Dyson Engineer Sandra Lup’s when she was interviewed by Bustle gave this advice to women in STEM fields (which stands for science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) fields is to “Be inquisitive, step outside your comfort zone, and find good role models”
To be honest- that’s bloody brilliant advise to just about anybody- especially Social Work practitioners. Without curiosity bad, really bad things happen- Serious Case Reviews proves this. Its so funny and a running joke with Social Workers that when you do- you are doomed and when you don’t you are even double doomed. Thus, if you assess a child as being really suffering or at risk of suffering significant harm- and then act accordingly and find alternative carers for her or him- you are vilified as an unfeeling evil and awful person. Yet , its also true the same knife cuts even more blunter when you don’t. Then, something really dreadful happens. Then you now have the hard hand of the law falling hard on you- proper doomed in fact.
Therefore, practicing Social Work calls for guts. It calls for total confidence and courage to do the right thing even when it looks and feels wrong. Yesterday a friend sent me a caption “what feels illegal, but isn’t? Before I read the answer- my Social Worker brain was all over the shore thinking- removing a child from a risky situation, or even probably putting down boundaries to a child– Nope,
the simply but super true answer was “Leaving work on time”
Off for my walk.. have a brilliant day 🙂