New Standards Provide Guidelines for Social Workers in an Ever-Changing Tech World

by Linda May Grobman, MSW, ACSW, LSW

   In June 2017, the NASW, ASWB, CSWE, and CSWA Standards for Technology in Social Work Practice were released. The 64-page document marked the culmination of a 2-year process of collaboration among the four organizations. The Task Force for Technology Standards in Social Work Practice reviewed literature and emerging standards in social work and related professions. A draft of the standards was released in Summer 2016 for public comment, and the Task Force then reviewed every comment received.

    Allan Barsky, J.D., MSW, Ph.D., served as a member of the National Task Force on Practice Standards on Technology and Social Work and Chair of the NASW Task Force on Code of Ethics Revisions. “In both capacities, my colleagues and I strove to identify what types of guidance may be helpful in helping social workers determine whether and how to implement different forms of technology in social work in an ethical manner,” Barsky says. “We did a lot of research on how other professions handled similar issues....We incorporated feedback from social workers representing a broad range of areas of practice. The process of developing practice standards was very dynamic, and not without controversy and spirited conflict. And now, the process and dialogue continue. Both task forces realized that any guidelines we establish today will need to be reconsidered as technology and its applications in social work continue to evolve.”

    According to the document’s  Introduction, the standards “...are designed to guide social workers’ use of technology; enhance social workers’ awareness of their ethical responsibilities when using technology; and inform social workers, employers, and the public about practice standards pertaining to social workers’ use of technology.” The Standards provide general guidance to social workers and are best used in conjunction with the NASW Code of Ethics and relevant statutes and regulations. (See Barsky’s article on technology-related and other changes to the Code of Ethics.)

    Julie Gilliam, Sc.D., M.S., BSW, Lead Instructional Technologist at the University of Maryland School of Social Work, served as a member of the Technology Standards Sub-Task Force Advisory Group. She told The New Social Worker, “In my opinion, the new standards are very comprehensive in terms of the utilization of technology for social workers. The new standards doubled in size from 28 to 64 pages. The new standards cover the following topics in terms of social work and technology: presenting, designing, delivering, gathering, managing, storing, connecting, and educating.”

    Barsky adds, “The standards do not dictate whether social workers should use technology, or how they should use technology, but they do inform social workers about some of the complications and concerns that should be addressed when deciding whether and how to use various forms of technology in social work practice.”

    This comprehensive document includes four main sections:

1. Provision of information to the public (2 standards)
2. Designing and delivering services (27 standards)
3. Gathering, managing, and storing information (14 standards)
4. Social work education and supervision (12 standards)

    The document provides an extensive glossary of terms, as well as resources.

    Section 1 (provision of information to the public) includes standards on ethics and values, as well as representation of self and accuracy of information. Section 2 (designing and delivering services) is by far the most extensive, with 27 standards. Examples of standards in Section 2 include: ethical use of technology to deliver social work services, services requiring licensure or other forms of accreditation, informed consent, providing electronic social work services, assessing clients’ relationship with technology, confidentiality, electronic payments, maintaining professional boundaries, social media policy, fundraising, using personal technology for work, and others.

    Section 3 (gathering, managing, and storing information) provides 14 standards.  These range from separation of personal and professional communications to credibility of information gathered to clients’ access to their own records.

    Section 4 (social work education and supervision) addresses training social workers in the use of technology, continuing education, evaluation, distance education, educator-student boundaries, and other related issues.

    I have not listed every standard. Instead, you can find the complete standards online at: http://bit.ly/2sFmTwI

    Besides the specific standards themselves, the document provides an interpretation for each of the standards, and in some cases examples of how they might apply to a social worker’s practice.

Social Workers Weigh In

    Stephen Cummings, LISW, ACSW, Clinical Assistant Professor and Director of Distance Education at the University of Iowa School of Social Work, commented, “The document reflects a modern-day understanding of technology and practice. Maintaining professional boundaries is addressed in our current social media existence, for example.” Cummings believes, however, that the standards’ focus is “...deeply clinical to the detriment of macro-level practice.”

    The Standards are currently available in a 64-page PDF format. Gilliam believes they could be more useful in a different format, stating:

A key consideration when developing documents such as these would be seeking to understand the cognitive load for social workers...cognitive load meaning the amount of information processing that is expected of the learning when retaining information. There are strategic methods to create information so that people can retain over a period of time. An example of this would be adding images and extracting key components of the standards to create a quick reference guide.

    Gilliam adds, “The technology standards do not identify specific technologies, nor do they explain specific methods on how to use the technology in line with the social work values. This is a challenge, because technology changes so rapidly. However, creating a dynamic website or portal to list applicable use of technology might satisfy this requirement.”

    But Ellen Belluomini, Ph.D., LCSW, thinks that, because “technology advances so quickly, it is important these guidelines were not specific, therefore easily outdated.” She adds, “These guidelines place the responsibility for digital ethical awareness and practice on the social worker....Our profession is in need of frequent training in diverse areas to stay up to date with evolving digital practices and their potential uses and risks within their practice, use with client populations, or in a macro setting.”

    According to Barsky, this was “...the first time that the NASW, CSWE, ASWB, and CSWA collaborated on establishing any type of practice standards for the profession. By eliciting feedback and support from all four national associations, we hope this set of standards will be used broadly—by social work practitioners, educators, students, and licensing bodies,” he says. “We also hope these standards will prove to be beneficial across the spectrum of social work.”

    The Standards are available online at: http://bit.ly/2sFmTwI

Linda May Grobman, MSW, LSW, ACSW, is the founder, publisher, and editor of  The New Social Worker magazine. She received the Pennsylvania NASW Social Worker of the Year for 2014 and is an NASW Social Work Pioneer®.