Part%202%20The%20PIC%20Model:%20The%20Role%20of%20Counselors

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Part 2The PIC ModelThe Role of Counselors
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• PIC provides a framework for a dynamic and
  interactive process which emphasizes career
  counselors role as decision counselors, whose
  aim is to facilitate an active decision-making
  process.

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The 3 Roles of Career Counselors

• Discover what stage of the career-decision making
  process the individual is in currently.
• Review the individuals previous career
  decision-making stage(s), and, if needed, repeat
  one or more of them.
• Guide the clients through the remaining stages.
• -- Thus, the models components can be adapted
  according to the counselees style and needs, and
  the counselors judgment.

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All three stages of the PIC have the similar
underlying structure of a dynamic
counselor-client dialogue

• First, the counselor presents the goal of the
  stage and the clients expected role in it.
• Second, the client actively participates by
  providing answers to questions presented by the
  counselor. The counselor uses his or her
  expertise and impression of the clients unique
  personality and abilities to monitor the adequacy
  of the clients responses.
• Third, the counselor discusses with the client
  what occurred in the second phase and the
  outcomes.

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Before Beginning the Decision-Making Process
Assessing the Clients Readiness

1. Evaluating the clients general level of career
   indecision (e.g., Career Decision Scale),
2. Examining his or her specific difficulties in
   reaching a decision (e.g., the Career
   Decision-making Difficulties Questionnaire)
3. Assessing career choice anxiety (e.g., Career
   Factors Inventory)
4. Discovering dysfunctional thinking patterns in
   career problem-solving and decision-making (e.g.,
   the Career Thoughts Inventory)
5. Identifying dysfunctional beliefs (e.g., the
   Career Beliefs Inventory).

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Career Decision-Making Difficulties

• The first step in helping individuals is to
  locate the focuses of the difficulties they face
  in making career decisions
• Gati, Krausz, and Osipow (1996) proposed a
  taxonomy for describing the difficulties (see
  Figure 1)

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Figure 1 Locating Career Decision-making
Difficulties based on the taxonomy of Gati,
Krausz, Osipow (1996)
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The Career Decision-making Difficulties
Questionnaire (CDDQ)

• The Career Decision-making Difficulties
  Questionnaire (CDDQ) was developed to test this
  taxonomy and serve as a means for assessing
  individuals career decision-making difficulties
• Cronbach Alpha internal consistency estimates
  .70-.90 for the 3 major categories, .95 for the
  total CDDQ score

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Empirical Structure of the Difficulties (N
10,000 2004)
Lack of motivations
Indecisiveness
Dysfunctional beliefs
Lack of info about self
Lack of info about process
LoI about occupations
LoI about addition sources of help
Unreliable Information
Internal conflicts
External conflicts
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Computerized Assessment of Career
Decision-Making Difficulties

• The CDDQ was incorporated into a career-related
  self-help-oriented free of charge Internet site
  (www.cddq.org).
• Research has shown that the Internet and the
  paper-and-pencil versions of the CDDQ are
  equivalent (Gati Saka, 2001 Kleiman Gati,
  2004).
• The CDDQ was found suitable for different
  countries and cultures and has been translated
  into 18 languages.

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Increasing the Clients Readiness

• Dealing with general indecisiveness.
  Indecisiveness is a generalized inability to make
  decisions. If the clients degree of
  indecisiveness appears to require a more intense
  and longer intervention, the client should be
  referred to relevant clinical counseling.
• Dismantling dysfunctional beliefs and thoughts.
  Beliefs such as There is a perfect occupation
  for me or The counselor will find me the right
  occupation may impede the decision-making
  process and lead to less than optimal
  career-counseling outcomes. It is therefore
  important to elicit and locate the clients
  dysfunctional beliefs and dismantle them as part
  of the preparation phase.
• Explaining the steps of the decision-making
  process to the client. This includes explaining
  the basic rationale behind the systematic
  procedure and its advantages over a haphazard
  choice, describing the three stages of the PIC
  model, and discussing each stages goal, process,
  and expected outcome.

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(1)Prescreening the Potential Alternatives

• (a) locating the career-related aspects that are
  most important to the client
• Clients can construct a list of relevant aspects
  by themselves, based on their life experience and
  aspirations.
• The clients more important aspects can be
  elicited using Kellys repertory grid or using
  Tylers Vocational Card Sort
• Counselors can facilitate this step also by
  presenting the client with a list of the
  potentially relevant aspects

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(1)Prescreening the Potential Alternatives

• (b) ranking the selected aspects by importance
• To help the client create a rank-order of
  aspects, the counselor might ask guiding
  questions, such as You said that independence
  is the most important aspect for you. What
  aspect would you regard as second in importance?

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(1)Prescreening the Potential Alternatives

• (c) defining the compromise range for each of the
  selected aspects
• The counselor is expected to encourage the client
  to locate and report his or her optimal
  preferences, yet also to consider compromising on
  within-aspect levels.
• For example You said that for the aspect
  length of training your optimal level would be
  a 2-year college program. Would you be willing
  to compromise and regard a 4-year college program
  as acceptable as well?

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(1)Prescreening the Potential Alternatives

• (d) Sequential Elimination comparing the
  individuals preferences with the alternatives
  characteristics
• Provide the client with feedback, including
  examples of the eliminated options in each
  aspect.
• For example With respect to the aspect length
  of training, the following occupations are
  incompatible with your preference for a 2-year or
  4-year college program medicine, psychology, law
  ....
• Using computerized systems such as CHOICES,
  DISCOVER, and MBCD (Making Better Career
  Decisions (http//mbcd.intocareers.org) can help
  provide such feedback.

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(1)Prescreening the Potential Alternatives

• (e) Testing the sensitivity of the results to
  possible changes in preferences
• Checking whether the reported preferences still
  seem acceptable Are you certain that you are
  not willing to consider graduate studies?
• Understanding why certain alternatives, which
  were considered intuitively appealing by the
  client before the systematic search, were
  eliminated High-school teaching was eliminated
  from your list because it is incompatible with
  your preferences for a very high income, high
  flexibility in working hours, and short
  training.
• Locating alternatives that are almost promising
  examining the validity of the information about
  the critical aspect and considering the
  possibility of compromising in that aspect Your
  wish to use only high artistic ability at work
  led to the elimination of several occupations
  which are compatible with your preferences in all
  the other important aspects. Would you like to
  also consider occupations requiring moderate
  artistic ability, while expressing your artistic
  skills in avocational activities?

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(1)Prescreening the Potential Alternatives

• Helping explicating preferences
• If at any point during the prescreening the
  client has difficulties in explicating his or her
  preferences, the counselor can help by directing
  the client to relevant past experiences and the
  clients emotional reactions to those experiences
  
• For example, if the client is unsure whether
  teamwork is an important aspect for her, or how
  willing she is to compromise on this aspect, the
  counselor may help elicit memories of
  participation on school committees or in youth
  organizations, and the emotions associated with
  them.

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(2) In-depth Exploration of the Promising
Alternatives

• Verify compatibility of the alternative with the
  clients preferences in the most important
  aspects (e.g., a person who works in one of the
  considered occupations may mention that she is
  given much independence in choosing both what to
  do and how to do it)
• Consider the compatibility of the alternative
  with the clients preferences in the less
  important aspects as well. The client may
  consider going through the prescreening process
  again, based on revised preferences
• See whether he or she is willing to meet the
  requirements specified by the core aspects
• Examine the probability of actualizing the
  alternative, explore possible ways of increasing
  the probability of actualizing certain promising
  alternatives with the counselor

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(3) Choosing the Most Suitable Alternative

• (a) Comparing and evaluating the suitable
  alternatives
• clients can make approximate, local comparisons
  of the various alternatives advantages by
  combining some characteristics of one alternative
  that are equivalent to some combination of
  characteristics of the other.
• For example, the advantage of alternative x over
  y in terms of expected higher income may be
  roughly equivalent to the advantage of
  alternative y in terms of better work environment
  and higher variety.
• (b) Selecting additional suitable alternatives

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(3) Choosing the Most Suitable Alternative

• (c) Reflecting on the decision-making process.
• The implementation of the decision is liable to
  be delayed or avoided if the client does not
  truly feel certain in the decision.
• Counselors can help clients locate the source of
  their lack of confidence and discrepancies
  between intuition and systematic processing, and
  then either confirm their decision or reach a
  different one.
• If the counselor feels that the systematic
  process has led to an optimal decision, but
  various emotional factors (e.g., fear of
  commitment, anxiety, low self-esteem, lack of
  motivation etc.) deter the client from following
  through with implementation, the client and
  counselor should engage collaboratively in
  cognitive restructuring, affective regulation and
  stress management.
• (4) Completing the Decision-Making Process
  Implementing the steps that need to be carried
  out in order to actualize the clients chosen
  alternative

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Identifying the Clients Stage in the Process

• It is possible to start the PIC process from the
  middle according to the clients needs
• However, it is recommended to start the process
  from the beginning, in order to
• Strengthen confidence in the occupational
  alternatives considered by the client
• Eliminate inadequate alternatives considered by
  the client
• Offer additional alternatives that were not
  considered by the client so far
• Teach decisions skills aspect-based instead of
  occupation-based approach

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Concluding Remarks

• The PIC model is flexible and dynamic it allows
  clients to move back and forth in the
  decision-making process
• The PIC model constitutes a framework for a
  decision-making process that allows clients to
  play not only an active role but a leading one
• Informal reports of career counselors suggest
  that they often, implicitly and intuitively, use
  a PIC-like, three-stage approach in relevant
  career counseling cases

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Still

• Career decision-making requires collecting a vast
  amount of information
• Complex information-processing is needed
• But luckily, information and communication
  technologies are available
• More and more career counselors incorporate the
  use of one or more Computer-Assisted Career
  Guidance Systems, or an Internet version of such
  systems, into the face-to-face career counseling
  process
• The use of an Internet-based career-guidance
  system for the clinical implementation of the PIC
  model will be demonstrated in the next part of
  the workshop