Georgia State Ethical Codes Case Study

Georgia State Ethical Codes If John was employed in Georgia, there are a couple of ethical rule that he would have breached. The first ethical code is Rule 135-7.01 (c), it says “participating in dual relationships with clients that create a conflict of interest which could impair the licensee’s professional judgment, harm the client, or compromise the therapy” (GA Code of Ethics, 2016). John has entered into a dual or multiple relationship with Ben through the acceptance of Ben’s friend request. Multiple relationship means “a therapist is in a professional role with a person in addition to another role with that same individual, or with another person who is close to that individual” (Bratt, W, 2010). John is not only in a client-counselor

The first mistake that John made was accepting friend requests from clients. The ACA board of directors advises that it is better not to accept personal friend requests from clients, it causes boundaries to be construed between client-counselor relationship and friendship (Remley & Herlihy, pg. 258- 259). Not accepting friend requests from clients under any circumstances will prevent ethical codes from being violated. If John had any confusion as to whether accepting a friend request was acceptable, he could have contacted the counselor who was co-leading with him or the supervisor of the group to ask questions on the way to ethically handle social media situations. If John’s choice was to not seek out any help, he could have asked himself a few simple questions: Is entering into a relationship in addition to the professional one necessary, or should I avoid it? Can the multiple relationship potentially cause harm to the client? If harm seems unlikely, would the additional relationship prove beneficial? Is there a risk that the multiple relationship could disrupt the therapeutic relationship? Can I evaluate this matter objectively? (Bratt W, 2010). These are the same questions that counselors use to prevent multiple relationships, and

A counselor being able to admit when he or she is wrong gives a positive model for the client to follow. One issue that people have a problem with is being able to admit when they are wrong and not blaming it on others. When counselors own up to their problems the client will see that the counselor is honest and is not exempt from making mistakes. John can talk to Ben about his mistake in accepting his friend request because it is a over step in boundaries for to have close personal relationships with clients. John can talk to Jeanne about the mistake in responding the way he did. John can admit that his comment seems discriminatory because he referenced that because she is a woman, he could not accept her friend request. John could apologize to both clients for the confusion and possible harm he could have caused in their client-counselor relationship. To further help the situation and meet the need of the clients to have a social media connection with the drug and alcohol addiction recovery group, John could suggest making a separate social media group that can include all the members of the group, and make sure that it is strictly professional and pertains to the welfare of the clients in the group. John would need to unfriend Ben and connect both Ben and Jeanne to the separate online group for the addiction recovery group.