“ Improving Diversity through

Supported Employment ”

The Employment specialist as a

tightrope walker between power and user involvementTonje Sanden Sannes

Øystein Spjelkavik

hosted by:

In association with:

• My intention:

Critical reflection about your mandate as an employment specialist

MOTIVATION

In order to balance adequately between power and user

involvement, it is necessary to have a high level of awareness and

also adequate knowledge

• What is critical reflection? • It is about understanding how knowledge in a

certain context is constructed and maintained• Through a deconstruction and a reconstruction

of power in our context as employment specialists, we can identify our assumptions about power and user involvement

• Age• Gender• Clothing• Ethical beliefs • Your perspective on the system

(alienating or strengthening?)

What is your political context and your formal role as an

employment specialist?

Power as a complicating factor

“This leads Foucault to point out that any form of knowledge, even knowledge of the self, is linked to a form of power: to a network of scientific discourse, knowledge, professions, institutions and practices, the function of which is to classify, normalize and regulate human behavior” (Burkitt 2008:86).

Checkmate?

• The job seeker’s power• The job seekers bear the

consequenses of the constructions

• Respect• Adequate knowledge

• User involvement• «I know you can do this»

• Inner motivation

• Critical reflection• What is your mandate as an

employment specialist?