is informing the case
• Emotion and values can also be explored in this area and the self-aware practitioner can explore how they are responding and reacting to risk 

4. What is missing?

• These are the requests for information coming from the people listening to the story (supervisors, peers, and other agency staff) that prompt the practitioner to acknowledge there are gaps in the information
• The gaps then have to be examined to see if the lack of information might have a bearing on the decision-making in the case; if so, it needs to be explored

Step Three: Reflections

Once the exercise is complete the practitioner is then asked: 

• What has changed about what you know?
• What do you still need to know?
• What does this mean for the child/family?
• What do you want to do next?

Management support

Supportive managers are essential for practitioners to be successfully professionally curious and looking beyond what they see.

In our work to develop this resource, our panel of expert practitioners from the LSCP Practitioner Group, stressed the importance of giving managers clear insight into what their teams find helpful and supportive.

They told us that having the right management support is crucial in being professionally curious.

So, straight from the survey, this is what practitioners said they needed:

• access to resources, safeguarding training, and support from leadership or colleagues
• management courage, to allow them to be inquisitive and to act on what they find, when they ask the right questions
• encouragement to foster a person-centred approach in work with families, allowing them to build positive relationships in order to truly understand children’s lived experience
• the provision of a supportive environment, where they comfortable asking questions and discussing difficult conversations
• access to workshops, briefings and short training sessions on professional curiosity
• access to training on motivational interviewing techniques, to encourage the use of open-ended questioning and active listening
• opportunities for role modelling, shadowing and peer supervision during professional post-induction periods
• coaching and guidance on managing difficult situations curiously
• reassurance and empowerment

One of the ways that the LSCP Business Unit supports effective and curious conversations in teams, is by providing a series of Team Briefings; a manager’s resource to foster peer learning, build confidence, and promote a culture of continuous improvement.