External supervision offers health and social service practitioners’ opportunities for exploring their practice, professional development, and associated relationships. Within a context that is outside of the workplace, the relationship allegedly supports practice within the workplace. There is a range of understanding within the sectors about the relationship between supervisor and practitioner. This paper will sketch some current supervision approaches and practices, and explore the possibilities of relationship between the agency and supervisor. Reflecting on our own practice as supervisors both within agencies and as supervisors external to agencies, this paper invites readers (supervisors and practitioners) to draw on their own supervision experiences. The intention is to critique, challenge and support ways of developing useful and satisfying supervision arrangements for practitioners who have supervision external to their agencies.