Many people gravitate towards the helping professions because they have a desire to make a meaningful difference in the lives of those who are suffering. Perhaps they are drawn to this work because they want to heal themselves, or because they benefited from counseling or therapy. Friends and family members may have told them that they are good listeners who offer sound advice. Clearly, the motives and reasons for entering the helping professions may be as varied as the number of helpers! Regardless of what is fueling their desire, helpers must acquire the knowledge and develop the skills, attitudes, and self-awareness to be helpful. Although this may seem unnecessary to state, despite good intentions, counselor and social work trainees sometimes fall into the trap of engaging in behaviors that actually are not helpful. Through the process of training, they must challenge themselves to differentiate between effective and ineffective practices in order to hone their clinical judgment and develop competence.

• Complete the Relationship Skills Rating Scale Quiz from page 107 and then a 200 wrd short summary response to this assignment and discuss what you have learned about your own relationship skills and accepting clients.

Discuss these questions in your assignment:

• What are your relationship strengths?
• Which areas do you see that need improvement according to the scale?
• What might you do to improve this skill?

REFERENCE:

• Kottler, A. & Shepard, D. (2015).Introduction to counseling: Voices from the field (8th ed.) CT: Cengage
• ISBN:978-1285084763