The client
In social work practice, a client system may be an individual, family, group, organization, or community. For an individual, key elements in his or her history are important to identify. Possible key elements for individuals include:
Gender, age, education level, family history, and mental health history
Client strengths, capacities, and resources
Client expectations and preferences for problems addressed, outcomes to be achieved, and modes of treatment
If the client system is a family, a community, or an agency, key characteristics of the group or the type of organization that are critical to the search need to be identified.
Possible key elements for client systems that involve more than one individual include:
Extended family kinship networks
Organizational structure of client system
Leadership of client system
Communication patterns for client system
Client system strengths, capacities, and resources
Client system expectations and preferences for problems addressed, outcomes to be achieved, and modes of intervention.
For all client systems, factors related to race, ethnicity, and other cultural variables should be considered for their relevance in the search. Possible factors include characteristics associated with social inequalities that may the client system’s present situation (i.e., age, race or ethnic background, disability, religion, income, insurance, etc.), as well as neighborhood context or other community variables.