Shine Sibanda

I am currently working as a team manager in children care and Care Leavers Team in Devon. My role is quite vast in that I manage a team of social workers and personal advisors and also train students but also directly work with young people. I enjoy all the different tasks especially the role of Practice Supervisor, being able to deploy a range of theoretically informed approaches to support the workers with emotionally and professionally complex dilemmas.

I completed my undergraduate degree in social work at the University of Bath (2016) and during my studies, I worked with alcohol and substance misusers, gaining an understanding of their addiction and the impact it has on their parenting. Then I went on to work for a charity called Home Start, supporting families who did not meet the threshold for social services. Prior to this I worked as an accountant, a completely different field to what I am doing now.

I started on the MA working with children young people and families: a psychoanalytic observational approach at the Tavistock and Portman in 2021. I am hoping to go on to study on the professional doctorate child and adolescent psychotherapy. I’m keen to widen my experience and understanding of young people especially unaccompanied asylum seekers. I want to gain a better understanding of risks and managing emotions during moments of uncertainty. My passion is developing others, creating a learning culture, promoting reflective thinking and building emotional resilience in the team. I believe that social workers need to keep learning and improving to meet the demands of the role.