Goals of Counseling – the key component of individual, group, organizational and community

success 
-Detailed and expansive counseling goals have been identified by Gibson and Mitchell (2003),
which are as follows:
1. Development Goals 
-assist in meeting or advancing the clients human growth and development including social,
personal, emotional, cognitive, and physical wellness.
2. Preventive Goals
– helps the client avoid some undesired outcome.
3. Enhancement Goals
- enhance special skills and abilities.
4. Remedial Goals
– assisting a client to overcome and treat an undesirable development
5. Exploratory Goals
- examining options, testing of skills, trying new  and different activities, etc.
6. Reinforcement Goals
- helps client in recognizing, that what they are  
  doing, thinking, and feeling is fine
7. Cognitive Goals

- involves acquiring the basic foundation of  learning and cognitive skills

8. Physiological Goals
– involves acquiring the basic understanding and habits for good health
9. Psychological Goals
– aids in developing good social interaction skills, learning emotional control, and  developing
positive self – concept.
Roles
of Counsellors

The roles are classified into three:

counselling

consultation

facilitation

Counselling
-acts as an advocate for students
-develop realistic interventions upon listening to the needs of students
-report/refer a case when a person’s welfare is in jeopardy
-guide students in their participation in school and community activities
-provide feedback to parent/guardian
-assist students in developing coping skills and healthy outlets for stress
Consultation
-assist in identification of problems that arise in school and help provide recommendations that
lead to solutions
-develop educational strategies to accommodate the needs of students who are experiencing
difficulty
-collaborate with special teachers to aid in the development of educational plans that meet the
needs of special education students
-advocate for appropriate students placement
Facilitation
-coordinate yearly course selections and course changes
-assist in the coordination of school meetings with parents, teachers and students  as requested
-organize standardized testing administration
-review and maintain all records, report cards,progress reports and test scores
-monitor student’s academic progress
-communicate with teachers, parents and students regarding academic status

Roles and Functions of Counselor

Individual Assessment
Seeks to identify the characteristics and potential of every client ; promotes the client’s self-
understanding and assisting counselors to understand the client better
Individual Counseling
Considers as the core activity through which other activities become meaningful. It is a client –
centered process that demand confidentiality. Relationship is established between counselor
and client.
Group Counseling and Guidance
Groups are means of providing organized and planned assistance to individuals for an array of
needs. Counselor provides assistance through group counseling and group guidance.
Career Assistance
Counselors are called on to provide career planning and adjustment assistance to clients.
Placements and Follow -Up
A service of school counseling programs with emphasis on educational placements in course
and programs.
Referral
It is the practice of helping the clients find needed expert assistance that the referring
counselor cannot provide.
Consultation
It is the process of helping a client through a third party or helping system improve its service to
its clientele.
Research
It is necessary to advance the profession of counseling; it can provide empirically based data
relevant to the ultimate goal of implementing effective counseling.
Evaluation and Accountability
Evaluation is a means of assessing the effectiveness of counselor’s activities.
Accountability is an outgrowth of demand that schools and other tax-supported institutions be
held accountable for their actions.
Prevention
This includes promotion of mental health through primary prevention using a social –
psychological perspective.

Competence in Counseling
-counselling helps people to explore feelings and emotions that are often related to their
experiences. This allows clients to reflect on what is happening to them and consider
alternative ways of doing things.
-the aim of counselling is to reduce a client’s confusion and enable them to cope with
challenges, or to make positive changes in their life where necessary.
-Counsellors do not give advice but it help clients to make their own choices within the
framework of an agreed counselling contract.

 Competencies of Counselors
(Seven distinct competence areas of counselors)

1. Interpersonal Skills
–counselors who are competent display ability to listen, communicate ; empathize ; be
present ; aware of nonverbal communication; sensitive to voice quality , responsive to
expressions of emotion, turn taking, structure of time and use of language

2. Personal beliefs and Attitude

- counselors have the capacity to accept others, belief in potential of change,
awareness of ethical and moral choices and sensitive to values held by client and self.

3. Conceptual ability
– counselors have the ability to understand and assess client’s problem; to anticipate
future problems; make sense of immediate process in terms of wider conceptual
scheme to remember information about the client

4. Personal Soundness
– counselors must have no irrational beliefs that are destructive to counseling
relationships, self-confidence ,capacity to tolerate strong of uncomfortable feelings in
relation to the clients, secure personal boundaries, ability to be a client ; must carry no
social prejudice, ethnocentrism and authoritarianism.
5. Mastery of Techniques
– counselors must have a knowledge of when and how to carry out specific
interventions, ability to assess effectiveness of the interventions, understanding the
rationale behind techniques, possession of wide repertoire of intervention

6. Ability to understand and work within social system

– this would be compromise of awareness of family and work relationships of client the impact
of agency on the clients, the capacity to use support networks and supervision ; sensitivity to
client from different gender, ethnicity , sexual orientation, or age group.

7. Openness to learning and inquiry

– counselors must have the capacity to be curious about client’s backgrounds and
problems; being open to new knowledge.

Career Opportunities and Areas of Specialization of Counselors

1. Marriage and Family Counseling 

– refers to the efforts to establish an encouraging relationship with couple or family and appreciate the
complications in the family system.

2. Child and Adolescent Counseling 

– is a developing area of expertise in counseling profession. 
The counseling strategies focus on helping children and adolescents acquire coping skills
through promotion of :
resiliency
positive attachment relationship
emotional and intellectual intelligence
and other qualities that promote optional development.
3. Group Counseling 
– is the dynamic field in the counseling profession. 
Group counseling as a practice can be located in most counseling programs and became the
essential part of counselor’s system. 
Group counseling offers the following : 
- opportunities to members to learn from observing other group members 
- opportunities to discover that others have similar concerns 
- opportunities to enhance interpersonal skills
4. Career Counseling 
 - is an evolving and challenging counseling field. 
-This type of counseling aids individual on decisions and  planning concerning their career. 
-The counseling approach includes integrating theory and practice. 
5. School Counseling 
- refers to the process of reaching out students with concerns on drugs, family and peers or
gang involvement. 
-The job requires sensitivity to individual differences and considers diversity in enhancing
educational perspective. 
-The job requires skills on consultation, counseling’s exceptional students and with the ability to
handle problems such as drug abuse, teenage pregnancy, divorced or single parents, dropping
out of school.
6. Mental Health Counseling 
- is manifested in the challenges posed by its clientele with mental disorders. 
- Mental disorders include serious depression, schizophrenia, and  substance abuse. 
- Mental health counselors have to be inventive, and creative to address  these problems. 
The job requires patience, humility, kindness and compassion.

CODE OF ETHICS OF COUNSELORS

Rights and Responsibilities, and Accountabilities of Counselors 
Code of ethics help counselors to remind them of their rights, responsibilities and
accountabilities in the counseling profession. 
The rights, responsibilities and accountabilities of the counselors are based on the counselors
associations of Code of Conduct. 
The code of ethics of the counselors is divided into seven sections, namely  , 
(a) counseling relationship, (b) confidentiality 
(c) professional responsibility (d) relationships with other professionals ,
 (e) evaluation, assessment, and interpretation, (f) teaching ,training and supervision
 (g) research and publication.
We shall only present in details three of the seven areas, namely
counseling relationships
confidentiality
professional responsibility. 
The Counseling Relationships
1. Client welfare
Counselor’s primary responsibility is to respect the dignity and promote the welfare of clients.
They are also expected to encourage client’s growth. Counselors and clients are expected to
work together in crafting individual counseling plans consistent with the client’s circumstances.
2. Respecting Diversity
Counselors do not engage in discrimination based on age, color, culture, disability, ethnic
group, gender, race, religion, sexual orientation, marital status and socio economic status.
Counselors shall respect differences and understand the diverse cultural backgrounds of their
clients.
3. Client Rights
Counselors shall disclose the purposes, goals, techniques, procedures, limitations, potential
risks, benefits of the services to be performed and other pertinent information to the client
throughout the counseling process. Counselors offer clients the freedom to choose whether to
enter into a counseling relationship and determine which professional will provide counseling,
except when the client is unable to give consent.
4. Clients Served by others
In cases where the client is receiving services from another mental health professional, with
clients consent, inform the professional person already involved to develop an agreement.
5. Personal Needs and values
Maintain the clients and avoid actions that seek to meet their personal needs at the expense of
the clients. Counselors shall be aware of their values, attitudes, beliefs, and behavior and how
these apply in a diverse society and avoid imposing their values on clients.
6. Dual Relationships
Counselors are aware of their influential position over their clients avoid the exploiting the trust
and dependency of the clients. Counselors should not accept as superiors or subordinates
clients’.
7. Sexual Intimacies with Clients
Counselors should not have any type of sexual intimacies with clients and do not counsel
persons with whom they have sexual relationship. Counselors should not also engage with
sexual intimacies with their former clients within a minimum of two years.
8. Multiple Clients
In cases where counselors agree to provide counseling services to two or more persons who
have a relationship, counselors clarify at the outset which person or persons are clients and the
nature of relationship they will have with each other.
9. Group Work
Counselors screen prospective group counseling / therapy participants to determine those with
compatible needs. In group setting, counselors take reasonable precautions to protect clients
from physical or psychological trauma.
10. Fees
Prior to entering the counseling relationship, the counselors clearly explain the clients all
financial arrangements related to professional fees.