Outline the qualities of a good counselor

-Communication Skills
Effective counselors should have excellent communication skills. Although some of these skills can be honed during graduate school and are developed and refined over the course of your career, you should already possess certain communication skills before embarking on a counseling career. Counselors need to have a natural ability to listen and be able clearly explain their ideas and thoughts to others.
-Acceptance
Being nonjudgmental and accepting are important attributes in any of the helping professions. But professional counselors must be able to "start where the client is at." This phrase is often used in counseling to describe the ability to relate to clients with an open, nonjudgmental attitude -accepting the client for who she is and in her current situation. Counselors need to be able to convey acceptance to their clients with warmth and understanding.
-Empathy
Counselors help people through some of the most difficult and stressful times of their lives. They must be able to display empathy -- the ability to feel what another person is feeling. Empathy means that you are truly able to imagine what it's like to stand in someone else's shoes. Compassion and empathy help your clients feel understood and heard.
-Problem-Solving Skills
It's not up to a counselor to solve her clients' problems, no matter how much she might want to help. But counselors must have excellent problem-solving skills to be able to help their clients identify and make changes to negative thought patterns and other harmful behaviors that might be contributing to their issues, says Dr. Lynn Ponton in an article for PsychCentral.
-Rapport-Building Skills
Counselors must possess a strong set of interpersonal skills to help establish rapport quickly with clients and develop strong relationships. They must give their undivided attention to clients and be able to cultivate trust. Counselors need to be able to place all of their focus on what their clients are saying and avoid being distracted by their own personal problems or concerns when they are in a session.
-Flexibility
Flexibility in counseling is defined as the ability to adapt and change the way you respond to meet your clients' needs. You don't stay rigid and stick to a predetermined treatment path when your clients require a different approach. Being flexible is one of the most important attributes of a professional counselor, says Gerald Juhnke, professor of counseling at the University of Texas at San Antonio, in an interview with "Counseling Today."
-Self-Awareness
Self-awareness is the ability to look within and identify your own unmet psychological needs and desires, such as a need for intimacy or the desire to be professionally competent. This ability prevents your issues from affecting or conflicting with those of your clients. Self-awareness has a major impact on a counselor's effectiveness, says professor David Hutchinson in his book, "The Essential Counselor."
-Multicultural Competency
Counselors help people from all walks of life. They must display multicultural competency and adopt a multicultural worldview, says Hutchinson. Multicultural competency means that you try to relate to and understand your clients regardless of their race, ethnicity, religious or political beliefs or socioeconomic background.
-Patience
As a counselor you need to have patience with your clients as they process the discussion. It may take them time to accept certain things and to move towards positive changes. Some people need to discuss something many times before they are prepared to make a move in any particular direction. Also, you are not likely to see large changes in an individual client; therefore, you must be okay with incremental progress in their lives and rejoice over small victories.
Good Listener Counselors spend a significant amount of time listening to their clients. You will do more listening than talking. You must be content to give the client time to express their story and their feelings. You will need to be intuitive in discerning what the client is really saying and “read between the lines”.
-Compassionate
It is very important that your clients feel your compassion for their problems and that they sense you truly care about them. You may not be able to relate to every issue that is shared with you, but you need to be able to have compassion for how it feels to be in their shoes. Genuine concern yields positive results.
-Nonjudgmental Counselors hear all kinds of private information and encounter all types of people. You may hear dark secrets from someone’s past involving such things as sexual or criminal behavior. You must do you best to refrain from judgment and instead communicate positive regard. There are times when it may be necessary to judge a particular behavior, but the client must not feel that you are judging them. Likewise, you may encounter clients of different races and/or cultures. You must not push your cultural or religious views upon them. Multicultural competency is a necessary skill. The counseling environment needs to be a safe place for a client to share their most intimate concerns.
-Research-Oriented
Being a counselor involves a significant amount of time spent researching. You will need to stay current on the research in order to help your clients. This involves reading books and journal articles on a regular basis. You do not learn everything you need to know while in college. Much of your knowledge will come from personal research after you have begun to see clients.
-Empathetic Empathy is the ability to understand and share the feelings of others. You need to be able to put yourself in the shoes of your client and understand the situation from their point of view. Even if you don’t agree with their perspective, you still need the ability to understand how it feels to them in order to address their issue effectively. However, it’s important that you are not too empathetic. Some people struggle as counselors because they are unable to maintain objectivity and therefore carry home the emotional stress of the job. The level of empathy necessary can be a fine line between helpful to client and harmful to counselor.
-Discrete Confidentiality is of upmost importance when you are a counselor.
You must be able to maintain confidentiality so the client can trust you with their most intimate concerns.
Encouraging The ability to encourage is important for a counselor. Many clients are struggling to find hope in their situation. One of the primary jobs of a counselor often involves instilling hope in a hopeless individual.
Self-Aware A counselor who is aware of their own fears, insecurities, and weaknesses will be effective in the therapeutic relationship. It is important that you do not react defensively to what a client shares. You must be able to keep your own feelings out of the session. You will be better able to do this if you are self-aware. In addition, self-aware individuals are more intuitive with regards to solving their own problems and can use that knowledge to help clients through similar situations.
-Authenticity
Authenticity is vital when working with clients. Clients will know if you are being fake or not showing genuine concern. They will not open up to you or trust your advice unless they feel you are genuine. This is even more critically important when working with teens.

---

marto answered the question on March 20, 2019 at 06:24