Experts in counseling have described a number of qualities that counselors should possess. Pick what you consider to be the five most important qualities and explain your rationale for picking them. In addition, discuss what a counselor can do to improve

Question

himself or herself professionally throughout his or her career.

What will be an ideal response?

Answer 1

Five qualities of an effective counselor and ways counselors can improve professionally throughout their career.
• Students should choose from five of the following qualities of counselors and describe their rationale for each:
• Curiosity and inquisitiveness
• Ability to listen
• Comfort with conversation
• Empathy and understanding
• Emotional insightfulness
• Introspection
• Capacity for self-denial
• Tolerance of intimacy
• Comfort with power
• Ability to laugh
• Intellectual competence
• Energy
• Flexibility
• Support
• Goodwill
• Self-awareness
• Options for what counselors can do to improve professionally throughout their career:
• Monitor biases
• Listen attentively
• Ask for clarification
• Explore racial and cultural differences in open and positive ways
• Practice “alonetime”
• Modify environmental as well as individual and interpersonal factors to avoid compassion fatigue and burnout
• Associate with healthy individuals
• Work with committed colleagues and organizations that have a sense of mission
• Be reasonably committed to a theory of counseling
• Use stress-reduction exercises
• Modify environmental stressors
• Engage in self-assessment
• Periodically examine and clarify counseling roles, expectations, and beliefs
• Obtain personal therapy
• Set aside free and private time
• Maintain an attitude of detached concern when working with clients
• Retain an attitude of hope