Consulting and Coaching - Essay Example

The career coach seems to expand the role of the career counselor by combining several types of consulting processes. Career coaches put themselves in mentoring roles with their clients and they seem to be more business-oriented. One of the things that career coaches do is guide a client towards making better career goals, help them create strategies to make more money, and make them more valuable to their boss (Simpson, 2006).

            In using these models with clients, I would concentrate on helping my clients identify their strengths and weaknesses using career coaching. This would help the client take more control of their own career needs. As a consultant, I would work with groups rather than individuals because it seems that groups and organizations are more conducive to consulting.

Reference

Simpson, L.R. (2006). Consultation, consulting, and supervision in Capuzzi, D., and       Stauffer, M.D. (Eds.). Career counseling: Foundations, perspectives, and applications. PPS. 230-253. MA: Pearson.

Assignment 3

            When comparing the roles of a career counselor in consulting, coaching, and supervision, there are many distinctive similarities and differences. The focus of these three is similar in that they all work with people. With consulting and coaching, the client is more important. In supervision, the focus is on the counselor and their performance. In consulting, the focus is on developing a plan that will help the client's functioning. Coaching is more action-oriented than the other two and is focused on specific interventions for specific clients.

            The goals of the three roles are to provide feedback in some way. As a consultant, the role is to "advise and educate" (Simpson, 2006, p. 247) the consultee. In coaching, the coach engages actively with the client to identify their skills, goals, and talents to show them how to maximize their potential. In supervision, the supervisor provides feedback to the counselor to help them improve their skills to better serve their clients (Simpson, 2006).

            When looking at the examples, both consulting and coaching worked directly with professional clients who wanted to improve something. In the policeman's example, he wanted to develop a new program. The coaching example is similar because the sales manager wants to improve himself by designing a plan that will help him realize his dream of entrepreneurship. In supervision, the counselor also needs assistance with a problem but it is in how to deal with their clients.

            Under roles and responsibilities, the consultant's role seems to be the most distant from their clients because they must assess the problem, identify the problem, and prepare a plan that goes to the consultee. The coach also does this but forms the point of view that the client is capable of creating their plan with the coach's help. In supervision, the counselor is taught to provide holistic care to their clients (Simpson, 2006).

            John is a 17-year-old high school student who is deciding on a college major. He is interested in meteorology and he is strong in Math and Science (Starkey and Rasmus, 2006). He has taken career tests and found many occupations that could work to his strengths. As a career coach, the practitioner would begin to work towards helping John identify his strengths and weaknesses. The coach would move him towards action that would help him find his college major. The career coach would also help John become empowered to do his work. The coach would actively work with John to help him to understand his strengths and weaknesses as well as his skills, goals, and talents (Simpson, 2006). This would mean that John would learn how to maximize his potential.

            The career coach would be observing John's career situation and help him develop a plan of action that would include his current situation and a plan for at least his first year in college.

            In terms of consulting, the aspect that would be important is the "advice and educate" aspect because it would give him the information, he needs to make a decision.