My ASYE Year

Social worker writing notes at a desk

This practice highlight looks back at my Assessed and Supported Year in Employment (ASYE) as a newly qualified social worker. It was a year of learning how to balance risk, recording, relationships and my own emotions, while building confidence in frontline practice.

All examples are anonymised and details have been changed to protect confidentiality.

The purpose of ASYE

The ASYE year is designed to give newly qualified social workers a structured transition from student to practitioner. In theory, it offers:

A slightly reduced caseload compared to experienced workers
Regular, protected supervision and reflective sessions
Extra learning and development opportunities
A clear framework for reviewing progress and competence

In reality, pressures in services mean the year can still feel intense. Even so, having a recognised period where learning and support are named as priorities made a real difference.

Early months: finding my feet

The first few months of ASYE felt like an extension of my final placement, but with more responsibility. I was:

Holding my own cases, with managerial oversight
Completing assessments from start to finish
Leading some visits and meetings rather than just observing
Learning how to manage my diary and workload with less direction

I remember the mixture of pride at being trusted with real work and fear of making mistakes. Supervision and informal support from colleagues were essential during this time.

Building confidence with assessments and visits

One of the biggest learning areas was completing assessments and visits more independently.

Over the year I became more confident in:

Planning visits with clear purposes, not just turning up and seeing what happens
Explaining my role and reasons for involvement in a clear, honest way
Asking open questions and allowing silence, rather than rushing to fill gaps
Noticing both strengths and worries, including what was not being said
Bringing observations and information together into a balanced assessment

Feedback from supervision helped me see where my analysis was developing and where I needed to deepen my thinking.

Managing risk and uncertainty

Another central part of the ASYE year was learning to live with uncertainty. Many situations did not have simple answers. I had to make decisions with incomplete information, while thinking about children’s safety and rights.

This involved:

Using supervision to talk through risk, not just to report actions
Being honest when I felt out of my depth and needed guidance
Learning to use tools like chronologies, genograms and mapping to see patterns over time
Understanding local thresholds and legal frameworks more clearly
Accepting that some decisions would always feel uncomfortable, even when they were necessary

The aim was never to work alone, but to contribute actively to shared decision making.

Recording and time management

Recording took up more time than I first expected. It was not just a case of typing quickly; it required thought and care.

During ASYE, I worked on:

Writing records that were clear, respectful and understandable to families
Recording not only what happened but what I thought it meant and what needed to happen next
Keeping up with timescales for visits, reviews and plans
Blocking out recording time in my diary so it did not always slip to the end of the day

Good recording helped me feel more on top of my work and made supervision discussions more grounded.

Emotional impact and self-care

The emotional side of ASYE was as important as the technical side. I was exposed to stories of neglect, abuse, poverty and loss, sometimes several times in one day.

Some things that helped me cope included:

Using supervision to talk honestly about how the work was affecting me
Talking to trusted colleagues after difficult visits or meetings
Allowing myself to feel upset or moved, without seeing this as unprofessional
Setting small boundaries, like trying to finish at a reasonable time on most days and not checking emails late at night
Doing ordinary, grounding things outside work such as walks, time with family or hobbies

I learned that looking after myself was not a luxury; it was part of practising safely.

Support and supervision during ASYE

The quality of supervision and wider support made a huge difference to my experience.

What I found most helpful was:

Having regular, protected one-to-one supervision sessions
Using supervision for reflection, not just updates and tasks
Being encouraged to bring pieces of recording, direct work and ethical dilemmas for discussion
Having access to group learning sessions with other ASYE workers
Receiving specific, constructive feedback rather than only general comments

This support helped me notice progress over time, not just what still needed work.

Key learning by the end of the year

By the end of my ASYE year, I did not feel like an expert, but I did feel more like a social worker and less like a student.

Some of the key things I had learned were:

Confidence grows from doing the work, reflecting on it and doing it again, not from waiting until you feel ready
Asking for help early is a sign of responsibility, not weakness
Good social work is a team effort, involving families, colleagues and other professionals
It is possible to hold both care and curiosity, empathy and boundaries at the same time
Mistakes and difficult days will happen; what matters is how you respond and learn from them

Looking forward

ASYE is only the beginning of a social work career, but it is an important foundation. It gave me:

A first chance to build my own style of practice within a supported framework
A clearer sense of my strengths and areas for development
Experience of managing a caseload, even with extra support
Confidence that I could be part of complex work while still learning

In future posts, I hope to share more detailed reflections on specific parts of the ASYE year, including supervision, direct work and managing workload, in case they are helpful for other newly qualified workers.