Running head: THE CASE OF ANNA

The Case of Anna COUN 512: Lifespan Career Development Katie C. Pinney Seattle University October 30, 2013

THE CASE OF ANNA Anna is a Caucasian 27-year-old female with a bachelors degree in

Communication from Western Washington University. She is currently working towards her Masters degree in Student Development Administration at Seattle University and has three quarters left in her program. Anna appears to be open to the idea of career counseling and would like to use the service to her benefit as she nears the end of her graduate program. More specifically, Anna is experiencing anxiety around the job search process, which is approaching in the next quarter. Anna recently left her full time position within social services in order to focus more on school. She recently started working at Seattle University in the business schools career center as a graduate assistant. She also interns for about ten hours a week at a community college working in the Trio Center. Anna is originally from Salt Lake City, Utah and expressed growing up in a very sheltered life. When she graduated from high school, she moved to Bellingham, WA. She wanted to live in a more liberal area and one that had a very outdoorsy lifestyle, which she was passionate about. When she started at Western, she was undecided in terms of a major. She took a variety of electives and really thrived in a communication studies class. She was given the opportunity to co-teach the class the following semester and felt as if she really found her place in order to grow as an individual. She then decided to major in communication. Anna was very satisfied with her choice of major because she felt like she would have many options in terms of a job when she graduated. When she graduated in 2008, she moved to Seattle. The economy was in a bad state at that time and she was unable to find a job right away. She ended up taking up an internship at a theatre company to get some experience and build her resume. After the summer ended, the

THE CASE OF ANNA company discontinued her internship and she found herself jobless again. She moved

back to Bellingham because the cost of living was much lower, and worked at restaurants for the next two years. During this time, Anna was still continuing to apply and interview for jobs, but was not getting hired anywhere. She also spent her time volunteering in order to explore her interests and to continue building her resume. She volunteered for a non-profit called Educating Future Leaders in which she supported college students. This experience sprung her interest in working with students and is what prompted her to apply for graduate school. She applied at Seattle University and did not get accepted. This was very challenging for Anna to accept. But she did not give up. The following year, Anna replied to the program after networking with program faculty and students. She was accepted the second time and was very excited. She is now over half through her graduate program. Anna is in a relationship and lives with her partner. They met in college and have been together for seven years. Her partners sister passed away six months ago and his mother is battling cancer. Anna feels she has a lot going on in her life right now and is struggling to balance her various roles as a student and partner. She expressed that she does not practice self-care because of the lack of time in her life. She reported that balance and self care have always been important to her and since she feels these are lacking in her life right now, she is unhappy and stressed out. Finishing her graduate program is at the top of her priority list right now. She knows that being in school is temporary, yet very intense, but has decided to power through it. When asked what Annas dream job is, she had a difficult time answering it. She claims that she doesnt know what she wants to do and is feeling pressure from other

THE CASE OF ANNA students in her graduate program to be unique. She wants to work with students in some capacity and be surrounded by positive people. She is undecided about what kind of

institution she wants to work for, but is leaning towards community college or a four-year university. Because she is feeling pressure to choose a direction, Anna is getting fixated on choosing the right thing and feels like time is running out. Because she is graduating soon, she wants to decide on a particular job, but has many uncertainties about that right now. Additionally, she is worried about entering the world of work given her previous career related rejections. She is open about her lack of confidence and how that may be preventing her from being successful in the upcoming job search. This lack of confidence stems from being new to her profession and her lack of direct experience, especially in comparison to some of her classmates. Anna also fears that she will be unemployed due to her insecurities, and does not want to relive her previous experiences. Anna also struggles with insecurities in other areas of her life and worries about how she is perceived by others. Establishing Purpose/Strategies Anna reports a considerable amount of insecurity around searching for a job when she finishes her graduate program. She is worried that she will not offered any jobs that she applies for, or she will not be able to find a job that she is qualified for. She is also concerned that she will not match up to her competition, which she reports as the people in her program. She perceives them to each have a unique set of qualities and more experience in the field than she. Additionally, is having a difficult time identifying her unique skills and strengths as they relate to the career search process. Because she has

THE CASE OF ANNA been unemployed and experienced a very challenging job search process right after she received her bachelors, there is a lot of fear around that happening again.

In terms of her current work status, Anna is navigating between two different part time roles; an intern at a community college and an career advisor in the business school of a four-year university. She feels more supported by her supervisor at the community college and is intimidated by her supervisor at the university. She claims that her supervisor at the business school is really successful, smart and confident. She is happy to have the experience at both institutions because she claims is gives her more experience to have on her resume. In Annas current state, she doubts herself as a new professional in the field of student development. Her past experiences have lowered her confidence in her own abilities and skills as a professional, and she holds on to a lot of that in her current positions, and in the upcoming job search. Her feelings of inadequacy are draining in to her assistantship in the business school. She reports that she worries that she wont know what to do when she meets with students to discuss career services. Yet she states that she took this position because she felt she could help guide students given her rocky career past. Anna heavily relies on support from others to help her through tough situations. She likes to talk things through which she expressed in counseling many times. She needs support from her supervisor, which includes positive reinforcement, regular meetings, and positive conversations. She needs to know she is doing a good job otherwise she begins to doubt herself. Additionally, Anna needs to have high contact with the people she works with. If she works alone, she again begins to doubt herself and questions if she

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is doing something adequately. She has also stated that she likes working with on a team, so she can bounce ideas off of her team members. Anna doesnt believe that she is leader or has leadership skills. She associates the word leader with someone with high status and years of experience. Anna worries that it will take a long time before she can call herself a leader. Based on what she has explicitly and implicitly stated, Anna would like to focus on identifying her strengths and skills so she can have better language to market herself to employers. Additionally, in our counseling sessions, we focused on career assessments to guide Anna towards higher confidence and being able to name her strengths, skills and needs. In our sessions, I worked with Anna to interpret her assessment results as well as to help come up with strategies to build confidence in her as a professional. She tends to compare herself to classmates in her graduate program so it was important for her to identify how she is unique in order to help build up her confidence. Assessment Results Anna completed four career assessment instruments: Meyers Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI), Strong Interest Inventory (SII), Skills Scan, and the MyPlan Values Survey. Her type for the MBTI was ENFJ. As we dove deeper in to the interpretation of each of her preferences, Anna began to provide more information about who she is as individual. To start, Anna prefers to work in a team environment and bounce ideas off of others. She prefers to focus her attention on people and projects, which is a strong quality of an extrovert. She also finds joy in helping others, especially students in her professional role.

THE CASE OF ANNA Additionally, Annas focus is on future possibilities. In our sessions, she has indicated her anxiety around the job search and that finding the right fit is important to her. Anna prefers feeling over thinking to make decisions. She has expressed her difficulty in making decisions, but when she does she tends to turn inward and focus on what she find important before making a final call. Finally, Anna is very organized and likes to have control in her life, especially since beginning graduate school. While she would like to be considered more

spontaneous and go-with-the-flow, because she is juggling many roles, she must have a plan and feel in control. She felt reassured to hear about her type, although she was hesitate to agree that she is a leader. Based on her extrovert and intuitive type, she has the qualities of seeing the bigger picture and supporting others, which she agrees. Anna has difficulty with the word leader and leadership. She does not see her self as a leader, yet agrees that she possesses qualities that can be considered a leader. For the SII, Anna was coded as Social, Artistic, and Enterprising or SAE. She scored very high in Social, very high in Artistic and high in Enterprising. Her social code indicates that she has a strong interest in working with people, and on teams. She also likes helping and supporting others, and values community and service. For artistic as her second highest code, Anna has interest in being creative, whether that is in her work or at home. She has expressed that she was involved in theatre and performing arts as a child. Professionally, Anna tends to find creative ways to be artistic in her work. For her third highest code, Enterprising, Anna has interest in business, leadership, and management. She currently works in a business environment at the university. She has held a marketing

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position at a previous job, which also ties in to her artistic side. As an enterpriser, Anna is very influenced by strong leaders. She has expressed that she looks up to her current supervisor at the university because of how confident and smart she is. Initially, Anna was resistant to the idea that she was enterprising because of her dissonance with being a leader. After talking through this element, Anna began to understand and then agree with her enterprising side. In her graduate program, she is working towards becoming a leader through taking classes and gaining experience in both of her jobs. Once again, Anna is struggling with her image of being a leader. Annas skill scan indicated high proficiency skills in the relationship, creative, and leadership categories. This activity was very useful for Anna, especially helping her to identify skills in leadership. Anna gets stuck on words and the verbiage around leadership, and this activity helped to break it down in to smaller, more reasonable parts, such as having organization, and project management skills. In terms of relationship skills, Anna has high proficiency in providing care and support, facilitating groups, and demonstrating social sensitivity. She is utilizing these skills in her job at the community college, which gives her great pride. For Annas creative skills, she has high proficiency in creating images, visualizing, and brainstorming. There is a clear theme between Annas MBTI, SII and skill scan results. She has clear interests in the social areas including positions that include working with people, building relationships with students, supporting others, and feeling supported in her role. She has reported having interests in advocacy, social justice, and empowering students. By identifying these things, Anna has reassured herself that she is in the right field.

THE CASE OF ANNA The last assessment that Anna completed was the Values inventory on MyPlan. Anna had indicated that she didnt want to apply to just any job upon graduation, but wanted to apply to jobs that she would be happy in. I suggested completing this

assessment to organize and identify what is important to her at work in order to complete the full picture of her desires in a job. After completing the assessment, Annas top values were achievement, relationship, work conditions, support, independence, and recognition. Anna reported she had a great amount of difficulty completing this assessment because she felt like all 24 values were equally important. She also indicated that she was in a weird mood when she took the assessment. After interpreting her top six values, Anna realized that she agreed with her results much more than she had originally thought. Her top value, achievement, indicates that Anna is looking for something that will allow her to use her skills and abilities in order to achieve success in a position. She wants to position in which she can move up in her work place. At her graduate assistantship it is also important for Anna to build and maintain relationships with the people she works with, and in her case they are coworkers and students. For working conditions, Anna finds stability and security within her job very important. Because of her previous experiences with job rejection, this value is in is one of her top priorities. Next, Anna finds support at work very important to her, specifically from her supervisor. As mentioned earlier, Anna needs reassurance that she is performing well and seeks ways to improve. She seeks this out from her supervisors typically. Recognition is also important to Anna. She likes to be recognized for working hard and doing a good job. Finally, Anna finds independence important as well. While she has very low confidence

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her ability to be independent, she wants to be trusted that she will complete projects, and do well. Anna strongly prefers to work with others, but being independent is something she is striving for, which may be why it landed in her top six values. Anna has indicated that is it is important that she is able to use her skills at work. When her skills are not put to use, she feels bored and defeated. Anna is very high confidence in naming her skills, but lacks confidence in interests and personality. The skills scan activity was a good tool for Anna because it helped her to identify skills that she not only possesses, but wants to use in her next professional role as well as in her current positions. Anna was able to identify that she is not using her top skills at the university, which is leaving her feeling uneasy about her position within her department. She wants to use her skills in supporting students, and building relationships. She is still very new to the position and is using that as an excuse. I have encouraged her to communicate with her supervisor about ways to incorporate using her skills even as a new employee. At the community college, Anna has been able to make a lot of connections with staff and students, which is leaving her feeling very satisfied in her role. Creating bonds with students and her supervisor is really important to her. She has indicated that her supervisor is very supportive, and they have regular check ins which she likes. In their meetings, they talk about things beyond work, and he makes an effort to get to know Anna. In her assistantship role at the university, Anna doesnt feel like she is connecting with her new supervisor. Their meetings only consist of trainings. Anna would like to spend some time creating a connection with her supervisor.

THE CASE OF ANNA Next Steps After meeting with Anna, I have learned that she has clear concerns about the

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upcoming job search process. She has low confidence in herself and worries about being rejected. Throughout the three counseling sessions, Anna has made great progress towards identifying her strengths, skills, values, and personality with the help of the career assessments. These results have given her language in which I have encouraged her to draw upon when searching for the best fit job, as well as marketing herself through her resume and cover letter. Specifically, Anna has made some progress towards accepting herself as a leader in her current and future job positions. At the start of our counseling sessions, Anna was in complete denial that she possessed leadership skills and after identifying what skills those are, she lit up and got excited about this knowledge. She clearly struggles with the terminology that is associated with leadership. Through our counseling sessions, Anna is less apprehensive about maximizing her skills, particularly her leadership skills. Additionally, through these sessions, Anna has clearly reported her need for support from her supervisor, which she is not getting just yet at her assistantship position. I have encouraged Anna to bring an agenda to her meeting in which she identifies time to ask her supervisor important questions in order to get to know her better. Anna thinks this is a great idea that she will try soon. Anna clearly finds great value in talking to others so she felt that these counseling sessions were very useful. She was very open, perceptive, and willing to learn more about herself. She shared a lot about herself and really tried to narrow things down in terms of the job search. At the beginning of our sessions, she said that she felt pressured to fit in to

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a certain box. Since our sessions, she feels more confident about entering the job search with broader interests. She understands that she possesses very transferable skills, and she now recognizes this as a unique quality rather than a deficit. Evaluation As a student having taken the foundations counseling class already, it felt really great to be back in the counselors seat. Over the last six months, I have gained valuable experience as both an academic and career advisor. Within these roles and from the counseling class, I have learned very valuable skills of how to work with studentshelping them discern their future. The experience I had working with Anna was just that. While our counselor-client relationship lasted only three short sessions, I believe that I was able to help Anna move through a few of her issues and concerns she is facing in her career development process. When listening to our recordings, I felt confident in asking her very open-ended questions, and providing her with a sense of empathy, so she knew I was here to support her. I believe Anna trusted me because she was very open and willing to not only share her story, but to learn about herself. There were times in our sessions in which I wish I had more of an agenda because the conversation would stop and I was unsure of where to go next. I also know I could improve the way in which I ask questions. I need to be more direct and succinct in the way I ask. Finally, this experience in career counseling has really affirmed my passion for career development and working one on one with people in my own future profession. As a client in this process, I was a little bit more resistant to opening up to my counselor at first. I had never met him before this class and it was not until the third session in which I felt more relaxed. Even then, I still felt very vulnerable. But I was

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very willing to share information about my past experience and current concerns. There were things that clearly rose to the surface much faster than others, and honestly, they were things that I wasnt expecting. We talked a lot about my skills and I realized that I have less confidence in certain skills. After talking with the counselor, I realized that I tend to not give myself enough credit for my accomplishments and abilities as a person and professional. This was great to identify. I can really see the value in building a trusting relationship with the client as important and useful. If I am hesitant to open up in my first session, so may be many other clients, especially if they are experiencing some very tough situations regarding their career and personal lives. For me, talking with a counselor regarding my career was helpful. I have walked away with a better understanding of who I am, my capabilities, and with more confidence in myself.