Collaborative Supervision
​As professional caregivers we engage with the complexity of people’s lives on a daily basis. The provision of dedicated guidance and support is essential for helping professionals as we navigate the demands of supporting clients and families through challenges, difficulties, changing life circumstances, serious illness, death, and grief. We know that without an ongoing commitment to reflection, development, learning and humility, quality practice will be impacted. Yet locating a place to slow down, reflect and turn toward the impact of this work can be difficult.
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Collaboraide supervision is an initiative of Leigh Donovan and Elham Day.
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Our Team
Shared between us, Leigh Donovan and Elham Day have decades of practice and supervision experience across a range of contexts. Our joint specialty lies in palliative care, grief, bereavement and death care. Although these are all contexts where grief may be prevalent explicitly, we also acknowledge that grief and non death losses are also present across all contexts of professional caregiving.
We offer a collaborative approach to supervision, where we invite professional caregivers to critically reflect, sharing the vulnerabilities of practice, to learn, grow and further refine our approach to caregiving. We bring a humanist lens to supervision as we honour the complexity of human lives - for those you work with, as well as you own. Care and curiosity drive our conversations.
Between us, we have experience in moving through the myriad of relational, emotional and organisational complexities in our careers, and collaborative supervision will support you to do the same.
We work with individuals and teams throughout Australia.
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Collaborative Supervision, offering dedicated support for professional caregivers
Here's how we work with you
Offer compassionate presence
Listening deeply, inviting reflection and contemplation
Integrate a praxis approach
Combining professional knowledge with practice wisdom, crafting collaborative responses to the lived reality of practice
Apply the various roles of a supervisor
Drawing on multiple perspectives including educator, mentor, counsellor, peer, practice area specialists
Without an ongoing commitment to reflection, development, learning and humility, quality practice will be impacted
As a professional caregiver the realities of client work often raise clinical, ethical, and relational questions that sit beyond what can be addressed in operational line management.
You are not alone. We know that for many caring professionals it can be challenging to access specialist support in the workplace which addresses the nuanced needs of care delivery. Research shows that a lack of appropriate support on the job is one of the main causes of professional burnout. Collaborative supervision is offered by practitioners who integrate the lived experience of this challenge in our own work history, together with specific skills in order to adapt our support to your individual situation.
I’m struggling to consistently integrate my values and principles into the lived reality of practice.
We know that emerging professional caregivers are more likely to experience a widening disconnect between what was taught from textbooks or theories while training - and the messy intricacies of human suffering within the complex health and social care systems we work in. At Collaboraide, we offer you a place to bring challenging cases, complex ethical or professional issues as well as practice development questions to support your ongoing skill and knowledge development.
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How can I maintain safe and effective practice when client experiences of suffering or distress cut across textbook understandings of professional / personal boundaries?
We know that as professional caregivers the boundary between what is professional and personal can become more unclear and uncertain at various times in our careers, whether we are an emerging or established practitioner. Questions about boundaries can be especially present when we are supporting clients facing any of life’s primary concerns (death, isolation, anxiety, meaning). Collaborative Supervision will offer you a space to process questions, unpack uncertainty or critically reflect on that recurring organisational issue that has been affecting your sleep.
As a caring professional, I am thinking about stepping into a more senior role with some management responsibility, but I feel unsure or unprepared.
Questions around career progression, workplace transitions and the associated considerations when facing a change in your work situation can feel overwhelming and difficult especially when there doesn't seem to be a clear right or wrong choice. Collaboraide supervision offers a compassionate presence alongside you to work through practicalities and the reflexive considerations when you are facing changes at work.
Frequently asked questions
1. What’s the difference between what you each have to offer?
Leigh: Hello. I hold over twenty years of practice and supervision in palliative and bereavement care and currently extend supervision to individuals and teams working in these sectors throughout Australia. In each supervision session I may be wearing the lens of supervisor, mentor, peer, counsellor, educator. I support colleagues throughout the professional lifespan from emerging to senior practitioner. My supervision training is in Existential Supervision undertaken through The Centre for Existential Practice. An existential approach means I hold a broad lens around the complexities of human life. I approach conversations with curiosity and am led by the person I supervise. I believe in the intersection between our personal and professional lives and within supervision we hold the tension between these spaces.
Elham: Hi. I have a special interest in supporting practitioners who are either regularly working alongside grief, death, bereavement, disability and complex illness - or who are seeking to deepen practice skills in any of these areas. As a counselling psychotherapist and supervisor I hold an integrative existential and ecologically-relational framework which is power-aware, justice-oriented and non-pathologising. I am particularly interested in how sustained curiosity within the relational container of supervision can support reflexivity in professional and personal development. Exploring the complexity of professional practice through the kaleidoscopic lens of our worldview, values, and biases in the company of a compassionate witness can offer unique invitations to refine, adapt, and sustain our ongoing growth as practitioners.
I undertook supervision training with the Centre for Existential Practice (NSW), and for the last decade I have worked at an Australian Children’s Hospice, specialising in complex client and family support, grief, end of life, after death, funeral care and team management. I also have experience in working with young people and families in a range of community settings - and welcome supervision clients from healthcare, the funeral industry, and from across the human and social service sector.
2. Frequency + Options inc single or semi-regular session consults - options and benefits
You can engage in supervision with either Leigh or Elham in a variety of ways.
Regular Individual Supervision: Some people we meet engage in regular 1:1 monthly sessions, where a supervisory relationship can be built over time. This often means we walk alongside supervisees as they move through different professional roles and contexts.
Regular Group or Team Supervision: We are able to work with teams to engage in regular group supervision. We welcome engaging with teams who may not have had formal supervision previously. We can work with you to discuss team priorities, goals and ways of working together.
Adhoc Specialist Supervision Consultations: Given our speciality in grief, loss and bereavement, we also offer joint (Leigh and Elham) single-session consults with individuals and teams. These supervisory conversations would typically be exploring a complex case which you may have taken to a regular supervisor, but which you feel may benefit from a specialist grief lens. These sessions are also well suited to managers exploring shared team concerns, such as staff wellbeing following challenging episodes of care.
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All of our offerings are equally well suited to individuals who are working in Palliative/Hospice/Healthcare and to anyone working in broader social, allied health or therapeutic contexts.
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3. Contexts (face to face : online)
We work with individuals and teams throughout Australia via Zoom.
In certain circumstances, we may be able to provide in person consultations so please contact us to explore how we may be able to support you if in person sessions are of interest.
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4. Clinical or professional or collaborative supervision- what’s the difference?
Clinical Supervision focuses on clinical work with clients or patients. Conversations may focus on reflective practice, therapeutic interventions and skill development.
Professional Supervision has a broader focus on the workplace, clarifying boundaries, sustainable practice, professional growth, and navigating organisational contexts.
Collaborative Supervision takes an integrative approach drawing on both of these approaches, as many supervisors do.
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5. Fees
Individual Supervision:
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$244.50 inc GST (60min session) for supervisees who are funded by an organisation.
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$230 inc GST (60 min session) for supervisees who are self-funding.
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Emerging practitioners: If you have graduated within the last 5 years, and/or you would not be able to meet the above fees - we welcome the chance to discuss flexible rates, please reach out.
Group Supervision: Fees for group supervision are dependent on various factors including group size and frequency. We welcome a conversation to locate a mutually beneficial outcome for you and your team.
Adhoc Specialist Consultations: Fees for these joint sessions (x2 supervisors) are dependent on a variety of factors. We welcome a conversation to locate a mutually beneficial outcome for you and your team.
6. Dialogue with either Elham or Leigh?
Depending on when you are seeking to commence, we may both be accepting new clients, or we may make a recommendation based on current availability.
Alternatively, it may be that you would like to speak with one of us specifically to hear more about our approach, as well as our distinct areas of practice. Please feel free to contact us to schedule an obligation free chat for 15-20mins, we would welcome hearing from you.
To discuss supervision options with Elham email elham@elhamday.com
To discuss supervision options with Leigh email leigh@collaboraide.com
