The BEST thing to FIRST do to get yourself ready to face these questions? Know the Code. What does the Code do? It will tell you. Six things:
- The Code identifies core values on which social work’s mission is based.
- The Code summarizes broad ethical principles that reflect the profession’s core values and establishes a set of specific ethical standards that should be used to guide social work practice.
- The Code is designed to help social workers identify relevant considerations when professional obligations conflict or ethical uncertainties arise.
- The Code provides ethical standards to which the general public can hold the social work profession accountable.
- The Code socializes practitioners new to the field to social work’s mission, values, ethical principles, and ethical standards.
- The Code articulates standards that the social work profession itself can use to assess whether social workers have engaged in unethical conduct. NASW has formal procedures to adjudicate ethics complaints filed against its members.* In subscribing to this Code, social workers are required to cooperate in its implementation, participate in NASW adjudication proceedings, and abide by any NASW disciplinary rulings or sanctions based on it.
Here's the Code, three different ways. Take your pick!
- On the NASW website: https://www.socialworkers.org/pubs/code/code.asp
- Printable PDF (U of Texas): https://socialwork.utexas.edu/dl/files/academic-programs/other/nasw-code-of-ethics.pdf
- In Spanish (also on the NASW website): https://www.socialworkers.org/pubs/code/code.asp