From Burnout to Vicarious Resilience: A Literature Review on Practitioner Wellbeing in Social Work

Abstract

Social work and human service practice are characterised by high levels of emotional labour, systemic complexity, and frequent exposure to trauma. These conditions place practitioners at risk of burnout, compassion fatigue, and vicarious trauma, making self-care, resilience, and professional sustainability central concerns for the profession. This literature review critically examines how these concepts are understood, enacted, and contested in contemporary scholarship. The review begins by mapping conceptual foundations, defining self-care as intentional practices to sustain wellbeing, resilience as a dynamic capacity shaped by personal and contextual factors, and sustainability as the long-term ability to maintain ethical and effective practice. It traces the historical trajectory from early discourses of burnout to recent developments such as vicarious resilience and collective care.

The discussion highlights the ethical framing of self-care, the protective role of supervision and peer networks, and the contested nature of resilience, which has been critiqued for individualising responsibility within neoliberal contexts. Intersectional and decolonial perspectives are also examined, demonstrating how gender, culture, race, sexuality, and Indigenous knowledges shape practitioner wellbeing. An integrative framework is proposed, synthesising the literature across four levels: individual strategies, relational supports, organisational cultures, and systemic conditions. By situating practitioner wellbeing across these domains, the review argues for a holistic, justice-oriented approach to sustainability. The conclusion emphasises that self-care and resilience should not be framed as individual traits but as ethical and collective commitments that require organisational and systemic reform.

Keywords: practitioner wellbeing; vicarious resilience; social work; self-care; professional sustainability; emotional labour; burnout; critical social work; supervision; intersectionality.

Social work and human service practice are consistently described as professions marked by emotional intensity, systemic complexity, and ongoing exposure to human suffering. Practitioners are called upon to act as counsellors, advocates, educators, and agents of social change, often while navigating organisations shaped by managerialist reforms and neoliberal policy frameworks. As Chenoweth and McAuliffe (2024) observe, this dual role creates a constant tension between care and control, where workers must support clients while simultaneously implementing statutory requirements. Within this context, the risks of burnout, compassion fatigue, and vicarious trauma are significant, and the sustainability of the workforce becomes a pressing concern.

The concepts of self-care, resilience, and professional sustainability have therefore taken on increased importance in both scholarship and practice. Self-care has been defined as the deliberate actions taken to maintain wellbeing and prevent the negative effects of occupational stress (Newell and Nelson-Gardell, 2014). Resilience, though a contested term, is generally described as the dynamic capacity to adapt and recover in the face of adversity (Hernandez-Wolfe, 2018). Professional sustainability extends this further, referring to the long-term capacity of practitioners to maintain ethical, effective, and meaningful practice across the span of a career, despite systemic pressures and exposure to trauma (Beddoe and Maidment, 2015). These concepts overlap, but they also bring distinct emphases: self-care highlights the strategies individuals adopt, resilience captures adaptive capacity, and sustainability speaks to the broader trajectory of professional life.

At the same time, critical voices have questioned how these terms are mobilised. As Maidment (2016) points out, discourses of self-care and resilience can individualise responsibility, implying that practitioners should simply “cope better” with unsustainable conditions rather than addressing structural sources of stress. Similarly, Morley and O’Bree (2021) argue that under neoliberal managerialism, the rhetoric of resilience can be weaponised, shifting attention away from underfunding, risk cultures, and excessive workloads. These critiques suggest that any serious discussion of practitioner wellbeing must adopt a multi-level approach, situating self-care and resilience within relational, organisational, and policy contexts as well as individual practice.

The purpose of this review is to critically examine the literature on self-care, resilience, and professional sustainability in social work and human services. It draws together insights from professional codes, course materials, and contemporary scholarship to explore how practitioners can sustain themselves in the face of complex and demanding work. The review begins by mapping the conceptual foundations and historical development of these terms, before examining the emotional labour of practice and the risks it entails. It then considers self-care as an ethical responsibility, the protective role of supervision and peer support, and the dynamics of resilience and vicarious resilience. Finally, it explores intersectional dimensions, organisational and policy contexts, and future challenges such as digitalisation, climate change, and post-pandemic practice. By weaving together these perspectives, the review seeks not only to synthesise the literature but also to highlight opportunities for framing resilience and self-care in ways that resist neoliberal responsibilisation and foster sustainable, justice-oriented professional identities.

Conceptual Foundations

The literature on practitioner wellbeing in social work consistently circles around three interrelated concepts: self-care, resilience, and professional sustainability. Each has a distinct emphasis but together they form the backbone of current discussions on sustainable practice.

Self-care is often defined as the intentional activities that practitioners engage in to maintain their wellbeing and manage the demands of their work. As Newell and Nelson-Gardell (2014) explain, self-care includes physical, emotional, relational, and spiritual practices aimed at preventing stress-related harm. Importantly, self-care is not simply a private endeavour but is framed by professional codes as a matter of ethical obligation. The Australian Association of Social Workers Code of Ethics (AASW, 2020), for instance, identifies practitioner self-care as central to sustaining safe and ethical practice.

Resilience is a more contested concept. It has frequently been described as the dynamic capacity to adapt, recover, and even grow in the face of adversity. Hernandez-Wolfe (2018) positions resilience not as a fixed trait but as an evolving process that is shaped by relationships, context, and structural supports. Ungar (2019) similarly argues that resilience is best understood ecologically, reflecting the interaction between individual resources and environmental conditions. In this view, resilience extends beyond coping and involves the ability to sustain practice and purpose over time.

Professional sustainability brings the discussion to a broader plane. Beddoe and Maidment (2015) use the term to describe the long-term capacity of practitioners to maintain meaningful and ethical practice across their careers, despite systemic pressures and exposure to trauma. Sustainability integrates self-care and resilience but situates them within the larger trajectory of a professional life, emphasising the importance of organisational structures, supportive supervision, and enabling policy frameworks.

Theoretical Lenses

Several theoretical frameworks shape how self-care, resilience, and sustainability are interpreted in the literature. Ecological systems theory, first articulated by Bronfenbrenner (1979), remains influential, as it highlights the interaction between micro-level factors such as coping strategies and macro-level factors such as policy and funding structures. From this perspective, practitioner wellbeing is not reducible to individual behaviours but must be understood within complex and layered systems.

Critical social work also provides a valuable lens. Scholars such as Morley and O’Bree (2021) argue that neoliberal managerialism has co-opted the language of resilience and self-care, reframing them as individual responsibilities rather than collective or organisational ones. This perspective insists that discussions of practitioner wellbeing must address the structural conditions—such as austerity, workload intensification, and casualisation—that undermine sustainability.

Complementing these perspectives, trauma-informed and positive psychology approaches frame resilience as adaptive growth. Tedeschi and Calhoun (2004) introduced the concept of post-traumatic growth, which emphasises the potential for individuals to develop new strengths and insights after adversity. In social work, this aligns with the idea that practitioners may not only endure but also find renewed meaning in their work through reflective practice and supervision.

Finally, Indigenous and collective care perspectives challenge the dominance of Western, individualised approaches to wellbeing. Gray and Coates (2016) argue that Indigenous knowledges emphasise relationality, reciprocity, and community resilience, which provide alternative frameworks for sustaining practitioners. This resonates with the view advanced by Chenoweth and McAuliffe (2024) that social work must move beyond self-care as an isolated activity and consider collective and structural approaches to resilience.

Historical Trajectory

The ways in which practitioner wellbeing has been conceptualised have shifted over time. Early accounts in the profession often drew on the “wounded healer” motif, suggesting that personal experiences of hardship could both motivate entry into social work and create risks for burnout. By the 1980s and 1990s, research on burnout and compassion fatigue dominated, with Maslach (1981) developing the widely cited three-component model of burnout and Figley (1995) coining compassion fatigue as the “cost of caring.” These models framed practitioner stress primarily as an individual psychological response to emotionally demanding work.

In the early 2000s, resilience became a central focus, reframing the conversation toward adaptive capacity and strengths-based perspectives. However, as Maidment (2016) notes, resilience discourse was often criticised for masking structural contributors to practitioner stress by individualising responsibility. More recently, new concepts such as vicarious resilience have emerged. Hernandez-Wolfe (2018) highlights how practitioners can be positively influenced by witnessing clients’ strengths and coping strategies, experiencing growth and inspiration rather than only harm. Alongside this, Newcomb (2020) has emphasised collective care, positioning sustainability as a relational and organisational responsibility rather than an individual one.

This historical trajectory illustrates a shift from deficit-based models that emphasised pathology (burnout, fatigue) toward more dynamic, strength-based, and systemic approaches that better reflect the complexity of social work practice today.

Emotional Labour and Risks

The Nature of Emotional Labour

Social work is grounded in what Hochschild (1983) famously described as emotional labour, the management of one’s own feelings in order to meet the emotional needs of others. Unlike professions that primarily rely on external tools or technologies, social workers use the self as their central instrument of practice, engaging relationally through empathy, presence, and communication (Chenoweth and McAuliffe, 2024). This makes emotional labour both the essence of the profession and a key source of vulnerability. As Kinman and Grant (2011) point out, practitioners are expected to sustain authentic empathy while also containing and regulating their emotional responses, a balancing act that can become overwhelming when repeated over long periods. Moreover, the dual function of social work — combining caring support with statutory functions of monitoring and control — intensifies emotional strain (Stanford, 2010).

Risks to Practitioner Wellbeing

Three interrelated risks emerge consistently in the literature. The first is burnout, a syndrome first conceptualised by Maslach (1981) as comprising emotional exhaustion, depersonalisation, and reduced personal accomplishment. Burnout remains pervasive in social work, often driven by high caseloads, limited autonomy, and resource scarcity (Morley and O’Bree, 2021).

The second is vicarious trauma, or the transformation in a practitioner’s cognitive schemas that can result from prolonged exposure to clients’ traumatic experiences. Bride (2007) demonstrated that social workers working with survivors of violence frequently report symptoms akin to post-traumatic stress. This risk is reinforced by course readings, which emphasise that vicarious trauma is a normal occupational hazard rather than a personal failing, though it can be profoundly destabilising if unaddressed (Chenoweth and McAuliffe, 2024).

The third is compassion fatigue, a concept developed by Figley (1995) to capture the gradual erosion of empathic capacity through sustained exposure to suffering. Adams, Boscarino, and Figley (2006) argue that compassion fatigue represents the “cost of caring,” with consequences including diminished effectiveness, absenteeism, and early exit from the profession.

Structural Stressors

While early scholarship framed burnout and fatigue largely as individual conditions, contemporary writers insist on the importance of structural analysis. Neoliberal reforms and the rise of managerialism have transformed human services into environments characterised by competitive tendering, risk-averse cultures, and fragmented service delivery. Pease, Goldingay, Hosken, and Nipperess (2016) argue that these changes erode practitioner autonomy, forcing workers into bureaucratised routines that prioritise efficiency over relational care. As Morley and O’Bree (2021) observe, workers are often expected to embody resilience while operating within systems that actively undermine it, creating a paradoxical and unsustainable situation.

Ethical Stakes

The risks of emotional labour are not only personal but also ethical. The AASW Code of Ethics (2020) stresses that practitioners have a duty to maintain their own wellbeing to safeguard client welfare. A social worker struggling with burnout, vicarious trauma, or compassion fatigue is more likely to make poor judgments, detach from clients, or unintentionally cause harm. Conversely, sustaining practitioner wellbeing is essential for ethical decision-making, authentic relationships, and professional integrity. As Beddoe and Maidment (2015) emphasise, protecting the worker is inseparable from protecting the client, as the quality of care is only as strong as the practitioner who delivers it.

Self-Care as Ethical and Professional Responsibility

Self-Care as a Professional Imperative

In contemporary social work discourse, self-care is framed not as an optional luxury but as a professional imperative. The Australian Association of Social Workers Code of Ethics (AASW, 2020) explicitly identifies practitioner self-care as a responsibility tied to the delivery of safe, ethical, and competent practice. Similarly, the National Association of Social Workers in the United States recognises self-care as integral to ethical behaviour, situating it within the duty to protect client wellbeing (NASW, 2021). This framing signals a shift in professional identity: to neglect self-care is to risk undermining one’s professional obligations.

Strategies and Practices

The literature highlights a diverse range of strategies for self-care. Newell and Nelson-Gardell (2014) describe self-care as encompassing physical practices such as exercise and nutrition, psychological practices such as mindfulness and therapy, relational practices such as boundary-setting and nurturing personal connections, and spiritual practices that provide renewal and meaning. Grant and Kinman (2014) emphasise the role of work-life balance, arguing that cultivating a life outside work is critical for emotional sustainability. Spirituality and creativity have also been identified as important domains of self-care, with Canning, Lopez, and Kroth (2022) noting that engagement with faith, art, or nature can restore a sense of hope and perspective.

Course materials reinforce these points, outlining stress management techniques, journaling, and professional development activities such as supervision as vital elements of practitioner self-care (Chenoweth and McAuliffe, 2024). These strategies are not isolated acts but part of a broader process of sustaining the practitioner’s most important tool: the self.

Critical Perspectives

Despite widespread advocacy for self-care, critical scholars caution against reducing the issue to individual responsibility. Maidment (2016) argues that the rhetoric of self-care is often deployed within neoliberal frameworks to responsibilise workers, framing systemic failures as matters of personal inadequacy. Morley and O’Bree (2021) similarly highlight how the discourse of resilience and self-care can be weaponised in managerialist environments, where workers are expected to adapt endlessly to unreasonable conditions rather than challenge structural inequities. Such critiques remind us that self-care must be understood not only as an individual practice but also as an organisational and systemic concern.

Ethical Stakes

Framing self-care as an ethical obligation underscores its significance. As Beddoe and Maidment (2015) contend, practitioner wellbeing and client wellbeing are inseparable: the quality of practice depends on the health and integrity of the practitioner. A worker who is chronically exhausted, traumatised, or disengaged risks making ethically compromised decisions, reducing empathy, or inadvertently harming clients. Conversely, embedding self-care into professional identity enhances ethical capacity, promotes authentic relationships, and contributes to the long-term sustainability of the profession.

Professional Supervision and Peer Support

The Centrality of Supervision

Professional supervision is consistently identified as one of the most effective mechanisms for sustaining practitioner wellbeing. Beddoe and Maidment (2015) distinguish supervision from managerial oversight, emphasising its educative, supportive, and reflective functions. Whereas management often prioritises compliance and performance, professional supervision provides a protected space where workers can process complex emotions, critically reflect on practice, and develop professionally. Course readings reinforce this distinction, noting that supervision is first introduced in field education and should continue as a lifelong professional commitment (Chenoweth and McAuliffe, 2024). The AASW Code of Ethics (2020) explicitly positions supervision as an ethical obligation, underscoring its role in safeguarding both practitioners and clients.

Evidence of Impact

The effectiveness of supervision is well established. Carpenter, Webb, and Bostock (2015) found that high-quality supervision improves job satisfaction, reduces turnover, and enhances worker resilience. O’Donoghue and Engelbrecht (2021) argue that supervision enables practitioners to critically engage with the emotional labour of their work, mitigating risks such as vicarious trauma and compassion fatigue. Wilkins, Forrester, and Grant (2017) similarly demonstrate that reflective supervision strengthens ethical decision-making and directly contributes to improved outcomes for service users. Taken together, these studies affirm supervision as not merely supportive but central to sustainable and ethical practice.

Peer and Collegial Support

Beyond formal supervision, peer and collegial support provide additional layers of protection. Sicora (2017) introduces the notion of “critical friends” — colleagues who can offer both empathy and constructive challenge, fostering deeper reflection and accountability. Peer supervision groups have been shown to reduce feelings of isolation, promote collective problem-solving, and provide validation in contexts where formal supervision is inconsistent or unavailable. Course materials highlight the value of peer support networks, positioning them as integral to self-care and professional development (Chenoweth and McAuliffe, 2024).

Organisational Responsibility

Although supervision is often framed as an individual responsibility, it also reflects broader organisational commitments. Trauma-informed organisations recognise that reflective supervision is essential for both worker safety and service quality. Yet, as Morley and O’Bree (2021) note, managerialist priorities frequently marginalise supervision, treating it as expendable under conditions of resource scarcity. This structural neglect shifts responsibility back onto individuals, reinforcing neoliberal patterns of responsibilisation. For supervision to fulfil its potential, organisations must prioritise it as a structural norm, ensuring it is adequately resourced, protected from managerial encroachment, and embedded in professional cultures.

Ethical and Collective Dimensions

Supervision and peer support also carry ethical weight. As Beddoe and Maidment (2015) remind us, supervision safeguards the integrity of practice by creating space for workers to process ethical dilemmas, manage emotional labour, and maintain professional standards. At the collective level, peer support fosters solidarity and shared responsibility, countering the isolation and competitive individualism that neoliberal workplace cultures often impose. By positioning supervision and collegial support as both ethical imperatives and collective practices, the literature underscores their centrality to the sustainability of social work as a profession.

Resilience and Vicarious Resilience

Resilience in Professional Context

Resilience is one of the most frequently invoked concepts in discussions of practitioner wellbeing, yet it is also one of the most contested. Traditionally, resilience has been defined as the ability to adapt, recover, and maintain functioning in the face of adversity. Ungar (2019) expands this definition by positioning resilience as an ecological process shaped by both personal capacities and environmental resources. Within social work, this means resilience cannot be reduced to individual toughness or endurance, but must be understood in relation to relational supports, organisational structures, and wider socio-political contexts. Kinman and Grant (2011) emphasise that resilience is not about suppressing vulnerability but about developing adaptive strategies that enable practitioners to continue practicing effectively over time.

Critiques of Resilience Discourse

Although resilience is often celebrated as a protective factor, it has also been subject to significant critique. Maidment (2016) argues that resilience discourse has been co-opted by neoliberal ideologies, shifting responsibility for systemic failures onto individual workers who are expected to “bounce back” from untenable conditions. Morley and O’Bree (2021) similarly caution that resilience can be weaponised within managerialist frameworks, where structural stressors such as high caseloads, underfunding, and bureaucratic constraints remain unaddressed. These critiques highlight the need to approach resilience as both an individual capacity and a structural condition, resisting narratives that isolate responsibility at the personal level.

Vicarious Resilience

In contrast to deficit-focused models, the concept of vicarious resilience introduces a more hopeful perspective. Hernandez-Wolfe (2018) defines vicarious resilience as the positive transformation that practitioners can experience when they witness their clients’ strengths, coping strategies, and survival in the face of adversity. Rather than being diminished by exposure to trauma, workers may be inspired and enriched, developing greater empathy, meaning, and professional commitment. This idea has gained traction in recent years, offering a counterbalance to the focus on burnout and trauma. Course materials reinforce this perspective, noting that practitioners can draw strength from client narratives and may even experience growth through their work (Chenoweth and McAuliffe, 2024).

Post-Traumatic Growth and Positive Adaptation

The concept of vicarious resilience aligns with broader psychological literature on post-traumatic growth, first articulated by Tedeschi and Calhoun (2004). Post-traumatic growth refers to the positive psychological changes that emerge in the aftermath of struggle, such as increased relational depth, greater tolerance for ambiguity, and enhanced appreciation of life. In the context of social work, this means that engaging with trauma does not inevitably lead to depletion; it can also catalyse reflection, renewal, and deeper alignment with professional values.

Implications for Practice

Taken together, the literature suggests that resilience should be conceptualised not as stoicism or endless endurance, but as a dynamic process that is nurtured through reflection, supervision, and supportive environments. For emerging practitioners, resilience can be strengthened through field education, mentoring, and exposure to positive role models (Chenoweth and McAuliffe, 2024). For experienced workers, ongoing professional development and critical reflection are essential to sustaining resilience across a career. Importantly, authentic resilience acknowledges vulnerability and includes the capacity to seek support, establish boundaries, and engage in collective advocacy to challenge harmful structures.

Intersectionality and Diversity

The Importance of Intersectional Analysis

The concept of intersectionality was first introduced by Kimberlé Crenshaw (1989), who argued that people’s experiences are shaped not by a single axis of identity but by the overlapping systems of power they inhabit. Applying this lens to social work reminds us that practitioners do not experience resilience and risk in identical ways. Instead, their wellbeing is mediated by gender, race, culture, sexuality, disability, and class, which intersect to influence both vulnerabilities and protective resources.

Gendered Dimensions of Emotional Labour

As Elizabeth Manning (2003) has observed, social work is a feminised profession that carries cultural expectations of women as natural carers. This gendered framing intensifies the demands of emotional labour and often places women at greater risk of burnout and compassion fatigue. Gail Kinman and Louise Grant (2014) extend this argument by showing that women are not only expected to provide high levels of care but are frequently embedded in organisations that undervalue the very emotional competencies on which practice depends. For women from minority or migrant backgrounds, as Sophie Lewis (2020) points out, this creates a “double burden,” combining gendered expectations with systemic discrimination.

Race, Culture, and Professional Sustainability

The cultural dimensions of practice have also been highlighted in the work of Miu Chung Yan (2010), who shows that practitioners from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds often experience racism and microaggressions in the workplace, as well as additional pressure to act as cultural brokers. While these stressors can undermine sustainability, Yan also notes that many workers draw on strong community ties and culturally grounded coping strategies, which function as protective resources. These findings illustrate the importance of recognising diversity within resilience discourse.

Indigenous and Collective Care Perspectives

Bob Gray and John Coates (2016) provide a powerful critique of Western individualist models of self-care by drawing on Indigenous worldviews. They emphasise relationality, reciprocity, and collective care, framing resilience as a communal attribute rather than a personal trait. Their insights resonate with the arguments of Lesley Chenoweth and Donna McAuliffe (2024), who encourage social workers to adopt collective approaches that reflect interdependence and community values. Incorporating Indigenous perspectives not only broadens our understanding of resilience but also responds to the ethical imperative of decolonising social work practice.

LGBTQIA+ Practitioners and Other Marginalised Identities

Recent scholarship by Shelley Craig and colleagues (2021) highlights the distinct experiences of LGBTQIA+ practitioners, who may face discrimination or pressure to conceal their identities within organisational settings. These stressors, when combined with the emotional labour of practice, heighten risks of burnout and fatigue. Similarly, practitioners with disabilities or caring responsibilities may encounter systemic barriers such as limited access to flexible work arrangements or supervision opportunities. These patterns reveal that resilience cannot be meaningfully discussed without attention to structural inequities.

Implications of Intersectional Approaches

Taken together, these contributions demonstrate that generic models of self-care and resilience are insufficient. Intersectional approaches insist that strategies must be tailored to practitioners’ lived realities and structural positions. This requires culturally responsive supervision, equity-focused organisational policies, and deliberate efforts to challenge sexism, racism, homophobia, and ableism within professional environments. Embedding intersectionality into discussions of practitioner wellbeing produces not only a more nuanced account of resilience but also a socially just framework for sustainability in social work.

Organisational and Policy Dimensions

Organisational Culture and Its Contradictions

When we look at the organisational settings in which most social workers are employed, what stands out is the tension between values and structures. Michael Lipsky (1980), in his classic work on “street-level bureaucracy,” argued that human service professionals work within systems characterised by ambiguous goals, limited resources, and constant pressures from competing stakeholders. More recently, Yeheskel Hasenfeld (2010) described human service organisations as unique precisely because their “raw material” is people, which makes outcomes difficult to measure and interventions inherently uncertain. Within this environment, culture becomes a key determinant of sustainability. Robbins, Judge, and Millett (2008) describe organisational culture as a “system of shared meaning” that profoundly influences how staff experience their work. For social workers, cultures that prioritise risk management and efficiency over reflection and care can amplify stress, while supportive, trauma-informed cultures can foster resilience.

Managerialism and Neoliberalism

Over the past three decades, scholars such as Bob Pease, Susan Goldingay, Lesley Hosken, and Susan Nipperess (2016) have charted the rise of managerialism in human services. They argue that the shift to competitive tendering, performance auditing, and market-based approaches has fragmented services, increased casualisation, and undermined practitioner autonomy. Donna Morley and Margaret O’Bree (2021) extend this critique, observing that neoliberal discourses encourage practitioners to embody resilience and self-care as personal traits, while masking the structural drivers of burnout such as underfunding and excessive workloads. This dynamic not only intensifies stress but also risks distorting professional values, replacing social justice commitments with managerial priorities.

Policy Environments and Structural Pressures

Policy frameworks themselves are deeply implicated in shaping practitioner wellbeing. In Australia, for example, the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) has been celebrated for expanding choice but critiqued for creating precarious working conditions and intensifying bureaucratic oversight (Carey, Malbon, and Olney, 2018). In child protection, Karen Healy and Ros Gray (2013) point out that statutory requirements frequently leave workers balancing the impossible task of safeguarding children while working in under-resourced systems. These pressures contribute to what Stanford (2010) has called the “care-control paradox,” where practitioners are expected to care for clients while also enforcing surveillance and compliance.

Ethical and Professional Consequences

The organisational and policy environment has direct ethical consequences. When supervision is deprioritised, caseloads are inflated, and resources are scarce, practitioners face heightened risks of error, detachment, and burnout. Beddoe and Maidment (2015) argue that sustainability must therefore be understood not simply as an individual issue but as a systemic one. Embedding trauma-informed policies, ensuring reflective supervision, and resisting the dominance of managerialist discourses are essential steps in protecting both practitioners and clients. The challenge, as Chenoweth and McAuliffe (2024) note, is to negotiate the organisational “maze” in ways that preserve professional values of care, dignity, and justice.

Future Directions and Emerging Issues

Digital Technologies and E-Professionalism

One of the most significant shifts in recent years has been the rise of digital practice. As Lesley Chenoweth and Donna McAuliffe (2024) explain, social workers now increasingly rely on digital platforms for supervision, professional learning, and client engagement. This creates both opportunities and risks. On the one hand, online supervision and peer networks can expand access to support, especially for rural and remote practitioners. On the other hand, issues of surveillance, privacy, and blurred professional boundaries have raised concerns about what Sue Nissen (2021) refers to as “e-professionalism.” For sustainability, practitioners will need to balance the benefits of digital connection with strategies to maintain boundaries and protect wellbeing in increasingly online work environments.

Globalisation and the Post-Pandemic Landscape

The COVID-19 pandemic has laid bare the vulnerabilities of human service systems worldwide. Scholars such as Michael Reisch (2021) have argued that the pandemic intensified structural inequalities, placing frontline social workers under unprecedented strain while also revealing their adaptability and commitment. In the Australian context, Chenoweth and McAuliffe (2024) highlight how practitioners were required to rapidly pivot to online services, manage heightened grief and loss, and address rising levels of social isolation. Beyond the pandemic, globalisation continues to reshape practice through increased migration, cultural diversity, and the cross-border exchange of ideas. These shifts demand a globally literate profession, capable of sustaining itself while responding to rapidly changing conditions.

Climate Change and Eco-Social Work

Climate change has emerged as both a social justice issue and a pressing frontier for social work. The International Federation of Social Workers (2022) has called for an eco-social approach that integrates environmental justice with human wellbeing. In Australia, Pease (2017) has argued that climate-related disasters such as bushfires and floods not only impact communities but also place enormous emotional demands on practitioners who provide crisis intervention and long-term recovery support. The implications for sustainability are profound: as environmental crises intensify, practitioners will need new frameworks of resilience that address not just personal wellbeing but also collective, planetary health.

Consumer Voice and Participation

Another emerging theme is the growing emphasis on service user voice and participation. As Morley and O’Bree (2021) note, the expansion of consumer advocacy groups has shifted expectations of practice, with clients increasingly seen not just as recipients of services but as co-designers and co-producers. Hernandez-Wolfe (2018) connects this to vicarious resilience, suggesting that practitioners who witness the strengths and agency of clients may themselves find renewed meaning and hope. Embedding consumer voice into organisational structures can therefore function as a protective factor for workers, reinforcing the sense that their efforts align with values of dignity, empowerment, and justice.

Preparing for the Future

Looking ahead, sustainability in social work will require a readiness to embrace complexity. As Tedeschi and Calhoun (2004) argued in their work on post-traumatic growth, adversity can generate new insights and strengths if processed reflectively. Applied to social work, this suggests that the challenges of digitalisation, globalisation, and climate change can also catalyse innovation and renewal. The task for the profession is to ensure that resilience is not individualised but embedded in supportive supervision, inclusive organisational cultures, and responsive policies. By framing resilience as collective, ethical, and future-focused, social work can sustain itself in an increasingly turbulent world.

Integrative Framework for Practitioner Sustainability

Purpose of Integration

The literature reviewed reveals that discussions of self-care, resilience, and sustainability are often fragmented — some emphasise individual strategies, others highlight organisational structures, while critical scholars stress systemic reform. What is missing, as Beddoe and Maidment (2015) suggest, is a holistic view that recognises how these levels interact. An integrative framework does not propose a brand-new theory, but rather draws existing insights together into a coherent model that practitioners, educators, and policymakers can use to guide thinking.

Multi-Level Dimensions

An integrated reading of the literature suggests four interrelated levels at which practitioner wellbeing must be understood:

• Individual: strategies such as self-care routines, mindfulness, reflective practice, and boundary-setting (Newell and Nelson-Gardell, 2014; Grant and Kinman, 2014).

• Relational: the protective role of supervision, mentoring, and peer networks that provide validation and critical reflection (Beddoe and Maidment, 2015; Sicora, 2017).

• Organisational: trauma-informed cultures, supportive policies, manageable caseloads, and a commitment to professional values rather than narrow managerial targets (Hasenfeld, 2010; Morley and O’Bree, 2021).

• Systemic: broader policy environments, neoliberal restructuring, and global challenges such as climate change and digitalisation, all of which shape the conditions of practice (Pease et al., 2016; IFSW, 2022).

Ethical Thread

Running through each of these levels is an ethical imperative. As the AASW Code of Ethics (2020) makes clear, practitioner wellbeing is inseparable from client safety and professional integrity. Positioning self-care and resilience as ethical matters shifts them from the private realm into the professional domain, affirming that sustainability is a collective concern of the profession.

A Way Forward

This integrative framework is not presented as a new theory, but as a synthesis of existing scholarship that highlights the interdependence of individual, relational, organisational, and systemic domains. It offers a way of seeing the literature as a whole, and it underscores that sustainable practice requires attention at all levels simultaneously. By recognising these connections, social work can move beyond fragmented debates and situate practitioner wellbeing at the heart of ethical, just, and future-ready practice.

Conclusion

This review has examined the interconnected themes of self-care, resilience, and professional sustainability within social work and human services. The literature demonstrates that social work is a profession deeply characterised by emotional labour, where practitioners use the self as their central tool of practice. Such work carries profound risks, including burnout, vicarious trauma, and compassion fatigue, which threaten not only practitioner wellbeing but also the ethical quality of client care. While strategies such as self-care practices, supervision, and resilience-building are consistently identified as protective, the evidence is clear that these cannot be reduced to matters of individual responsibility.

Instead, sustainability must be understood as multi-level. At the individual level, deliberate acts of self-care and reflective practice remain important. At the relational level, supervision, mentoring, and peer networks provide essential validation and accountability. At the organisational level, cultures shaped by trauma-informed approaches, manageable caseloads, and supportive leadership determine whether workers can flourish or flounder. At the systemic level, neoliberal reforms, funding structures, and global challenges such as digitalisation, climate change, and pandemics fundamentally shape the conditions of practice. As Pease and colleagues (2016) and Morley and O’Bree (2021) remind us, resilience discourse must always be accompanied by a critique of these broader structures, otherwise it risks being weaponised to responsibilise individuals for systemic failures.

The review also highlighted the importance of intersectional and decolonial perspectives. As Crenshaw (1989) and Gray and Coates (2016) argue, identity and culture profoundly shape both risks and resources, while Indigenous and collective care perspectives challenge Western individualist framings of wellbeing. Embedding these approaches not only enriches theoretical understanding but also aligns with the ethical imperative to advance social justice and decolonise social work practice.

Taken together, the literature points to an integrative framework in which practitioner sustainability is shaped by the interplay of individual, relational, organisational, and systemic domains. Framing self-care and resilience as ethical, collective, and justice-oriented concerns enables the profession to move beyond fragmented debates and reaffirm its core values. For educators, this means embedding resilience-building and reflective practice in professional preparation. For organisations, it requires investing in supervision, valuing relational work, and resisting the dominance of managerialist discourses. For policymakers, it calls for structural reforms that reduce precariousness and uphold human dignity.

Sustainable social work practice, then, is not about cultivating endless endurance in individual workers but about creating conditions in which resilience can thrive collectively. In this way, the wellbeing of practitioners is inseparable from the wellbeing of clients, communities, and the profession itself. By recognising and addressing these interdependencies, social work can sustain its ethical commitments and continue to act as a force for justice in an increasingly complex and turbulent world.

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