Social work is a discipline that promotes development, cohesion and social transformation, including the individual strengthening of those who are part of a community.

Starting with a brief description of social work itself, in the following lines we will see what the functions of social workers are, what they do as professionals and how their performance has an impact on groups in vulnerable situations.

What is social work? A brief description

The history of social work is related to different processes that occurred in the mid-19th century. On the one hand, it emerges from needs detected by different vulnerable groups : drug addicts, dysfunctional families, abandoned elderly people, etc.

In particular, these needs were generated by the massive migratory processes and the growing urbanization, which made family and socio-health intervention indispensable. On the other hand, the origins of social work as an academic discipline are related to the gender and sexual division of the professions, specifically that which took place in sociological research and intervention.

In this sense, social work is a field of study and action linked to various tasks and branches of the social sciences, the humanities and community intervention . Therefore, it is an area that operates around concepts such as social justice, human rights, diversity, respect and equity, among others.

Based on the above, social work professionals have recognized different fields of action, as well as different functions, understood as the role played and recognized for those who practice a specific discipline . Next we will see what some of the functions of social workers are.

10 functions of social workers

Ballestero, A, Viscarret, J.J. and Úriz, M. J. (2013), carried out a nationwide study in Spain. They took as a reference the White Paper on Social Work and after carrying out surveys with Social Work professionals they summarized the functions of social workers in the 10 points that follow:

1. Prevent

The aim is to anticipate the possible causes of both individual and collective conflicts . This can be done through intervention projects that allow us to know the population context and the situations of social risk that arise, as well as the deficiencies and needs of the context itself.

2. Provide direct care

Acting with individuals or groups, whether they are at risk or already have a particular problem that is social in nature. The goal of direct care is to strengthen individual capacities so that it is the people themselves who face and respond to everyday social conflicts .

3. Planning

To carry out the interventions it is necessary to elaborate an action plan with concrete objectives and make explicit the process of analysis, as well as the possibilities of accompaniment and evaluation .

According to the authors, this can be done at both the micro-social and the macro-social level. The first is the design of interventions and projects, while the second is the design of programmes and the organisation of social services.

4. Teaching

While social work is composed of different theoretical and practical teachings, which are taught in a specialized manner in university centers, it is important to train academics for both undergraduate and graduate degrees in social work, and related areas.

5. Promoting promotion and social insertion

The aim is to carry out the necessary actions to restore or preserve both individual and collective self-determination and functioning . This can be done through the design and implementation of social policies that readjust access to the different services.

6. Supervise

Social work professionals can carry out supervisions to accompany the people responsible for implementing a particular programme, social policy or service. This involves putting into practice different knowledge and skills that accompany the professional performance of those responsible for providing the different social services.

7. Conducting evaluations

The aim is to consult and evaluate the results of the interventions, as well as to ascertain whether the programmed objectives have been met, and what needs remain to be satisfied . Likewise, it is a matter of assessing the methodologies used and detecting the relevant modifications.

8. Management role

Social workers can perform managerial tasks, which have to do with the responsibility for planning and organising both social centres and the specific programmes and services they provide.

9. Research

It consists of putting into practice methodological techniques that allow to evaluate and intervene with scientific rigor in the specific problems of a particular social group. Broadly speaking, this involves analysing, describing and explaining a specific reality, as well as establishing hypotheses that allow for appropriate intervention.

10. Coordinate

While the aim is to promote social change, many of the organizations where an intervention is carried out are organized in large groups. In this sense, it is a matter of specifying means, techniques and resources that allow for a line of intervention with common objectives and adapted to the needs of each group.

What the professionals in this field say

The results of the study carried out by Ballestero, Viscarret and Úriz (2013), show different trends in the daily tasks performed by the social workers surveyed. Professionals say that their main function is to help improve people’s lives , given that social work is a discipline focused on caring for others.

However, the study has detected the prevalence of functions that are increasingly oriented towards social management, planning and administration; which are combined with direct intervention. Likewise, professionals describe a scarce involvement in research activities. All of the above has led, according to the authors, to the prioritization of operational aspects centered on immediacy; and less focused on the process of reflection for intervention.

In this study, they carried out a multivariate analysis and found that, in daily practice, the functions of social workers correspond to four different professional profiles :

  • The profile of management-planning , with logistic functions at macro level (where 26% of the participants are located)
  • The profile of intervention for change , with functions of direct care and social diagnosis (corresponds to 24%)
  • The profile of care intervention , with direct care tasks combined with administrative-bureaucratic functions (41.1% of respondents).
  • The academic profile , with teaching and research (groups 9.4% of the participants)

The latter speaks of important transformations in the functions of social workers, and in the profession itself. Recently, social work has been directed at avoiding or overcoming dysfunctions that are systemic, with which, the management and planning of programs have an important weight . The initial objective, centred on the needs of the individual, participation and community, sometimes loses relevance. Likewise, the results speak of a growing specialization of the discipline where the functions begin to vary according to the space of development and concrete application.

Finally, the research invites further reflection on these aspects, which are relevant to the future of the profession and its important application in different social contexts.

Bibliographic references:

  • Ballestero, A., Viscarret, J. J., and Úriz, M. J. (2013). Professional functions of social workers in Spain. Cuadernos de Trabajo Social, 26(1): 127-138.
  • García Dauder, S. (2009). Jessie Taft. Symbolic interactionism, feminist theory and clinical social work. Social Work Today, 56: 145-156.