Psychology

Decision making in career occurs in an adult life continuously. This involves, prioritizing and selecting alternatives after identifying ones career of choice. The skill of problem solving is referred to as counseling. Maglio and William (2005) states that career counseling normally is sought when an individual needs confidential help and guidance when faced with personal difficulties, for example if a person wants to change career. These individuals consult a counsellor. Counsellors understand the clients difficulties as they are experienced and qualified thus giving each individual appropriate advice. Counseling careers usually has the welfare of others at heart. These careers include support work, teaching, nursing and even the social work.

 Counseling is usually referred to as a second career. The salary of the cousellors is usually not much thus do not meet the demand of professionally trained counsellors. There are varieties of counseling vacancies these include counseling in AIDS agencies, counseling in the schools and in the further institutions and also in the rehabilitation institutions and also in the organizations of the people with disabilities. Fulltime counselor can be a counselor or a teacher, welfare worker, nurse or a coordinator. To become a counsellor an individual should have the theory knowledge, the individual must also have some personal characters or qualities and the person needs to have and get some practical skills. The above attributes may result from the training, experience, supervision of your work by a more experienced practitioners and also personal therapy.

 To become a professional counsellor, training must be extensive and the individual must work in a supervised placement. Counsellors attend further training programmes to upgrade their occupation In a private sector, a counselor should have experience and training. Maglio and William (2005) points out that counsellors help the individuals to consider other ways of doing things after reflecting on what is going on in their lives by helping the people to explore emotions that are related to the experiences they have undergone. Counsellors listen to their clients attentively and the offer empathy and the counsellors offer the clients time and allow the clients to express themselves this helps the counsellors to understand their clients better and also help the counsellors to enable the clients to make changes in their lives. Clients make choices with the help of the counsellors.

There are various activities related to counseling. Counsellors tend to specialize in models used in their area of specialization. Approach in the counseling models depends on the individual practitioners training the client group that are predominant and also on the setting of the counseling consultation. Various areas of counseling include, health, addiction, relationship guidance or sexual abuse. Typical work activities in the counseling  include, utilization and keeping of the record tools, helping clients make choices regarding  possible ways, establishing a trust relationship between the client and the counselor, encouraging the clients to talk even deeper issues that they cannot share with any one else ,empathizing with the client position and attentively listening to the clients, accepting issues raised by the client without been biased, referring   clients to other helpful sources if need be, agreeing on  a counseling contract on what will be covered during the counseling sessions, challenging   inconsistencies in the clients words or acts and working with the agreed target in accordance with the client contract.

In order for the counseling to be effective, counsellors need to know the clients. The counsellors also need to know themselves well, they must also know their influences to the clients and the social institutions that the cousellor can refer the client to. A counsellor must enjoy helping people to solve their problems. The counsellors aim is to enable the clients to talk freely, develop a better relationship and also to improve their self esteem thus discovering better ways of living. Counsellors must have the following personal qualities, counsellors need to have good communication skills, they need to listen attentively to their clients and ask questions that are right to the client thus guiding their clients towards making decisions. Counsellors also need to be patient and determined because some clients need longer sessions before they make sound decisions.

The experiences of the clients should not burden the counsellor as some clients may share very intense and personal emotions that are very painful. Counseling sessions should be in quiet and should be confidential, leading to developing respect and trust between the counsellor and the client. Counsellors are trained to be empathetic, non- judgmental and empathetic this enables the client to express their feelings, emotions and ideas that they cannot be able to share with anyone. Counsellors aim to create an environment that enables the clients to express their feelings in safety. Counsellors also aim to make clients to accept those feelings, thus helping the client to know the cause of their problems and to explore their feelings (Maglio and William, 2005).

There are various challenges associated with the career of counseling and these include, it is difficult to encourage the client to fully engage in the counseling. Counseling is also believed to be given at both formal and informal level thus some clients tend to reject professional help and opt to go for the advice from their peers. According to Maglio and William (2005), counsellors offer unconditional acceptance, a cousellor also offers confidentiality, and helps the client to look at things more clearly. Counsellors help clients to deal with the issues that are very difficult to deal with.
 
In conclusion, an effective counsellor must help the clients to question the way the client looks at things, the way the client reacts to situations, helps the client to develop new ways of dealing with their situation, will not dwell on the past, will teach the client to relax deeply, may ask the client to so things in between the sessions, increases the self confidence of the client, helps the client to overcome  anxiety problems like fear, is supportive incase of emergence of difficult feelings, understands issues facing the client and how to lift them up, helps the clients to think about their problems in another perspective and helps the client to develop social skills.