Diversity in Career Counseling - Article Example

Running head: Diversity in Career Counseling Diversity in Career Counseling s Diversity in Career Counseling Thereis a common conception about career counseling - in the ordinary sense it refers to the way you have given some guidelines to people regarding their profession. Firstly, there is a need to know what career counseling really means. Why is there a need for career counseling? What are the different strategies used in career counseling? There are various ways of career counseling. The first method is to take an aptitude test to see which profession is right for the person. After giving the aptitude test he may be surprised to learn that his original career plan does not suit him at all. Nowadays career counseling is flourishing a lot in the whole world; even the trend of career counseling is constructive in the third world or developing countries. Career counseling has been established to provide the students with an opportunity to have a single point of contact in case they need advice and help in a number of areas. There are a number of counseling centers that work for the betterment of the students, adults, professionals, etc. These centers facilitate the students in finding the right career path; they advise them on how to build an effective resume; help them with their interview skills; inform the as to how to deal with office politics and different situation work; and how to effectively follow up after an interview. Career counseling is more or less like a personal training - it helps us in building interpersonal skills within us. The counselor might be playing a different role at the same time i.e. that of a coordinator, administrator, management, and counselor. They approach different groups or classes for career planning. Sometimes they conduct different session for different age groups; for instance their targeted people may be school students, university students, people from corporative sectors, professionals and so on. Their sole aim is to enhance the interpersonal skills and to develop a positive self concept within the people. Career counseling also helps to assess the mental health of individual and to find out how strongly he can control his mental slackness. It gives an opportunity to an individual of transforming himself to overcome his deficiencies. Also strengthen the self-esteem of an individual. Self esteem is a kind of feeling or awareness of a person about himself and his ability to move in society efficiently. A mentally well adjusted person feels that he is an accepted part of the society. DIVERSITY: Another element regarding all this is the conception of diversity. Society is based on different social groups of people, different classes, races, sex, disabilities, religion, and orientation and so on. This diversity generates frustration to some extent among the people, which further causes misrepresentation of one’s personality. Eventually he loses his self confidence and self reliance. Weltanschauung is the world view. It interprets the whole world. It also explains the position of an individual in society and his socio economic status that measures the factor of education, income, type of occupation, place of residence and in some populations, ethnicity and religion. We have seen all around the world how social diversity affects the professions life of people. Many people are discriminated on the basis of race, religion sex, disability, language, social status and so on. Different strategies are being used for different people. Here we have to compare and contrast between two groups and the strategies they use. We have taken examples from USA, one is concerned with the Black Americans and other is concerned with the Muslims. We have seen the discrimination in USA, where Black Americans still do not have the equal right; they are still the depriving class. We can also say that USA is a multicultural society; there is no inequality in the States. We also know that people from different groups, race, gender, religion live there. Everyone does not have an equal opportunity. The most drastic change has occurred after 9/11. Many Muslims are harassed by the locals. Discriminations ration also raised, still we have seen the consequences of the 9/11 all over the world. This caused disorientation among the people including the students. Many people came there from different countries, for the purpose of studies. Now the need is to keep and maintain the peace and harmony among the people and for this they use different strategies. Students were the most suffering class and they become disoriented. They need to be counseled on an immediate basis. Different career development centers approached the universities and gave them a proper guideline and support and tried to enhance self realization in them. Strategies used by the counselor varied from situation to situation. So it is up to the counselor to decide that what methods he would use for the various circumstances; for instance after the incident of 9/11 happened there is a need of psychological counseling among the people. As concerned with black American case, the need is to counsel the students as well as the professionals. Methods they use are seminars, individual/group counseling, assessments, psychological test to promote self esteem and realization among the people. All these are the steps taken for the betterment of the people. As far as we are concerned with the National Career Development Association Guidelines, competence can also be defined as the sum total of characteristics and stability in a person’s behavior across different situations that differentiate him from the other people. Counseling focuses on the social, educational, career adjustment problems and in every walk of life. In the modern world the human life is going too fast and no one has time to think over his own problems neither have enough capabilities to resolve their problems themselves. In such circumstances counseling or guidelines move you toward the right path. Nowadays almost every school and college has a proper counseling staff where students can get advice from the psychologist/counselor, who helps them in choosing the right job for them. These counselors also helped them in other ways, in resolving every day’s life problem, how to smoothly move in a social circle, the student problems with their roommates, and they also give them different methods and strategies for resolving difficulties overcoming their complexes. I have chosen two list of competency in the national career guidelines: personal social development domain and development of positive interpersonal skills. In the above competency contents the emphasis is more on personality grooming, building the interpersonal skills within yourself and practicing to move in a social circle and society with confidence. To know about yourself is not too easy. In order to polish your hidden skills it is essential that you have some kind of guidelines and in this area a professional can help you more to enhance your skills. There are multiple strategies for use in career counseling. First of all individual or group counseling and free speech therapy will help you. This method is used in psychoanalysis. Along with this public presentations will also raise your confidence. Also, some aptitude tests can be conducted for the individual for assessing their area of interest and finding out which profession is more suitable for them. In the same manner some IQ test can also be conducted to check their mental capacity and how capable they are for doing some job. In every man there are some concealed qualities of which he does not know. It is the job of a counselor and guideline consultant to sharpen these qualities. After having certain kinds of knowledge about personal strength, weakness values and certain kind of job trend it is time to set goals. These goals may be short term, intermediate or long term. Through these challenging goals a person gets an opportunity to test his skills and capabilities in a more efficient way. These goals should be consistent with one’s own capabilities, competence and self-esteem. The other kind that helps individuals is the workshops. This is very helpful for enhancing one’s interpersonal skills. It is a kind of orientation which gives an opportunity of presenting oneself in a more enthusiastic way. It also gives you the opportunity to introduce yourself to the people. You should be clear enough when designing your career path. For this, you should ask some questions from yourself, for instance, what your standing is after the counseling, if you have developed enough skills in your personality, if you no longer have any fears and complexes. After having these answers, you are ready to prove yourself. Career counseling helps you in every walk of life, whether you are a student, parent, teacher, employer, etc. It gives you a proper channel to move ahead. As Socrates has said, “Know Thy Self”. It is not easy to ask yourself who you are. Other than a person’s parental identity, his religious beliefs and faith, his nationality, he even fails to find any answer about himself, i.e. what exactly he is, because he does not know about himself. In the same manner a career counselor helps one in locating these hidden qualities, that are truly yours, and that are actually the very essence of your own being. Reference Niles, S.G., & Harris-Bowlsbey, J. (2008) Career development interventions in the 21st century. (3rd ed). Columbus, OH: Merrill Prentice Hall. Read More