Social Work Interviewing Skills - Essay Example

The role that social workers play in improving the lives of socially challenged people cannot be undermined. Their responsibilities include working with specifically identified people from all ages who need support due to a wide range of dilemmas and guide them professionally to manage their own lives. In order for social workers to determine the scope and root cause of a client’s problem, they must have acquired the necessary skills to interview and solicit appropriate responses to enable them to apply uniquely designed interventions.

For this particular endeavor, a 15-minute interview with an adult client diagnosed to be addicted to cocaine was developed with the purpose of setting goals for the intervention with the client and assisting the client to develop his skills in problem solving. In this regard, this essay is written to discuss responses to the following questions: (1) how did information from the literature/research on goal setting and intervening inform the contents of your interview? (2) How did the purpose and profession of social work inform your practice in this interview (support your discussion with evidence from the literature and examples from the video)? And (3) how were your strengths and area for development as a social worker shown in the interview (provide examples).

The life of action requires more than analytical intelligence. It is not enough to have an idea and be able to evaluate its worth. Social workers are tasked with the responsibilities for the achievement of goals, the accomplishment of results, and the solution of problems. It is therefore a critical step to understand theoretical concepts underlying goal setting to serve the following purposes: assist social workers and clients in ensuring that they agree on the identified problems and “the changes that must occur to produce a suitable outcome”, to validate and empower the client through appropriate