The Counselling Process

Prior to discuss about the various stages in the process

of counselling let’s understand the meaning and

importance of counselling process. The term counselling

process means a systematic professional help given to

an individual. The analysis of various view-points and

definitions of counselling points out that:

i. It is a process of helping the individuals to help

themselves. It involves helping the individuals to

recognize and use their own inner potentials, to set

goals, to make plans and to take action accordingly.

ii. It is a continuous process as it is needed at the

different stages of life viz. childhood, adolescence,

adulthood and even in old age.

iii. The process involves a sequence of stages and steps

which are followed by the trained professionals in

order to help the client.

The importance of understanding the counselling

process is that it guides the worker in forecasting

probable future scenarios, setting objectives,

organising perceptions assessing clients problems,

developing realistic and optimistic expectations that

are stage specific and initiating different programmes

according to the specificity of the stages.

However, it should be noted that individual behaviour

is complex and sometimes may not fit into preconceived

and predetermined stages always. One is not discussing

here the exceptions but the generally practiced

sequence of the stages in the counselling process. These

are not rigid compartments. One may smoothly pass

into the next stage and sometimes the counselor has to

go backwards to a prior stage, and then again proceed

to the next. The whole process of counselling is meant

to help the persons to get from where they are to where

they want to be.

The process of counselling has been discussed by many

authors. However, some of the authors’ views in this

regard will be discussed here. With regards to counselling

process Judy Harrow (2001) writes, ‘One way to

understand the process of change is as an ongoing spiral.

Like all models, this is simplified, but the simplification

helps one to understand a very complex process. … Every

human being has many facets. One can grow at a

different rate (or even regress) in each facet, in different

periods of ones life’.

Marjorie Neslon (2001) has given the following nine steps

in the counselling process:

1. Establish a safe, trusting environment.

2. Clarify: Help the person put their concern into

words.

3. Active listening: find out the client’s agenda.

a) paraphrase, summarize, reflect, interpret

b) focus on feelings, not events

4. Transform problem statements into goal statements.

5. Explore possible approaches to goal.

6. Help person choose one way towards goal

Develop a plan (may involve several steps)

7. Make a contract to fulfill the plan (or to take the

next step).

8. Summarize what has occurred, clarify, and get

verification.

Evaluate progress

9. Get feedback and confirmation

According to G. Egan, G. (1986) successful counselling

can be seen as a three-stage process

1. Exploration: the client clarifies his/her

understanding of the problems that have brought

him/her to counselling. The client explores and

clarifies problems. The counselor helps the client

tell his or her story, focusing and clarifying as well

as pointing out blind spots and helping to generate

new perspective.

2. Planning: he develops strategies to improve his

situation. The client develops a plan for change. The

client imagines a new scenario and develops goals

to achieve it. The counselor encourages a

commitment to change.

3. Action: he takes concrete steps to achieve

measurable change. The client moves toward the

preferred scenario. The counsellor helps the client

develop strategies for action and encourages him or

her to implement plans and achieve goals.

Fuster (2005), while presenting the Carkhuff’s models

of counselling has presented the counselling process in

five stages as attending, responding, personalizing,

initiating and evaluating. He has also given the details

of attitudes and skills required of the counselor at each

stage. In literature about counselling, one also finds

the process comprising of four stages as initial interview,

the assessment, the middle phase and the termination.

The counselling process is discussed on the basis of the

stages mentioned above.

Preparatory Stage

The preparatory stage is very important for the

counsellor and the counselee. This stage is prior to the

actual counselling process. It is the point when the

client/person is getting ready to accept professional

help. The preparatory stage helps the client to get to

know the counsellor better, and to obtain reassurance

and even crisis support when necessary. At this stage,

the client and the counsellor approach each other and

try to understand the possibilities of working out an

agreement between them. The counsellor explains the

nature and goals of counselling, and they get agreed

upon the practical arrangements for counselling with

the client. This stage is important for the counsellors as

it helps them to know the client better, and make

appropriate plans for the intervention. These plans

include taking up the client for counselling or referring

the client to another, appropriate treatment service.

Thus, the preparatory stage is important for the client

and the counsellor to begin the process of understanding

and accepting one another. The preparatory stage is

very important because unless the counsellor gets the

counsellee interested in beginning counselling, nothing

will happen. This stage can be called as attending as it

is meant for paying attention to each other.

In the first meeting between the counsellor and

counselee, they get to know each other and some briefing

and discussion takes place about the counselling need

and service. The clients often come with unclear and

ambiguous ideas about their own problems. They are

vague and uncertain in their communication. Often their

thoughts are muddled, and heavily laden with emotional

content. Many times clients are brought to the

counselling or they are compelled to do so by family

members, friends or referral agencies. Such clients come

with some apprehensions and inhibitions. In such cases

clients are, more often than not unlikely to cooperate

whole-heartedly with counselling.

Fuster (2005) has listed some of the questions that the

counsellee raises at this stage. The counsellee has many

questions in his/her mind, such as, is the counsellor

interested in me? Is he/she willing to give me time and

listen carefully? Can I share my intimate thoughts and

feelings with him? Does the counsellor has anything I

can Use? Would he be successful in my world? Can he

help me?

On the part of counsellors the basic skills required at

this stage are social skills, attending physically,

observing and listening and the attitudes required are

respect, genuineness and empathy. The social skills

include greeting skills, politeness skills and kindness

skills. Greeting skills means using the customary ways

of greeting clients nicely, in mutual self-introduction,

in acknowledging them and what they want to say.

Politeness skills are an expression of one’s sensitivity to

the feelings and opinions of others, of one’s respect for

others, of one’s gratitude to others. And kindness skills

are about expressing one’s good wishes for others and

readiness to do something for others. Social skills

facilitate interpersonal interaction and give a chance to

explore each other and the goals of the relationship.

The skills of attending physically consist of the

counsellor’s ability to give his/her full attention to the

counsellee and to communicate his/her interest through

non-verbal messages. The purpose of attending

physically is to involve the counsellee in the counselling

process. The skill steps of attending physically are four

actions or behaviours, which should flow from the

attitudes of respect, genuineness and empathy. The

skills of observing at this stage consist of the

consunsellor’s ability to see the counsellee’s behaviours

and take clues from their non-verbal messages. The

observation helps the counsellor in understanding how

the client feels.

Exploratory Stage

The second stage in the counselling process is

exploratory. In this stage the client and counsellor meet

in the counselling room. It is the first session of

counselling in which the intake process or admission of

the client into the formalities of counselling are

completed. The actual counselling begins at this point

of time. This stage follows the preparatory stage. This is

like building something on the foundation of the first

stage in which the counsellor has established some

rapport and prepared the client for the counselling

sessions. The exploratory stage is meant for entering

into the counsellee’s frame of reference in order to

accurately understand how s/he experiences the world.

The purpose of this stage is also building the counsellee’s

trust in the counsellor. Further the counsellor tries to

gather more facts and data about the counsellee and

assess the client’s readiness to pass on to the next stage.

At this stage the information is obtained primarily from

the client, but it may also be sought, with the permission

of the client, from significant other in the client’s life.

The areas of enquiry for getting information include the

following:

1. The problem, and its effects on the client and his

environment;

2. Probable factors that create and maintain these

problems;

3. Probable factors that may relieve these problems;

4. The clients understanding about the problem and

efforts to tackle the problem.

Information is also obtained about the client’s personality

and life which include:

1. The client’s adjustment at home, at work, with

friends, with persons of the opposite sex, and with

society in general;

2. The client’s strengths and weaknesses, good and

bad habits, likes and dislikes; and,

3. how the client spends his time or runs his life.

Further information is obtained about the client’s

environment which include the family, friends, the

colleagues at workplace and other social, occupational

and leisure areas.

Accurate understanding of the person is very essential

for counselling. This is done at this stage through

stimulating the counsellee to a deeper self-exploration.

During the initial interviews the client shares and

clarifies the problems that have brought him/her to the

counsellor. Often, the client comes without having clarity

of own problem. The counselor helps the client to share

his or her story, focusing and clarifying the issues. The

counselor, based on the information given by the client,

prepares the case file. The counsellor at this stage helps

the client through self exploration to arrive at the

statement of the problem in clear and unambiguous

terms. The assessment of client’s motivation and

readiness to move on to the next stage is very important

at this point. If the counsellor understands that the

client is poorly motivated for counselling, by giving

feedback and in consultation with the client they may

decide on whether to go ahead with counselling or not.

Infact assessment of client’s motivation is an ongoing

process in counselling.

During the initial interviews, at this stage, the client

and the counsellor get into a formal or informal

agreement. This agreement is a sort of contract which is

essential. The terms of this understanding are basically

that the counsellor will work sincerely to accept,

understand and help the client, which the client will

cooperate to in the best possible manner in matters

such as self-revelation, truthfulness, and adherence to                                                      

the counsellor’s suggestions. At this point of time the

details about counselling and the necessary practical

arrangements for counselling such as duration, timing,

the frequency of sessions, payment schedule (if charged),                                                                                                                                                  

etc. are worked out clearly with the client.

On the part of counsellor, all the skills used in the first

stage continue to be used by the counsellor at the stage

of exploration. It must be noted that all the skills are

cumulative and the whole process of counselling is

graduallly built up. In the first stage by attending,

observing and listening to the counsellee the counsellors

communicate their interest in helping the client. While

interviewing the client, the counsellor attempts to gather

verbal and non verbal data about the client. After

gathering data the counsellor must integrate the data

into something meaningful in order to appropriately

respond to the clients’ feelings and content. Thus at

this stage the counsellors use the skill to label correctly

the counsellee’s feeling, the reason for the feeling and

to communicate this understanding to the counsellee.

This is done by integrating the observations and

understanding to the appropriate feeling, word for

responding to the client. As the counsellor keeps

accurate responding, the client builds up trust in the

counsellor. This trust in the counsellor together with

the counsellor’s attitudes of empathy, genuineness and

respect will prepare the counsellee to go deeper into

self-exploration. When the counsellor senses that the

client has explored all relevant areas of her personality

then the counsellor must summarise the understanding

about the main feelings and experiences expressed by

the counsellee. This summary must be accepted and

approved by the counsellee. Thus the acceptance and

approval to the counsellors understanding is clients

signal to move to the next stage.

Planning Stage

The third stage in counselling process is planning an

intervention for the client. This stage is also called as

personalising the problem and the goal. This is in

continuation with the earlier stage. At times this

overlaps. While discussing the last stage it has been

seen that through the process of self exploration the

counsellor helps the counsellee to understand where

s/he is with respect to where s/he wants or needs to

be. Once the client accepts and acknowledges the

counsellor’s response in the form of summary, s/he

shows readiness to formulate appropriate goals and plans

for the intervention. The counsellor must ensure the

clients readiness; otherwise the process will not be

helpful to the client.

For a few sessions after the initial stage of self exploration

the counsellor continues to assess the clients’

psychological framework and problem situation. After

obtaining a general understanding of the client’s

problems and expectations, specific goals of counselling

needs to be set. The counsellor guides the client in

setting the specific goals. Such goals are often stated as

specific emotional and behavioural changes that are

acceptable and desirable to the client and to society. It

is important to break down the goals into their logical

sub-components or sub-goals, which by virtue of such

identification, are more easily tackled. The specific goals

are useful in monitoring the progress of achieving these

goals. Involvement of the client in setting the goals is

very important.

At this stage, the counsellor uses the skill of

personalising the problem and the goal together. This

makes the client take responsibility and accept their

contribution to the problem situation. The counsellee’s

contribution to the problem or personal limitation must

be expressed in concrete behavioural terms. This

contribution is something negative and is generally

something that the counsellee is doing or not doing. In

this case while planning the goal it is just the opposite

of the problem and, thus it channels the counsellee’s

energy into something positive and constructive. For

example, if the client’s problem is that he cannot control

his temper, the goal is to control his temper.

The purpose of this stage is to help the client to plan

where they want to be. This stage is the crucial stage of

the counselling process and the success of counselling

entirely depends on it. If the plan has been carefully

designed with the involvement of the client, then

satisfactory results will be achieved. Thus, the counsellor

helps the client by identifying appropriate and

systematic steps suitable to the client. Based on the

understanding of the client the counsellor may suggest

some modification or changes in behaviour pattern or

life style of the client. The client may have to undergo

certain therapy or some sessions.

It is the stage during which the counsellor analyses the

clients’ feelings and behaviour, provides constant

feedback, support and guidance to plan behavioural

change. While planning change the following questions

are addressed:

l What are the emotional factors that have to be

corrected to resolve the dysfunctional behaviour?

l What are the faulty ways of thinking that the client

manifests that need to be corrected for a resolution

of the dysfunctional behaviour?

l What are the social and environmental factors that

have to be addressed to resolve the dysfunctional

behaviour?

The skills of the counsellor lies in stimulating the

counsellee to use her resources and contribute towards

dealing with own problem. Counselling is about

actualising human potential. One grows as a person

when one utilises his/her own personal resources. At

this stage the counsellor goes more deeply in sharing

his/her understanding of the client and tries to create

awareness about the client’s contribution to his/her own

problem. The skills mentioned in the preparatory stage

and the skills mentioned in the explorations stage are

carried over to this stage also. While helping the client

to personalise the problem and planning an action by

setting a goal the counsellor should attend, observe,

listen, respond and personalise by making the

counsellee aware of her deficit behaviours in

implementing the plan of action (Fuster,:2005). Along

with all the skills and attitudes the counsellor at this

stage uses confrontation and immediacy. The

confrontation here is an action which is initiated by the

counsellor based on his/her understanding of the

counsellee. The counsellor observes some discrepancy

in the counsellee’s behaviour and brings it to his/her

awareness. The purpose of confrontation is to reduce

the ambiguity and incongruities in the counsellee’s

experience and in his/her communication to the

counsellor. It aims at motivating personal growth.

Another skill used at this stage is immediacy. Immediacy

is dealing with the feeling between the counsellee and

the counsellor in the here and now. Immediacy overlaps

somewhat with confrontation but it is different. In

responding with immediacy the counsellor used the

observed discrepancy in the counsellee to interpret the

here and now relationship with the counsellee.

Action Stage

Once the planning stage has established where the

client is with respect to where s/he wants to be, the

action stage begins. This stage is also called by Fuster,

as initiating stage. At this stage, the client moves toward

the preferred state. The counsellor helps the client

develop strategies for action and encourages him or her

to implement plans and achieve goals. The counsellor

helps the client by identifying appropriate and

systematic steps suitable to his/her need and resources.

These steps are taken gradually to reach the goal. The

focus of this stage is to motivate the client to act in

order to solve his/her problem. This is done by

identifying what can be done to reach the goal and by

taking up specific steps in such a way that the counsellee

realises that the goal is attainable.

The client is helped to achieve the goal through various

available counselling models and techniques. Some of

the models used at this stage are: Rational Emotive

Therapy (RET), Transactional Analysis (TA), Gestalt

Psychotherapy (GT), Learning theories (LT), etc. and

some of the techniques used are supportive and

behavioural, cognitive and psychoanalytical, problem

solving and other. Some of these techniques are

discussed in detail in later units of this block. The

therapeutic gains during the action stage include:

l Resolution of emotional crisis;

l Resolution of problem behaviours;

l Improved self-confidence and self-esteem;

l Improved self-control and frustration tolerance;

l Improved reality orientation and appraisal of threats;

l Improved communication and problem-solving skills;

and

l Improved overall adjustment, judgment, and

emotional stability.

This presupposes that the counsellor is aware and

trained in various models and techniques of counselling

and is competent to use them. The skills at this stage

used by counsellor include all the skills used until this

stage as well as skills in setting goal clearly, identifying

appropriate steps to the goal and formulating the steps,

etc. The counsellor uses his/her skills in presenting a

goal very relevant to the client’s need, devising practical

and concrete steps within the capacity and available

resources of the client and helping the client in taking

the first step. The programme of action must be devised

in accordance with the capacity and awareness of the

client so that while taking action they must experience

the good feeling that they can do it and get motivated to

take the first step.

The counsellor should note that to make the action plan

more effective it must emerge from the counsellee’s frame

of reference and he/she must have acceptance for that.

The plan of action to the goal is on various levels;

physical, emotional, intellectual, interpersonal and

spiritual. Effective plans are based on a holistic approach.

It means, in attempting to help the client with a personal

problem, the counsellor must suggest steps which cover

all the levels of his/her personality i.e. biological,

psychological, sociological and spiritual levels. As

suggested by Fuster, on the biological level, plan may

include various ways of improving the counsellee’s

physical health, such as rest, diet, vitamins, exercise,

etc. On the psychological level action may include

training in responsiveness and assertiveness, training

in how to modify one’s attitudes, etc. On the sociological

level, it may include procedures to modify the

counsellee’s social environment. This may be done

either by moving away from some stressful situation or

by helping the counsellee to modify his/her attitudes

and his/her interpersonal relationships. On the spiritual

level, plans may include meditation and prayers for

strength and courage, trust in God, etc.

Evaluation and Termination Stage

Evaluation is an important part of the counselling

process. It is essential that the counsellor undertakes

evaluation before the termination of the process.

Evaluating means to review how the counselee has taken

the action in order to achieve the goal and in view of the

plans how far the client is progressing. Assessment or

evaluation of client’s progress is an ongoing process

which begins right in the first stage. However, it is done

at this stage with the purpose of terminating the process.

Counselling should never be abruptly terminated. The

termination of counselling is systematically done after

following a series of steps. The counsellor during the

evaluation and termination stage ensures the followings:

1. Evaluating readiness for termination of counselling

process;

2. Letting the client know in advance about the

termination of counselling;

3. Discuss with client the readiness for termination;

4. Review the course of action plan;

5. Emphasis the client’s role in effecting change;

6. Warning against the danger of ‘flight into health’;

7. Giving instructions for the maintenance of adaptive

functioning;

8. Discussion of follow up sessions; and

9. Assuring the availability of counsellor in case of

relapse into dysfunction.

While discussing about this stage, it is important to know

when and how the counsellor should discontinue the

counselling process. The client is the point of reference

to make this decision. As the client gains desired

benefits, the client her/himself may suggest that there

is no further need for continuation. Sometimes

termination may depend upon external influences, such

as time constraints or unforeseen contingencies. The

counselling may also terminate because the client feels

that s/he does not wish to continue; or, because both

either decide that no progress is being made towards

the set goals.

As it has been discussed in planning stage, counselling

is always conducted with predetermined goals. The goals

may be modified as required during the course of

therapy. The counsellor develops specific plan for each

client. Accordingly, as action plan progresses and the

goals of client are progressively attained, the counsellor

must evaluate and assess the readiness to terminate

the process.

The counsellor must give adequate advance notice of

termination so that clients can psychologically orient

themselves towards independent functioning. Such

notice of termination is also necessary to give the client

an opportunity to raise issues that she/he had not

discussed. Failure to provide adequate notice of

termination may lead to crisis in functioning when the

termination is announced. The clients appraisal of the

situation is essential while terminating counselling

sessions. The counsellor should discuss with the client

about his/her readiness to terminate. The discussion

may include client’s understanding of what has

transpired during the process, his/her doubts and

misconceptions, and confidence to handle future

situations. While terminating counselling, it is important

that the client is warned against the ‘flight into health’

which keeps him/her aware of the realities of the

situation and the possibilities of relapsse after returning

to the unsupervised environment. Since the risk for

setbacks, temporary or otherwise, after termination is

high, the client should be given adequate counselling

about how to handle potential troublesome situations.

Further, while reviewing the whole process, the

counsellor draws to the client’s attention the problems

initially identified with him/her, the goals that were

agreed upon and the plan of action employed to attain

the goals, tasks given, interpretations and insights that

resulted, progress and setbacks in the process, and such

other issues. In order to make the client more confident

the counsellor must make the client known about the

role that s/he has played. The counsellor should also

explain that his/her role has been that of a guide to the

client on his journey to achieve the set goal.

Lastly, at this stage some discussion of follow up sessions

and continued uncritical accessibility of the counsellor

to the clients is necessary. There is need for the client

to continue to maintain contact with the counsellor for

continued assistance for the maintenance of the

functional equilibrium. The frequency of such follow-up

sessions is based upon individual circumstances, and

can increase or decrease depending upon the need.

Therefore, the counsellor should stress on ‘open doors’

which refers to easy accessibility of the counsellor to

the client. The clients must be made feel that he/she

need not feel guilt in case he/she relapses into

dysfunction and he/she should be made to feel that

the counsellor will always be available to him/her.