A Client-Focused Definition of Social Work Practice

The 1958 working definition of social work practice highlights past and current paradoxes, competing interests, confusions, and mystifications in social work. Outcomes are not mentioned in this definition, reflecting the lack of attention to describing variations in services and their outcomes. This, as well as not clearly distinguishing between objectives selected based on what is good for society and what is valued by individual clients, reveals this definition not to be client focused. The definition downplayed social control functions of social work and controversies concerning how problems are defined. A definition that encourages practitioners to focus on their key responsibility—providing services most likely to help clients attain goals they value while considering others' interests—is needed. Current interest in describing variations in practice and their outcomes, attending to populations and individuals in the distribution of scarce resources, and increased Internet access to practice- and/or policy-related research findings may encourage such a definition.