IDENTIFYING PEOPLE WHO NEED COUNSELING

- May 26, 2021

2.1 IDENTIFYING PEOPLE WHO NEED COUNSELING

While developing the skills required to be a successful counselor is important, it is also important that you have the necessary skills to identify those who need counseling help and when they need help.

· They are not solving problems that they can solve on their own.

· They are unusually troubled, tensed or anxious

· Their behaviour has changed noticeably

· They seem unaware of the consequences of their behaviour

· They are not responding to usual motivators

· Their behaviour is self-defeating or self-destructive

· They are not mobilizing their energies

· They are not making necessary decision

· Their thinking is clouded

· Misunderstandings and negative perceptions

· Performance problem

Source : Grace College (2021)

2.2 TYPE OF COUNSELING

Directive Counselling

In directive counselling, the counselor hears the employee’s emotional problem, decide what the employee should do and then tells and motivate him to do it. Focuses on the counselor as judge and advisor.

Non-Directive Counselling

Non-Directive Counselling is just the opposite of directive counselling. This counselling technique is a client-oriented process. Non-directive counseling is a process of skillful listening and encouraging the counselee to explain emotional problems, understand them and determine appropriate solutions.

This type of counseling is generally use by the professional counselors

Co-operative Counseling

Both directive and non-directive counselling suffer from a lot of limitations. Directive Counselling is not generally accepted by the employees and non-directive counselling is very expensive and is generally used by professional counsellors. Another method generally used by organizations is in between these two extremes. Cooperative counselling is more practically applicable and more readily suitable to managerial attitude and temperament than the other two.

2.3 THE PHASES OF COUNSELING PROCESS

Source : slideshare (2013)

Phase	Counselor’s Task	Client’s Task
I	Understanding	Defining : Describing the problems as it currently appears
II	Challenging	Re-Defining : The problem in a way that allows a solution to be found
II	Resourcing	Managing the problem, finding the resources needed to implement the solution

Phase I

In phase, it is very important for the client to clearly define the problem as he or she currently perceives it. It is the responsibility of the counsellor to see and understand the problem as the client sees it and this requires certain skills and attitudes on the part of the counsellor.

· Active listening and Empathy

The counsellor needs to lean forward maintain eye contact and actively listen in order to understand the problem as the client sees it. It is important that the counsellor uses verbal and non-verbal communication to encourage the client to freely express his problem.

· Respect

The ability to show respect to your client is one important skill that a counsellor should develop. Open-mindedness, ensuring confidentiality, being honest, and trustworthy are all important qualities of a good counsellor.

· Genuineness and sincerity

· Tolerance

Phase II

In phase II the counsellor will challenge the client to reconsider his perception of the situation in order to re-define the problem. Finding the resources needed to implement the solution. this involves re-defining and re-stating the problem in a way that allows a solution to the problem. This process achieves a shift in thinking. The counsellor needs to probe and penetrate the issues so that you can both arrive at a clearer understanding of the real situation as opposed to the perceived one.

Challenges that a counsellor might face in Phase II

· They do not question their own motives

· They do not realize that their own behaviour is betraying them

· They get stuck in particular emotion.(E.g. anger, self-pity)

· They say things, which are not true

· They contradict themselves

· They are ignorant of elementary facts

Counsellor-Skills required for Phase II

· Active listening

· Ability to summarize and see the big picture

· Advising skill – Avoiding direct advising and giving the client the direction.

· Skilful Confronting or challenging

· Probing skills

Phase III

Phase III involves in developing different options or alternative courses of action to overcome the problem. Here the counsellor will offer the assistance that is needed to solve the problem. Whenever possible the counsellor will allow the client to draw his or her own resources and strengths and acts as a guide or a friend.

Steps involved in Phase III

1. Develop Alternatives.

2. Shift through them and ascertain the pros and cons of each.

3. Choose the best alternative or mix of alternatives.

4. Resource the alternatives. (assistance that may be required to implement the solution)

5. Priorities the selected alternatives.

6. Develop and action plan for implementation.

7. Set long-range goals and intermediate targets to be reached.

8. Determine ways of measuring the client’s progress at each stage.

Counsellor – Skills requires for Phase III

· Coaching Skills

· Advising Skills (Advice when asked for and sharing your own experiences in similar situation)

· Providing Feed back

· Referring (You have to sometimes refer your client to other for help)

2.4 PRACTICAL CONSIDERATIONS IN COUNSELING

· Responsibility of Counseling

Individual line managers should take the responsibility of counseling employees who have minor emotional or performance related problems

· Length and Number of Sessions.

Counseling sessions provide the real settings to solve the emotional problems of the employees and the duration of such sessions may vary, from 40 minutes to 75 minutes.

The spacing of the counseling sessions helps the client to consolidate the gains that have accumulated.

· Time and Place of Sessions.

When fixing the time and place of counseling sessions you should consider important factors such as suitability of time and place to both the parties, non-conflict with the timings of normal duties, secrecy , and so on.

Session should be of interest to both parties and therefore it should be arranged by mutual consent and convenience.

· Need for keeping Confidence.

It is important that the client feels confident to discuss matters freely with the counselor and whatever should be kept confidential between the two of them are kept in strict confidence. The success of the counseling session will depend on how much confidence can he command from the client.

Reference

Slideshare (2013) Counselling processing. Slideshare [online] available at https://www.slideshare.net/praveensureshpai/counseling-process Accessed on May 26, 2021

Grace College (2021) 4 Popular mental Health counseling theories from grace college. Grace College [online] available at https://online.grace.edu/news/masters/mental-health-counselor-theories/ Accessed on May 26, 2021