Transcript Counseling Process (Communication Skills)

Counseling Process
(Communication Skills)
(Communication Skills)
2. Introduction to Communication and the Skill of
Visibly Tuning in to CADETS (ATTENDING)
a. The Importance of Dialogue in Helping
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Conversations between Staff and Cadets should be a
therapeutic or helping dialogue.
(Communication Skills)
a. The Importance of Dialogue in Helping
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There are four requirements of true dialogue:
 Turn taking
 Connecting
 Mutual influencing
 Co-creating outcomes
(Communication Skills)
b. Visibly Tuning In To Cadets: The Importance of
Empathic Presence
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At some of the more dramatic moments in life, simply
being with another person is extremely important
Most people appreciate it when other pay attention to
them. By the same token, being ignored is often painful
Attending, or visibly tuning in to others, contributes to
empathic presence
Visibly tuning in as an expression of empathy tells
Cadets you are with them and puts you in a position to
listen carefully
(Communication Skills)
b. Visibly Tuning In To Cadets: The Importance of
Empathic Presence
(1) Nonverbal Behavior as a Channel of
Communication
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Body behavior (posture, body movements and gestures)
Eye behavior (eye contact, staring and eye movement)
Facial expressions (smiles, frowns, raised eyebrows,
twisted lips)
(Communication Skills)
b. Visibly Tuning In To Cadets: The Importance of
Empathic Presence
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Voice-related behavior (tone of voice, pitch, volume,
intensity, inflection, spacing of words, emphases, pauses,
silences, fluency)
Observable autonomic physiological responses
(quickened breathing, blushing, paleness and pupil
dilation)
Physical characteristics (fitness, height, weight and
complexion)
(Communication Skills)
b. Visibly Tuning In To Cadets: The Importance of
Empathic Presence
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Space (how close a person chooses to be during
conversation)
General appearance (grooming and dress)
(Communication Skills)
(2) Staff’s Nonverbal Behavior
 Before you begin interpreting the nonverbal
behavior of your Cadets, take a look at yourself.
 At times your nonverbal behavior is as important
than your words.
 Your nonverbal behavior influences Cadet for
better or worse.
 In your nonverbal behavior, Cadets read cues
that indicate the quality of your presence them.
(Communication Skills)
(2) Staff’s Nonverbal Behavior
 Attentive presence can invite or encourage them to
trust you, open up, and explore the significant
dimensions of their problem situations.
 Half-hearted presence can promote distrust and lead
to Cadets reluctance to reveal themselves to you.
 Part of listening is being sensitive of to Cadet’s
reactions to your nonverbal behavior.
 Effective Staff are mindful of the stream of
nonverbal messages they send to Cadets.
(Communication Skills)
(3) The Skill of Visibly Tuning in to Cadets
 You can use certain key nonverbal skills to
visibly tune into clients.
 These skills can be summarized in the acronym
SOLER.
(Communication Skills)
(3) The Skill of Visibly Tuning in to Cadet’s (Con’t)
 S: Face the client Squarely.
 O: Adopt an Open posture.
 L: Lean toward the other.
 E: Maintain good Eye contact.
 R: Try to be Relaxed.
(Communication Skills)
3. Active Listening: The Foundation of Understanding
a. Inadequate Listening
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Non-listening
Partial listening
Tape-recorder listening
Rehearsing
(Communication Skills)
b. Empathic Listening
Empathic listening centers on the kind of attending,
observing, and listening – the kind of “being with” –
needed to develop an understanding of Cadets and their
worlds.
(Communication Skills)
c. Listening to Words: Cadets stories, points of
view, decisions, and intentions or proposals
(1) Listening to stories
• Stories tend to be mixtures of clients’
 Experiences
 Behaviors
 Affect: Feelings, emotions, and moods
(Communication Skills)
c. Listening to Words: Cadets stories, points of
view, decisions, and intentions or proposals
(2) Listening to points of view
As Cadets tell their stories, explore possibilities
for a better future, set goals, make plans, and review
obstacles to accomplishing these plans, they often
share their points of view.
Cadets may share their points of view about
everything under the sun. The ones that are relevant
to their problem situation or undeveloped
opportunities need to be listened to and understood.
(Communication Skills)
c. Listening to Words: Cadets stories, points of
view, decisions, and intentions or proposals
(3) Listening to decisions
Decisions usually have implications for the
decision maker and for others. Sharing a decision
fully means spelling out the decision itself, the
reasons for the decision, the implications for self
and others, and some indication as to whether the
decision or any part of it is open to review.
(Communication Skills)
c. Listening to Words: Cadets stories, points of
view, decisions, and intentions or proposals
(4) Listening to intentions or proposals
Cadets state intentions, offer proposals, or make a
case for certain courses of action. A case often
includes what they want to do, the reasons for doing
it and the implications for themselves or others.
When clients talk about their concerns they mix all
these forms of discourse together.
(Communication Skills)
c. Listening to Words: Cadets stories, points of
view, decisions, and intentions or proposals
(5) “Hearing” opportunities and resources
If you listen only for problems, you will end up
talking mainly about problems, and in doing so you
will short change your clients. Every cadet has
something going for him or her. Your job is to spot
Cadets resources and help them invest these into
managing problem situations and opportunities. If
people generally use only a fraction of their
potential, then there is much to be tapped.
(Communication Skills)
d. Listening to Cadets nonverbal messages and
modifiers
Cadets send messages through their nonverbal
behavior. The ability of people to read these messages
can contribute to their relationship well being. Staffs
need to learn how to read these messages without
distorting or over interpreting them.
(Communication Skills)
d. Listening to Cadets nonverbal messages and
modifiers
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All kinds of nonverbal behavior can punctuate or
modify verbal communications in the following ways:
Confirming or repeating
Denying or confusing
Strengthening or emphasizing
Adding intensity
Controlling or regulating
(Communication Skills)
e. Processing what you hear: The thoughtful search
for meaning
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Thoughtful processing includes:
Identify key messages and feelings
Understand clients through context
Hear the slant or spin (Tough-minded listening and
processing)
(Communication Skills)
f. Listening to oneself: The Staff
Cadet/Officer internal conversation
The conversation Cadets have with themselves
during helping sessions is the “internal
conversation.” To be an effective helper, you
need to listen not only to the Cadet but also to
yourself.
Staff can use this second channel to listen to
what they are “saying” to themselves, their
nonverbal behavior, and their feeling and
emotions.
(Communication Skills)
g. The shadow side of listening to Cadets
(1) Forms of Distorted listening
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Filtered listening
Evaluative listening
Stereotype-based listening
Fact-centered rather than person-centered listening
Sympathetic listening
Interrupting
(Communication Skills)
4. Sharing Empathic Highlights:
Communicating and Checking Understanding
a. Responding skills
Staffs respond to Cadets in a variety of ways. They
share their understanding, they check to make sure
they got things right, they ask questions, they probe
for clarity, and they challenge clients in a variety of
ways. When Staffs communicate accurate
understandings to Cadets, they help their Cadets
understand themselves more fully.
(Communication Skills)
b. The three dimensions of responding skills:
Perceptiveness, know how, and assertiveness
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The communication skills involved in responding to
Cadets have three dimensions:
 Perceptiveness
 Know-how
 Assertiveness
(Communication Skills)
c. Sharing empathic highlights:
Communicating understanding to Cadets
If visibly tuning in and listening are the skills
that enable Staffs to get in touch with the world
of the Cadet, then sharing highlights is the skill
that enables them both to communicate their
understanding of that world and to check the
accuracy of that understanding.
(Communication Skills)
d. The key building blocks of empathic highlights
(1) The Basic Formula
Basic empathic understanding can be expressed in the
following stylized formula:
You feel…[name the correct emotion expressed by the
Cadet]…
Because…[indicate the correct experiences and
behaviors that give rise to the feelings].
(Communication Skills)
d. The key building blocks of empathic highlights
(2) Respond Accurately to Cadets Feelings, Emotions,
and Moods
Staffs need to respond to Cadets emotions in
such a way as to move the helping process forward.
This means identifying key emotions the Cadet
either expresses or discusses (Staff perceptiveness)
and weaving them into the dialogue (Staff knowhow) even when they are sensitive or part of a
messy situation (Staff courage or assertiveness).
(Communication Skills)
d. The key building blocks of empathic highlights
(2) Respond Accurately to Cadets Feelings, Emotions,
and Moods
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Use the right family of emotions and the right intensity.
Distinguish between expressed or discussed feelings.
Read and respond to feelings and emotions embedded in clients’
nonverbal behavior.
Be sensitive in naming emotions.
Use different ways to share highlights about feeling or emotions
Neither overemphasize nor underemphasize feelings, emotions, and
moods.
(Communication Skills)
d. The key building blocks of empathic highlights
(3) Respond Accurately to the Key Experiences and
Behaviors in Cadets Stories
Key experiences and behaviors give rise to Cadets feelings,
emotions, and moods. The “because” in the empathic highlight
formula is to be followed by an indication of the experiences
and behaviors that underlie the Cadets feelings.
(Communication Skills)
d. The key building blocks of empathic highlights
(4) Respond with Highlights to Cadets Points of View,
Decisions, and Proposals
By sharing highlights, you communicate to Cadets that you
are working hard at understanding them to foster constructive
change. This means not only understanding the key elements
of the stories they tell but also the key elements of anything
they share with you.
It goes without saying that points of view, decisions, and
proposals are, like stories, permeated to one degree or another
with feeling and emotions.
(Communication Skills)
e. Principles of sharing highlights
These guidelines are principles, not formulas to be
followed slavishly.
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Use empathic highlights at every stage and step of the helping
process.
Respond selectively to Cadets core messages
Respond to the context, not just the words
Use highlights as a mild social-influence process
Use highlights to stimulate movement in the helping process.
Recover from inaccurate understandings
Use empathic highlights to bridge diversity gaps
(Communication Skills)
f. Tactics for communicating highlights
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Give yourself time to think
Use short responses
Gear your responses to the Cadet but remain yourself
(Communication Skills)
g. A Caution: The importance of empathic
Relationships
In day-to-day conversation, sharing empathic highlights
is a tool of civility. Making an effort to get in touch with
your conversational partner’s frame of reference sends a
message of respect. Therefore, sharing highlights plays an
important part in building relationship. However, the
communication skills as practiced in helping settings don’t
automatically transfer to ordinary social settings of
everyday life.
(Communication Skills)
h. The shadow side of sharing empathic highlights
Some things that should be avoided:
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No response
Distracting questions
Clichés
Interpretations
Advice
Parroting
Sympathy and agreement
Faking it
(Communication Skills)
5. The art of probing and summarizing
Prompts and probes are:
Verbal and sometimes non-verbal tactics for helping
clients talk more freely and concretely about themselves.
(Communication Skills)
a. Nonverbal and verbal prompts:
 Nonverbal prompts
You can use various behaviors – bodily movements,
gestures, nods, eye movement, and the like as nonverbal
prompts
 Vocal and verbal prompts
You can use responses “um,” “uh-huh,” “sure,” “yes,” “I
see,” “ah,” “okay,” and “oh” as prompts, provided you use
them intentionally and they are not simply a sign that your
attention is flagging, you don’t know what else to do, or you
are on automatic pilot.
(Communication Skills)
b. Different forms of probes
Probes used judiciously, help Cadets name, take notice of,
explore, clarify, or further define any issue. Designed to provide
clarity and move things forward, probes can take different forms:
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Statements
Requests
Questions
Words or phrases that are, in effect, Questions or requests
(Communication Skills)
c.
Using questions effectively
Novices and inept counselors, tend to ask
too many
questions. When in doubt about what to say or do, they ask
questions that add no value. It is as if gathering information were
the goal of the helping interview. Social intelligence calls for
restraint. However, questions can be an important part of your
interactions with clients. Two guidelines to follow:
 Ask a limited number of questions
 Ask open ended questions
(Communication Skills)
d. Principles in the use of probes
Use probes to:
 Help Cadets engage as fully as possible in the
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therapeutic dialogue.
Help Cadets achieve concreteness and clarity.
Help Cadets complete the picture.
Help Cadets get a balanced view of problem
situations and opportunities.
Challenge Cadets and help them challenge
themselves.
(Communication Skills)
f. The art of summarizing: providing focus and
direction
There are certain times when summaries prove
particularly useful:
 At the beginning of a new session
 During a session that is going nowhere
 When a Cadet gets stuck
 When a Cadet needs a new perspective
(Communication Skills)
g. How to become proficient in using communication
skills
Understanding communication skills and how they fit into the
counseling process is one thing. Becoming proficient in their
use is another. Some trainees think that they can learn these
“soft” skills easily and fail to put in the kind of hard work and
practice needed to become fluent in them.
(Communication Skills)
h. Shadow-side realities of communication skills
Being good at communication skills is not the same as being
good at helping. Moreover, an overemphasis on
communication skills can turn helping into a great deal of talk
with very little action, and few outcomes.
(Communication Skills)
Summary and Review