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Social Work Counselling

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 SOCIAL WORK COUNSELING

LOREDANA DROBOT

Introduction

The social worker, psychologist, theologian, pedagogue can provide

counseling for clients and even organizational counseling, if they are trained
for such interventions. Achieving effcient counseling can be effective
without the training of the person who is performing the counseling in an
organized form of learning and personal development, over a period of at
least two years (basic training) and at least two years of supervision; some
schools of psychotherapy and counseling promote the idea of permanent
supervision, as long as the counselor and psychotherapist work with clients.
Training providers are institutions, accredited professional associations,
which provide training courses and personal development in a certain
therapeutic orientation. Such associations in Romania are accredited by the
College of Psychologists of Romania, Romanian Federation of
Psychotherapy and the College of Social Workers in Romania. To work in
counseling, psychotherapy with another person requires appropriate training.
Counseling has several names in literature: request for advice, the advice of
a priest, a tip from the best friend, etc.. but here we are referring to that
specialised help offered by a person trained in a school of counseling and
psychotherapy.
Psychological counseling has certain features which differentiates it
from other forms of counseling, for example psychological counseling,
educational. The social worker who intends to form counseling
competencies is likely to become a specialist in various segments of social
intervention. If we start from the premise that the social worker and social
pedagogue can fulfill the role of the activator, coordinator of personal
development groups, then it is necessary to acquire and to practice
counseling skills, competencies and skills that are common to the
psychologist, physician and theologian.
2 Social Work Counseling

Methods and Techniques

Counselling is a relationship, often between two people but
sometimes between a number of individuals or group and another person
named group counselor. Regardless of the location, the counseling
relationship is a special form of communication. Key aspects of
counseling are (Hough M, 2010, p. 2) :
- involves a relationship that is based on support;
- it is based on the principles of empowerment of the client;
- is based on confidentiality
- helps clients to identify their own resources.
Psychological counseling differs from other activities through the
following (idem.p.2):
- other aid relationships involve advices but counseling does not offer
advice;
- other aid relationships do not have delimiting boundaries unlike
counseling;
- there may exist, in other aid relationships, conflicts of interest;
- other relationships may provide more sympathy than empathy;
- in counseling there is an absence of mutual expectations, the
counselor is there to help the client and does not expect to receive back the
help ;
- counselors do not impose conditions to clients.
Counseling can take many forms: individual, couple or family
counseling, in organizations etc. The locations in which the counseling
takes place varies from private offices to organizations. Over time a
variety of counseling content was identified but three major approaches
have attracted attention: analytical, humanistic and behavioural.
Counseling helps people (Sutton J., Stewart W., 2008, p.4):
- to clarify what is important in their lives;
- to make contact with their internal resources;
- to explore their feelings, thoughts and set specific goals;
- to have support in times of crisis;
- to have support in development and transitional periods;
- to integrate childhood experiences;
- to reach to a solution for the problems they face.
To carry out effective work in any field it is necessary to be
competent. Professional competence is the ability to apply, transfer and
combine knowledge and skills necessary to perform activities at work, at a
quality level specified in an occupational standard. To be competent in a
profession involves:
 Loredana Drobot 3

- effectively applying specialized knowledge;

- to analyze and make decisions;
- to use creativity;
- to collaborate with other colleagues;
- to deal with the unexpected situations etc.
Elements of competence are key activities, subdivisions of the
activity described in the unit of competency from the standard of
professional training with relevant and quantifiable results.
Realization criteria are the quality benchmarks associated with
the results from the elements of competence and it is considered to be met
when the elements of competence are made correctly and independently
by the trainees.
Skills needed by counselors can not be learned together with
techniques because they have an impact on the one hand, on “the pupil”
and on the other hand, upon the specialist in his connexions. The problem
of selecting skills and strategies used appears in the social contacts of the
specialist (family, friends) but also in the relationships with clients. The
emotional response given by a specialist after learning skills follows a
repetitive cycle (Culley S., Bond T.,2006, pp.11-12):
(1) unconscious incompetence – the learning cycle is started in a
total state of ignorance in regard to communication and responses to other
people. Actions like “listening” and to ”answering” are raw, the counselor
and therapist do not take into consideration the consequences of these
actions;
(2) conscious incompetence – this stage marks the beginning of
awareness of the communication process. This process is not always a
pleasant one and is characterized by confusion and feelings that
accompany a loss or, to the contrary, prevail the feelings of joy. At this
point, the specialist achieves the potential development of skills and the
potential offered by these new skills;
(3) conscious competence - some skills are easy to learn, while
others are more difficult to interpret. In this case, the specialist will call the
supervisor and will make use of audio and video records for additional
information;
(4) unconscious competence - the cycle is completed when the
trainee has sufficient confidence in the acquired skills, applying them
naturally in their relationships with clients.
At this point, the therapist's process of learning skills is modified
by the following cycle of stages:
● to make - as a technique properly implemented only if it
reached the level of competence “good enough”;
4 Social Work Counseling

● to experience – stage that is characterized by the experiential

learning in the development of the therapeutic relationship because it
involves the specialist’s feelings and thoughts;
● to assess - the stage where the specialist seeks explanations for
the manifestations of the client and also for himself;
● to refine - the stage is witch the results of the client are adjusted
by the specialist according to other factors and other data about the client.

Discussion and Results

Counseling skills are required for any person who provides emotional
support to a friend, colleague, client or personal development group.
However, proper use of counseling skills requires the clarification of
objectives that are needed to be met. Instead, formal counseling is
recognized as having a professional role and refers to the specialist practices
in the field. The following table shows the difference between psychological
counseling and other forms of counseling.

Psychological counseling Other forms of counseling

The role of Tries to minimize or
the counselor avoid conflicts and
ambiguity.
Authority Does not possess
managerial or formal
authority on the client.
Contact In counseling, there is an
explicit agreement that
includes clarity and
privacy.
Time Is planned and protected
against possible
interruptions.
Professional There is a guide of
support professional ethics or a
supervision.
Process The counselor uses
ethical guides with the
need for regular
supervision in order to
develop the quality of
services offered.
Combines providing support
with other roles; can cause
role conflicts or ambiguity.
Can have managerial or
formal authority over the
client.
Skills are used spontaneously
and privacy is not defined.
It is not planned and is a
spontaneous response to a
request for help.
Assists clients to make their
own decisions.
It provides advice, coaching
for the client.
 Loredana Drobot 5

Focalization The specialist has double
focalization and is
required to take into
account the context in
which aid is provided.
The client is the center and
the context provides a
perspective of evaluating
both the client and counselor.

Table nr. 1 Differences between psychological

counseling and other forms of counseling.
Source S.Culley, T.Bond, 2006.p.6

Counseling skills can be very important because they are helpfull in getting
information, giving the counselor a position from where he can influence the
interviewer. The starting point in emphasizing ethics comes from the client, the
client's ethical expectations that seem simple at first glance. Usually, the client’s
ethical expectations refer to: the trust invested in the specialist, the respect received
from counselor and counselor’s competence:
• confidence – involves a certain risk from the
client who asks for help and protection of personal information which is disclosed
by the client. To ensure the integrity of the relationship, the counselor and client
will check if they have the same objectives in solving the problem;
• respect - refers to the willingness to accept
and capitalize the differences between people. The counselor will work to raise the
self-esteem of the client, stating that he is a person who deserves respect. The
counselor is challenged in his practice to try to understand and accept the
differences between people, rather than to judge people who seem strange;
• competence - requires proper use of
information, of the counselor’s knowledge. The counselor will avoid to experiment
with the client the unknown techniques in its professional formation or to use
skills in solving their own problems.

Psychosynthesis as a Method used in Counseling

In his formulation, Assagioli created, deliberately, an open system which gives the
counselors and psychotherapists the opportunity to create their own style of
intervention and action. Assagioli preferred to present a vision and to encourage the
exploration of a variety of ways and methods, than to provide a finished product or
a doctrine. Thus, the counselor has the responsibility of choosing an appropriate
counseling technique. Work can be of any type - physical, emotional, mental,
imaginative - and the counselor must master all these methods in order to have a
wide range of techniques available.
6 Social Work Counseling

Assagioli (1974, pp. 82-86)conceived psychosynthesis as being life-

centered, and not in the laboratory. He designed it to help clients to understand and
to master their problems, to shape their lives actively, to improve relations and to
create a meaning in life. Although the counselor is aware that the responsibility
lies, ultimately, to the client, he will provide possible scenarios.
The counselor will initiate exploration through active dialogue; however, if
such is the case, he can suggest experiential work. Guided imagery can provide a
structure whereby the customer can find the next step. The ideal model may evoke
a broader vision of what is possible. A provocative question from the counselor,
such as "How do you want your life to be?" , can inspire the client to set a goal.
When people begin counseling, emotional pain is the main force that
drives them. By empathic understanding the counselor will encourage the client to
share and release painful emotions underlying his experience and which need
attention. Thus, he communicates to the client that pain is important, thus
contributing to building their relationship. From this point of view of co-building
the counseling relationship, intervention in psychosynthesis can be seen as an
integrative, relational form.
The counselor will also seek to inform the client that he is more than his
pathology, that he can lead alone his work and there is no need for it to be
prescribed. If the vision of the counselor on healing the client reprezents only
relieving the symptoms, the client can live a vacuum that can be filled with other
symptoms of a similar force.
Psychosynthesis counselor does not interpret the symbolic meaning of
clients images, but through dialogue and gestalt identifying, he encourages clients
to realize their own interpretations.
The process of psychosynthesis counseling follows the tendency to find
our individuality and assert our own identity as unique and also:
 to express ourselves as autonomous and independent beings;
 to love and be loved;
 to become masters of our own lives;
At a deeper level, psychosynthesis promises:
 to provide a sense of belonging, to be more than an isolated individual;
 a sense of unity with self and others;
 to reveal the meaning and purpose of life;
 a transcendence of existential individuality and identity;
 to respond to the deep need for beauty and goodness.
In psychosynthesis counseling, the first principle of the initial meeting
is dealing with the obvious. "What do you feel about coming here? You're a little
nervous? " The majority of potential clients answer positively and it is useful to
confirm that anxiety in front of unknown situations is a natural response.
 Loredana Drobot 7

After establishing the purpose of the interview the counselor will start to
gather basic information such as age, marital status, family details and medical
history. He will be careful, also, at the general health of the client and at the
subjective relationship with his body. The counselor will ask a series of questions
like(Assagioli,1974, p.93):
There were serious illness in childhood or adulthood?
- The client has a psychiatric history?
- The client has ever had treatment for psychological problems?
- How would the client define his health?
- The client gets, or previously had a consistent medication?
- The client is considering himself strong or weak, healthy or unhealthy?
The counselor will allow the dialogue to develop, giving the client space
for spontaneous self-expression, introducing the following questions when the time
is right:
Difficult aspects of the clients life will be left for later, to
establish an authentic report, marked by trust, presence and security for the
client; when the client feels safe to be more open and honest, he might
reveal more from the perspective of his own motivations. Well-trained
counselor will feel that the time has arrived and will begin to explore the
emotional level, exploring the general feelings of the client and its current
problems.
Areas that are needed to be explored are centered on the following
questions that are addressed to the client:
- What is his relationship with the emotional experience?
- How it relates with his own feelings?
- Tends to express, or suppress them?
- His parents were free in expressing their emotions?
- What kind of models did the parents offer?
Gathering information on the subject offers greater openness to
the counselor, a very important situation if the counselor will work to
transform the basic patterns, rather than relieve symptoms.
The counselor can continue with other questions such as:
- What role did the client have in his family?
- He was a peacemaker, a rebel, a good girl or a clown??
This will help the counselor understand the client's family system.
- Why did he came to counseling and what does he hope to
achieve?
- What are the biggest challenges in the life of the client?
- What is the real reason for coming to counseling?
- What are his deepest fears and how does he perceive them?
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8 Social Work Counseling

During the interview, the counselor will listen actively and will
reflect, reflect and paraphrase clients communication. This helps establish
a relationship and a common language, and allows the client to be seen,
heard and understood. The counselor will encourage him to ask questions
if they arise during their dialogue.

Conclusions and Proposals

Psychosynthesis counseling is an approach of the client not only in a
strictly organized framework, such as the cabinet, and thus for the social
worker, social pedagogue the counseling activity can be extended through
different action-oriented approaches. Psychosynthesis remained somewhat
behind other therapeutic orientations, being overtaken by cognitive
behavioral approaches, dialectical therapy. One explanation may be that its
author, Roberto Assagioli developed his theory in a time not favorable to
his way of thinking. However, regardless of the proliferation of the forms
of counseling and psychotherapy, psychosynthesis can make her way in an
integrative perspective approach of the human suffering and also social
work constitutes such an intervention field.

References
1. Assagioly,R.A., (1974) Psychosintesis: A manual of principles and
techniques, N.Y.HobbsDorman; Baltimore: Penguin
2. Clarkson P., (2003) The Therapeutic Relationship,Whurr Publishers,
London and Philadelphia
3. Culley, S., Bond, T., (2004), Integrative Counseling Skills in Action, 2nd,
Edition, Sage Publications, London.
4. Drobot, L., (2009), Consiliere şi psihoterapie integrativă, Ed. Mirton,
Timişoara.
5. Hough, M., (2010) Counselling skills and Theory, Hodder Education
6. Sutton J., Stewart W (2008) Learning to Counsel Develop the skills, insight
and knwledge to counsel others, Spring Hill Hause