New Zealand Journal of Counselling
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“But They Only Came Once!” The Single Session in Career Counselling
Get PDFClients often come only once to a counsellor. As a practitioner, Rosemary wondered what happens next when clients only attend a single counselling session. Does career counselling work, even if there is just one session? Do people make changes? This article reports on a small study of clients from a career counselling service who came for a single session, usually with concerns about career choice or change. Results indicate that virtually all of them found the session helpful and most made short- or long-term changes as a result. Their comments provide insight into the potential value of even a single counselling session
School Counsellors, Values Learning, and The New Zealand Curriculum
Get PDFThe writer reports on a professional development workshop with a group of 16 school counsellors, which explored how their counselling work with students related to values learning. They found that counselling with students frequently, even typically, involves helping the students to develop the value thinking abilities outlined in The New Zealand Curriculum (Ministry of Education, 2007). The wide variety of therapeutic approaches that counsellors employ is illustrated. The distribution of power in the counsellor–client relationship is also explored, along with its effects for the learning environment in the counselling room. This study will be useful to school counsellors, teachers, and school leaders who are interested in ways in which the counselling room is a location for values learning, and how the distinctiveness of that learning environment can be protected and enhanced. 
Finding My Penis in the Counselling Room
Get PDFThe powerful cultural discourses within which we live, and the stereotypical gender constructions that impinge upon each one of us, produce internalised power relations that can be both oppressive and liberating. We internalise power dynamics which we enact within ourselves and in relations with others. Such power differentials also converge or collide in the counselling room. It is therefore vital that counsellors practise with a clear and deep self-awareness of both our own internal insecurities and absorbed gender constructions. As a female counsellor grappling with these challenges, I decided to write this article using colloquialisms for male genitalia as a metaphorical attempt to resist such stereotypes and share my own vulnerabilities that impact upon my practice. This is an invitation to other practitioners to embrace their tender spots and bring them into connection with others
Evaluation of a Counselling Service for the Elderly
Get PDFAn evaluation of WellElder, a counselling service for the elderly, was conducted using four years of accumulated client information and counselling outcome data. This information was collated, analysed, and compared with the New Zealand literature and with information from other countries on counselling the elderly. Findings showed that there was considerable similarity between clients using the WellElder service and clients of all ages at other community-based services in New Zealand and abroad. In addition, outcome data demonstrated that the large majority of clients were receiving brief counselling, fewer than six sessions, and that the counselling being offered to clients was effective in meeting their needs. The implications of these findings are discussed in relation to agency policy and development
Counsellors’ Reflections on Disenfranchised Grief
Get PDFIn this exploratory, qualitative study, six counsellors were interviewed about their understandings of the concept of disenfranchised grief (Doka, 1989, 2002) and perspectives on their work with clients who had experienced non-deathrelated losses. Further aims were to explore the extent to which counsellors’ own beliefs, values, and personal experiences of loss influenced this work and to gain an understanding of the ways in which practitioners may be affected when working with those who grieve. Key findings suggest that both personal experiences of loss and understandings of grief models influence counsellors’ work with their clients. The practitioners who were interviewed varied in their knowledge about the concept of disenfranchised grief. Their own personal experiences of loss influenced their practice. The complex nature of grieving processes was confirmed, as well as the multifaceted impact on counsellors of working with loss and grief. The implications for counsellors’ professional development and support are considered
Paying attention to wairua: Healing the intangible
Get PDFThis article discusses the crucial importance of two necessary priorities in the work of practitioners for addressing whānau violence that were noted in a 2004 report published in Aotearoa New Zealand by Kruger et al.: reconnecting a person’s wairua to the other dimensions of their person, and doing so while being mindful of their whakapapa. The discussion is conducted via the auto-ethnographical reflection of Fay Pouesi, kaitiaki of Black Rain, a kaupapa Māori approach that pays attention to wairua across generations, which has been successfully addressing historical, intergenerational and current trauma. It also notes the challenges that arise for training others – as Fay is increasingly being asked to do – in healing the intangible within a western-influenced environment
Encouraging counsellors to engage in collaborative practice-based research (PBR).
Get PDFIncreasing research productivity among practicing counsellors has long been an aim of the New Zealand Association of Counsellors as evidenced by several articles addressing the topic published in the New Zealand Journal of Counselling over the last 20 years. Similarly, in a profession increasingly pressured to be more accountable, it is no longer considered good enough for counsellors and counselling agencies merely to espouse the "art of counselling" perspective in justifying their practices. Instead, researching counselling, especially counselling impact, is vital to the wider acceptance of the profession. Such research depends, in large part, on encouraging more counsellors to participate in researching their own casework, either as individuals or as a member of a research team or group. This article references two examples of the second of those options (specifically, collaboration between a counsellor in private practice and outside researchers) to demonstrate that even rudimentary collaboration between counsellors and researchers can produce useful knowledge about the process and impact of counselling and can have positive effects on a counsellor's practice. Increased collaboration of this sort is one way to fulfil the need for counsellors and researchers to generate more practice-based research (PBR), especially outcome research (Sexton et al., 1997)
COVID-19: Experiences and strategies of secondary school counsellors in the 2021 Auckland lockdown.
Get PDFThis article reports the findings from a facilitated peer group discussion among secondary school counsellors on 4 October 2021 during the most prolonged lockdown in Auckland since the worldwide COVID-19 outbreak. With the first author as facilitator, four participants (co-authors of this paper) discussed the psychosocial effect of the lockdown on the wellbeing of secondary school students. These included increased anxiety and constant low mood, issues related to Information and Communication Technology (ICT) and the use of devices for education and communication, complex dynamics at home, and the different challenges and demands on counsellors that resulted from these effects. The participants also shared counselling strategies they had used in lockdown to work as effectively as possible for their clients. These included intentional therapeutic approaches that were flexible and creative, resilience building, and collaboration with the wider community of care. The counsellors also reflected on their selfcare strategies to prevent burnout and the silver linings they perceived from COVID-19
Supervising practitioners in the sexual violence sector in Aotearoa New Zealand, who are themselves survivors of sexual harm: Examining potential counter-transferential issues.
Get PDFThis article builds upon existing literature about the supervision needs of practitioners who are themselves adult survivors of childhood sexual harm, and who work in the field of sexual violence. It examines the personal and professional development needs of these survivor-practitioners and highlights potential issues that may surface in their work with adult survivors of childhood sexual harm. Particular attention is given to the counter-transferential dynamics between the survivor-supervisee, their client, and at times their supervisor. The question of what effective supervision looks like in this field of work is explored, with an emphasis on recognising potential counter-transferential issues at play for survivor-practitioners working in social services agencies that address the impacts of sexual harm in Aotearoa New Zealand
Strengthening we-ness in working with intercultural couples.
Get PDFThis article reports on a qualitative grounded theory study of how intercultural couples develop and nurture their relationships. Interviews were conducted with 33 individuals living in New Zealand who were part of heterosexual intercultural relationships where one person was Korean and the other was non-Korean. The findings indicated that intercultural couples work together to develop and nurture their relationships across three phases: (a) building a solid foundation, (b) striving for better relationships, and (c) embracing the relationship, culminating in a grounded theory referred to as strengthening we-ness. We argue that counsellors should understand the importance of strengthening we-ness when working with intercultural couples