Career Counselling En
CAREERCOUNSELLINGCOMPENDIUM OF METHODS AND TECHNIQUESEdited byMihai JIGĂUBucharest, 2007
Authors:Mihai JIGĂU, Ph.DLuminiţa TĂSICA, Ph.DAngela MUSCĂ, Ph.DMihaela CHIRUPetre BOTNARIUCIrina COZMASperanţa ŢIBUOther contributors to this Compendium:Carmen AVRAMESCUBogdana BURSUCLuminiţa DANEŞAdina IGNATGabriela LEMENIMarcela MARCINSCHI CĂLINECIAndreea-Diana MĂRUŢESCUDomnica PETROVAIMihaela PORUMBAndreea SZILAGYI, Ph.DAuthors are responsible for the scientific content of their articles and use of sourcesTranslation: Fides Limbi Străine SRLProofreading: Mihaela CHIRU LA ROCHEPublisher: AFIRISBN 973-7714-29-6This publication is financed by the European Commission. The content of thisbook does not necessarily reflect the position of the European Commission.Copyright Institute of Educational Sciences, Euroguidance – Romania
INDEXIntroduction (Mihai JIGĂU).5Methodological Aspects (Mihai JIGĂU).9Holland’s Inventories (SDS) (Mihai JIGĂU).27Kuder Occupational Interest Survey(KOIS) (Mihai JIGĂU).43Canadian Occupational Interest Inventory (COII) (Mihai JIGĂU) .57Strong Interest Inventory (SII) (Mihai JIGĂU).65Jackson Vocational Interest Survey (JVIS) (Mihai JIGĂU).71Cognitive Information Processing (CIP) (Mihai JIGĂU).85General Aptitude Tests Battery (GATB) (Mihai JIGĂU) . 101Psychological Tests Battery for Cognitive Aptitudes (BTPAC) (Mihaela PORUMB) . 111Card Sorting (Gabriela LEMENI, Mihaela PORUMB) . 129Curriculum Vitae (Angela MUSCĂ) . 145Presentation Letter (Angela MUSCĂ) . 157Values Clarification (Angela MUSCĂ). 165Competence Screening (Angela MUSCĂ). 179SWOT Analysis (Luminiţa TĂSICA). 193Interview (Andreea SZILAGYI) . 207Autobiography and Self-characterization (Adina IGNAT) . 221Computer-based Self-assessment (Petre BOTNARIUC). 235Narration (Mihaela CHIRU) . 249Critical Incident (Mihaela CHIRU). 259Observation (Andreea-Diana MĂRUŢESCU). 269Investigation (Luminiţa TĂSICA) . 281Case Study (Speranţa ŢIBU). 2913
Focus Group (Irina COZMA) . 305Group Discussion (Irina COZMA). 319Computer-assisted Information and Guidance (Petre BOTNARIUC). 335Brainstorming in Counselling (Speranţa ŢIBU) . 353Telephone Counselling (Mihaela CHIRU). 365Multicultural Counselling (Petre BOTNARIUC). 375Metaphor in Counselling (Gabriela LEMENI, Carmen AVRAMESCU) . 391Mass-media in Counselling (Luminiţa TĂSICA) . 407Problem Solving (Domnica PETROVAI, Bogdana BURSUC) . 419Decision Making Techniques (Mihaela CHIRU). 435Career Planning and Development (Irina COZMA). 447Curricular Area Counselling and Guidance (Angela MUSCĂ, Speranţa ŢIBU). 461Real Game (Andreea-Diana MĂRUŢESCU) . 481Student Record (Luminiţa TĂSICA, Marcela MARCINSCHI CĂLINECI). 497Scenario (Luminiţa TĂSICA) . 515Role-play (Angela MUSCĂ). 529Simulation (Luminiţa TĂSICA). 539Personal Project (Mihaela CHIRU). 549Occupational Profile (Luminiţa TĂSICA). 557Education Fair (Marcela MARCINSCHI CĂLINECI). 569Job Club (Luminiţa DANEŞ). 585Organisation of Professional Congresses, Conferences and Seminars (Mihai JIGĂU) . 5994
IntroductionMihai JIGĂUInstitute of Educational Sciences, BucharestThis Compendium of methods and techniques employed in career counselling aimsto be a synthetic presentation of the main instruments of the information, counselling andguidance practice.Such a work (alongside others introducing the legal framework, the objectives and tasksof counsellors, the ethical code and the quality standards in the guidance practice,information and communication technology in career counselling, the characteristics ofadult counselling, distance counselling, evaluating counsellors and counselling bodies,key competences of practitioners, counselling as education, etc.), is a milestone ofprofessional maturity in the field.It is to be expected that on review of this work, career counsellors should be able to: easily identify the methods and techniques that are most appropriate to thespecificity of their work, most adequate to the client categories they workwith and the problems that the latter face; choose – in awareness and by comparison – those counselling tools that haveappropriated qualities for the identification of interests, aptitude systems,personality features, etc. of the clients involved, and on implementation andresult interpretation, facilitate clients’ decision making regarding their career,suggest alternative occupational pathways, support the creation of anindividual career development plan, help understand the world of work andsocial and economic relations, enhance a successful start with the social andprofessional life; identify the evaluative qualities and the limits of professional counselling andguidance instruments;5
act professionally, ethically and qualitatively in the examinations, evaluationsand interpretations required by the particular counselling situations.European policies in the lifelong learning field reconfirm the essential importance ofinformation, counselling and guidance services in the process of “facilitating the access tothe education and continuing training offer” and of supporting the positive entering ofsocial and professional life for young people and adults. In this sense it is necessary tocreate a culture of open, transparent, comprehensible dialogue resulting in a practical gainfor both the clients and the employers. At the same time, these services must be providedinsistently and persuasively so that any person should have the opportunity of learningand training throughout their lifetime and benefit from equal opportunities on the labourmarket (special attention should be given to groups threatened by social and jobexclusion), stimulate social cohesion, encourage private initiative and assist theimprovement of beneficiary’s lifestyle.Counsellors who work in information, counselling and guidance institutions will makerecourse to the information and communication technologies to facilitate the access totheir services of as many clients as possible, will work in close cooperation with the localemployers and the community, endeavouring that their services should be up to date,connected to clients’ needs, to their systems of qualifications and interests, and to thedynamics of the local, regional, national and European social and economic development.While selecting the methods and techniques for this Compendium, we held in mind thefollowing issues: the practical value of the method or technique for the field of counselling; solid, rational, logical theoretical base, grounded on rigorous and systematicempirical research; the existence of standards adapted to the social, cultural and economicspecificity of the population or the possibility to easily adapt these instrumentto the practice prevalent in our country; facile use and quick results, comprehensible for client and counsellor; the extent to which the method or technique are is widespread in careercounselling in our country and internationally; the diversity of information sources, direct access to the reference materialabout the working method or technique.At the same time, the selection process is concerned with aspects such as:6 the consensus or majority vote of the authors team and their closecollaborators; the result of polls among counselling practitioners regarding the instrumentsthey employ in practice or have requested to use.
In the choice of instruments, the following practical considerations are of someimportance: adapting the instrument to the category of clients requesting counsellingservices and to the specificity of their problems; mastering in detail all the technical and methodological aspects required forthe administration of the instruments, scoring and interpretation of results; being acquainted with the social, cultural and economic environment of theclients, as well as with other characteristics pertaining to their gender,education, residence; knowing the context in which the instrument intended for use was developedbefore deciding for its applicability; the comprehensibility of the general structure, procedural friendliness,statistical support, availability of standards and scoring scales; the extent to which the instrument offers the information needed by theclients in their career development.The main questions that counsellors should ask when deciding upon the purchase,adaptation and use of tests are the following: To what purpose were the tests developed? What do they claim to measure? What target groups are they recommended for? What types of items / tasks does the test employ for evaluation? Does the test come with an administration and scoring manual? Does the test include standards and scoring scales for assessing the results? Is the test easy to use and the result interpretation comprehensible andtransparent for the beneficiaries? Are there data regarding the test’s reliability and validity? Are there copyright provisions? What are the costs? Who are the authors of the test?Another category of problems that such a work may encounter is related to themethodological systematisation, categorization, taxonomy of models and techniques usedin the practice of career counselling. It is known that extremely diverse objectives,criteria, indicators might be applied to the process.In their daily activity the counsellors develop their own working style based on theirpreferences regarding the methods and techniques; on the other hand they must usecertain methods and techniques adequate to the categories of clients and to the categoriesof problems raised.7
In general, the sources of information / purchase of the instruments / questionnaires /tests, etc. used in career counselling are: specialized publishing houses commercialising psychological investigationtools; publications (journals, books, other sources on the Internet); copies from the originals in universities (used experimentally for research); direct purchase from the source of the free use rights (through professionalorganizations, libraries, peer counsellors); purchasing the reference instruments and the rights of translation, adaptation,re-sampling and use (by institutes and universities) with their own funding orthrough various projects and programmes; elaborating original instruments at the national level as a result of researchactivity carried in institutes and universities.It must be said that it is forbidden to use psychological instruments protected by thecopyright act without the permission of the authors or publishers. Access to theseinstruments is granted on the condition of purchasing the rights to adapt and use in fullcompliance with the laws, orders and provisions of the Regulations of professionalassociations in the field.Besides the legislation, there are ethical principles that regulate the professional use ofmethods and techniques specific to career counselling and the counsellors behaviour inrelation to them.The present Compendium is a methodological handbook and also a professionalstatement of coherence, synergy and continuity in the work of career counselling, ascientific and systematic approach to the field and a way of supporting high qualityservice of information, counselling and guidance.We hope this Compendium to be a useful instrument both for the undergraduatespreparing to become counsellors, professors teaching this course and counsellingpractitioners in the fields of education, employment, youth work, law enforcement,healthcare, military and others and who are known as careers advisors, schoolcounsellors, educational and vocational guidance counsellors, employment officers, etc.8
Methodological AspectsMihai JIGĂUInstitute of Educational Sciences, BucharestCareer counselling is a global approach to individuals under all aspects of their personal,professional and social life; it consists in providing information, counselling and guidanceservices with a view to supporting each and every person – in any stage of their life – inthe development of their own career through decision-making as regards to education,work, and community life.The domain of career counselling has known success and recoil of using variousassessment methods and techniques (in the beginning mostly psychological tests,currently mostly questionnaires and inventories of interests, preferences, aptitudes,attitudes and values). In the dawn of educational and vocational guidance in Romania wecan identify a psychometric phase, followed by an educational phase, and by thecontemporary phase related to cognitive information management and processing, havingthe holistic career approach ethics and quality at its core.In career counselling we identify helpful methods among tests, questionnaires orinventories concerning: aptitudes (intellectual, verbal, numerical, reasoning, reaction speed, specialtalents, etc.); personality; interests and special needs; values and attitudes; assessment of academic acquisitions (learning skills and methods); interpersonal relations;9
self-image; decision-making; career development (training for decision-making); special categories of population.Tests are a means to objective and systematic measurement / assessment of certainbehavioural elements (in either areas: aptitudes, personality, attitudes, knowledge) ofindividuals, based on their answers to certain work-related tasks. These fixed sequencesof personal characteristics investigated are considered relevant to defining and identifyingthe respective aspects in human subjects.Standardized inventories are also means of measuring behavioural segments, in which thesubject’s answers are not judged as right or wrong, but compared against those of otherindividuals taken to be a group norm (Brown and Brooks, 1991).In practice, it has been shown that in most cases counsellors use inventories of interestsand skills rather than psychological performance and personality tests. In fact, the balancebetween one type of instruments and the other stems from the role assumed bycounsellors: whether it is centred in supporting clients with their career development anddecision-making, or in interpreting information for what is considered to be their clients’best interest. As it can be noticed, the ends are the same, but the means different in eachof the two situations described.Here are what psychological inventories and tests can identify with respect to careercounselling: areas of interest / preference in the sphere of occupations; skills, abilities, aptitudes, as well as levels of performance required in variousoccupational areas; aspects of personality compatible with certain occupational fields; possible causes of dissatisfaction or lack of progress in the case of people onthe job; personal blockage and stereotypes in decision-making in the clients’occupational field.Interposing tests and inventories between counsellor and client is not devoid of criticism.The most pertinent criticisms refer to the following:10 counselling does not necessarily involve testing; test results distort the relationship between counsellor and client; tests increase client dependency on external decision-making orself-evaluation, self-management, self governed social and professionalinsertion;
tests are not infallible and are often “responsible” for cultural and genderlabelling; some results of psychological tests and inventories have a negative impact oncertain categories of clients, in a manner that can discourage, debilitate theirself-image instead of improving it, etc.Nevertheless, many of the observations above target the inappropriate use of test andinventory results and not the instruments themselves.It is therefore up to the counsellor to choose the appropriate tests and inventories for eachparticular client according to the type of problems raised, the way the instruments areused and especially to the interpretation of the results, as well as to the ethical andprofessional standards of practice.After all, a counsellor employs certain tests and inventories to help clients get to knowthemselves, self-assess their personal resources, enable them for decision and planningtheir own careers. In other words, the assessment instruments can help clients with: awareness of personal aptitudes, ability, skills or knowledge; choosing education and training pathways in accordance with their projectsand results regarding their career in given life contexts; identifying occupational alternatives complementary to their structure ofinterests, aptitudes and dominant personality traits; drawing up a positive and realistic self-image; identifying the causes, the nature and the amplitude of barriers in theiroccupational area; preparing for decision-making and autonomous career planning development; compensating the gap in information, incomplete or erroneous informationand diminishing the stereotypes regarding the world of work; identifying possible sources of professional dissatisfaction, social misfit ordifficulty in carrying relationships and role performing.Counsellors employ psychological tests and inventories mainly in two cases: they wish to save time when busy with many clients; they attempt to compensate the lack of information in the case of new clients.A counsellor can obtain sufficient information about clients on a first meeting through theinterview that usually takes place in such circumstances. This is true in case of peoplefamiliar with counselling; in these situations, evaluation by psychological tests andinventories is uneconomic in terms of time, relevant information gained, and costs.Other clients directly and explicitly request assessment with psychological tests andmight not have an accurate self-image or ongoing projects for career development. Such11
people can express unrealistic expectations regarding the testing, as well as regarding thecounsellors themselves.In special cases, counsellors make use of tests or inventories in order to “break the ice” inthe communication with certain clients or in following meetings as supplementaryarguments to help them come to a decision: choose an education way or select anoccupation.Client priorities are the benchmark concerning whether to employ or not certain testsand/or inventories.Even more important than the administration of the psychological tests or inventories isthe interpretation of the outcomes they produce.Here are broadly the steps that a counsellor must make sure to have taken: choosing the most appropriate instrument which can have maximum impacton solving the problems of the client; making sure the subjects understand the purpose of the test and/or inventoryabout to the applied, the tasks that need completion, the filling out procedure,the reasonable expectations to have in relation to the testing; checking that subjects offer all required data; taking notes about the behaviour of the clients while sitting in the test; rigorously checking the answers, consulting with the answer page, encoding,adding up results (for subtests); accurately reporting performance to standards; reviewing the data obtained and preparing the client for the interpretations ofthe results (during the same appointment but preferably in the next session).Here are a few questions for the client that can be asked by the counsellorbefore the interpretation of the results: What do you think about the test?What do you think was your performance? What did you think of the testingconditions? What questions stood out? Can I clarify anything for you?; obtaining the necessary information in order to understand the performancewith respect to the client’s real life (level of education, social and culturalenvironment, gender status, personality traits, etc.; the same score does notautomatically mean the same irrespective of the client); integrating all the information on the client (education, family, personalexperience, etc.) in a dynamic, realistic interpretation, related to the client’sreal life, which should make sense and have the a proactive value; at the same time, during the interpretation itself, the counsellor must: 12actively involve the client in attributing meaning to the results (e.g.“With mechanic interests you scored very high and with artistic
interests below average. Why do you think this is the case?”), avoid a highly specialized language in explanations, technical termsthat could be unknown or wrongly / vaguely perceived by the client, have an attitude of well-meaning neutrality and not “beautify” theresults at certain subtests: some subjects may be astonished by thecapacity of the test and of the counsellor to reveal very personal thingsin their life or may be offended by certain failures (“The difficulty andthe discomfort of interpreting low performance or negative results isthe problem of the counsellor and not of the client” (Tinsley andBradley, 1986), be aware of the client’s attitude towards the “ability” of thepsychological tests to “solve” personal issues, support them so that theclients’ expectations are realistic (for instance the client may have anexaggerated faith in the test to provide miraculous results or solutions;the counsellor may encounter scepticism or negativity due todifficulties in introspection or as a defence mechanism, etc.).Practice has proved that in career counselling, guidance and information the clientsrequest and accept a comprehensive approach to their problems and do not focus onchoosing an occupation. This makes counsellors admit the fact – which is natural, in fact– that people consider the different roles they perform simultaneously and/or alternativelythroughout their lives to make up a continuum they get involved in completely, with theirentire being and all aspects of their personality. For these reasons, the counsellors mustunderstand the intra-personal interactions triggered by performing various roles by anindividual in a concrete life situation.Technical, basic information accompanying any quality psychological test refers to: reliability: lack of measurement errors in psychological evaluation, assessedby the internal consistency of the test and stability in time of the scoresobtained when the test is re-applied; the reliability coefficient (which in mostquality tests ranges between 0.80-0.90) is estimated through: internal consistency of the instrument, resulting from a statisticalcalculus of correlation and assessed to be high if all tasks / items ofthe test prove to measure the same psychological variable; the checkcan also be performed by applying test halves and calculating thecorrelation coefficients of the scores of the two halves of the test, stability in time of the performance obtained by the client, whichimplies testing-retesting after a certain interval (the two halves mustcontain the same number of items and a similar degree of difficulty,and the selection can be performed by selecting the items numbered13
with odd numbers for instance; a stability coefficient of the scores isconsidered to be better the closer it is to 1; validity: it is the most important quality of a test and refers to adapting thecontents of the test to the problem under investigation (in other words, is theaffirmative answer to the following question: does the test truly measurewhat it intends / claims to be measuring?). This quality of a test isindispensable because in many situations the direct measurement of one’spsychological characteristics is not possible (e.g. interests, attitudes,personality traits, etc.).There are three main categories of validity tests: content validity: refers to the proportion of items in the test that aresignificant / relevant to cover the objective of the psychologicalmeasurement (the most frequent cases are the scholar tests), criterion validity refers to providing a proof / prediction with respectto the existence of a relationship between the test results and a certaintype of behaviour, taken as a criterion (e.g.: if we are to evaluatework performance, we should include in the respective test thoseitems that will make sure that we are evaluating precisely the aspectsthat define the respective criterion); two types of criterion validity areidentified in that case: predictive and concurrent, function of thetemporal relationship between the test results and the confirmation inreality of the measurements made, construct validity refers to the degree in which a test through itsitems measures a certain psychological trait which we wish toevaluate (the construct / concept reflects in this case theoperationalisation of a theoretical psychological framework based onwhich the test is developed).A synthetic table regarding the types of validity, their purpose and theprocedures to determine the respective coefficients (Bezanson, Monsebraatenand Pigeon, 1990) is presented below:Validity typecontentscriterion14predictivePurposeto establish whether the scoresoffer a correct assessment ofperformance in a set of tasksto establish the potential of thescores to anticipate futureperformanceProcedurelogical comparison of items tobe evaluatedapplyingtheinventory,making use of the results toanticipate future performance,retestingandcomparingpredictions with new results
constructconcurrentto establish whether scoresallow an estimate of currentperformanceconvergentto verify if scales (of the tests,inventories) are linked to othersimilar ones with the sametheoretical fundamentto verify if scales (of the tests,inventories) are different fromsimilar ones in dobtaining direct measure oftargeted performance, makinga comparisonassessing the degree in whichthe scales are correlated withsimilar ones regarding thetheoretical approachassessing the degree in whichthe scales are correlated withsimilar ones from differenttheoretical approach objectivity: refers to that quality of the test that allows for similar resultswith different operators (tests relatively “immune” to the subjectivity of thescore-marker are multiple-choice questions, such as true / false orpre-formulated answers); the practical value of the test refers to its appropriateness in everydaypsychological evaluation: economical (re-usable materials: grid format, thetest itself, apparatus, textbooks, answer sheets), reduced duration ofapplication, easy to understand by subjects of the filling-out instructions,quick scoring and straightforward interpretation pathways).In general, the authors of professional psychological assessment instruments offer alongwith the test all the data regarding the characteristics of the population on which thescoring standards were elaborated (gender, age, education, etc.), as well as statisticalinformation and commentaries considered to be relevant with respect to the main qualityfeatures of the tests (reliability, validity, etc.).As regards the people whom are subjected to psychological tests, inventories,questionnaires, etc., the counsellor performs the assessment in order to find out what theycan do (due to their innate personal qualities or prior learning) and what they would liketo do (interests, moti
adult counselling, distance counselling, evaluating counsellors and counselling bodies, key competences of practitioners, counselling as education, etc.), is a milestone of professional maturity in the field. It is to be expected that on review of this work, career counsellors should be able to: easily identify the methods and techniques .
Unit 8: Continuing Personal Development in Counselling 57 Unit 9: Human Development in Relation to Counselling 63 Unit 10: Client Work in Therapeutic Counselling 69 Unit 11: Counselling for Loss and Grief 75 Unit 12: Counselling Clients Who Have Experienced Abuse 81 Unit 13: Counselling Young People 87 Unit 14: Relationship Counselling 93
Counselling is used in a variety of situations: psychological counselling, career counselling, legal counselling, etc., and has to do with engaging and assisting people facing a specific problem, to solve the problem or identify the acceptable coping mechanism. Despite there is not a single definition of "counselling",
a variety of therapeutic models is provided in our books Practical Counselling Skills (Geldard and Geldard, 2005, available in the UK and Europe) and Basic Personal Counselling (Geldard and Geldard, 2012, available in Australia and New Zealand). Counselling young people involves different demands from those encountered when counselling adults. By making use of a very wide range of counselling .
Counselling Card 4. Importance of exclusive breastfeeding during the first 6 months Counselling Card 5. Breastfeed on demand, both day and night (8 to 12 times) to build up your breast milk supply Counselling Card 6. Breastfeeding Positions Counselling Card 7. Good Attachment Counselling Card 8. Feeding a low birth weight baby Counselling Card 9.
Counselling Basics Counselling-Introduction. Definitions purpose. Counselling in Medicine and Psychiatry. Counselling Methods and Techniques – Information giving, Client – centred counseling. Problem solving counseling. Cognitive-behavioural approaches. Interpersonal counseling. Psychodynamic counseling. Crisis counseling.
counselling, according to site, are practised. Clinic-based counselling is counselling provided in a formal session— ina hospital, health centre or clinic—by a trained professional, such as a doctor, social worker, nurse or psychologist. Community-based counselling is given in a non-fo
MODULE 4 GROUP COUNSELLING. School of Distance Education Counselling Psychology Page 4 MODULE 1 DEFINITIONS OF COUNSELLING Counselling is a process by means of which the helper expresses care and concern towards the pers
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