4 things I’ve learnt from the first Compassionate Cohort (which you could use in your supervision practice)

In 2025 I launched the UK’s first compassion focused group supervision offer for EPs*: The Compassionate Cohort.

It’s been amazing. Participants have provided feedback like:

“Do it, you won't regret it. One of the most effective personal and professional development spaces I have experienced.”

and

“A brave space for EPs to consider and reflect on their work through a compassionate lens”.

The words that participants have used to describe The Compassionate Cohort give even more flavour (“Inspiring, Validating, Transformational, Invaluable, Supportive, Ethical, Soothing, Collaborative, Solution-focused”).

The next set of cohorts are being recruited so I thought I should reflect on what I have learnt - and share - so that other practitioners can benefit.

1) Creating the conditions for sessions is always worth it.
Supervision sessions start with a practice to create the conditions for working together. Sometimes I will facilitate a visualisation, grounding exercise or describe some imagery. It always provides rich material for reflection and normally helps supervisees get the most out of our time together. When I first started using compassion focussed approaches, I would sometimes feel awkward about suggesting a practice (“do they like it?”, “does it feel weird”). I’ve changed my thinking now - if it feels weird for some people we can discuss it. Starting with a practice is an investment in the rest of the session and the exercises are backed by 100s of journal articles. So, I’m glad that past Jo persevered. Now, it is here to stay. You might not want to use practices in your own supervision, which is fine, but I’d invite you to stay courageous with things you do to support the people you work with.

2) Practising the giving and receiving of compassion helps psychologists work more effectively
Caring professionals spend all day looking after other people. They normally consider themselves “compassionate”. Caring professionals are also are vulnerable to burn out, compassion fatigue and illness. They are humans, often working in unsustainable ways, in threat saturated systems. So, widening the concept of compassion to include three directions of flow lets us get a feel for what receiving compassion is like and opens up the potential for increased self compassion, over time. Like anything, the more you practice it, the easier it becomes. So, sessions on the Compassionate Cohort help participants to train the skills of receiving compassion and self compassion, so they are easier to access in daily work and life. Sometimes supervision can become managerial or “tick boxey”. However, at its heart supervision is a relationship, so there will always be opportunities to practice the giving and receiving of compassion.

3) Listening can be more helpful than talking
I am regularly described as “a good listener” and the perfectionist in me normally brushes this off (“it’s my job”). However, when fellow psychologists comment on my listening skills, multiple times in a week, it is probably time to take note. With The Compassionate Cohort I was so determined to make it a useful space I noticed an urge in me to “contribute” in early sessions. I had invited other psychologists to a novel model of supervision, which I had developed, so I wanted to “do good supervising”, “find the right question” and “show them I was helpful”. Luckily, I recognised this quickly and was able to channel my effort into thinking about what was actually going to be most helpful in interactions. Normally the wisest, courageous and most caring thing to do, was actually to let other group members contribute and lean into listening. The psychologist in me used to think that “questions were my super power”. Don’t get it twisted, they are a great tool in the toolbox, but I am connecting with the fact that supervision can benefit from listening just as much as questioning.

4) The urge to cancel supervision is natural...
I have been there - so many things to do - so little time. The faces of the people I have been working with pop into my mind, their stories, their context, their needs... all waiting for me to do something. So, I look at the diary and try to find extra time. Inevitably, my attention notices my supervision session. “That hour could be so useful... My supervisor wont mind?!” I start to bargain, “I probably don’t need the space this month...”, “I can be more useful if I don’t go”. This thought process is so common. I have seen it many psychological services that I have worked with (“I have so much work, I can’t make peer supervision this term”, “I don’t have time for my supervision session this month”). It is also something that supervisees have said to me over the years, normally after a session which I thought was very helpful (“it is so funny, I almost didn’t come today”). In The Compassionate Cohort we use models to understand the functions of emotional drives. The desire to make space and sacrifice yourself is a threat-based response. So, in sessions we can acknowledge it as human and try to avoid feeling shame. We can also focus on cultivating feelings of connection and safeness in sessions, to act as pull factors, when the diary Tetris is real and we feel the urge to cancel.

Learning is a process and I feel very lucky that I get to learn so much from the people I work with. I find reflecting on my work very helpful - I hope that by sharing my learning I can contribute to your own process.

Here are some links:

• If you are interested in participating in a compassion focussed supervision space

• If you’d like to learn more about The Compassionate Cohort or join a group.
  
  * As far as I know - and I have been looking! If you also run compassion focussed supervision for Educational Psychologists, please get in touch. It would be lovely to share experiences…