Theories Of Career Counselling

Theoretical assumptions:
People used to see career counselling as making a decision in regard to which career path to follow after having one or two meetings with a career counsellor (Krumboltz, Foley & Cotter, 2013). According to Hall (2004) this few has changed over the past two decades and it is clear that career development is not a onetime choice but rather a lifelong process. Savickas (2012) argues that the form of career intervention must change just like the form of work changes to reflect the labor needs of the twenty-first century. Krumboltz, Foley and Cotter (2013) argues that clients must create more satisfying lives for themselves with the help of counsellors. A model of career counselling, the happenstance learning theory, helps

There are several factors that determine decision-making, which includes learning experiences, genetic factors, environmental factors and task approach skills (Mitchell & Krumboltz, 1990). According to Krumboltz (2009) happenstance learning theory has four propositions. The first proposition is that “assessments should be used to stimulate learning – not to match personal characteristics with occupational characteristics” (Krumboltz, 2009). According to Schreuder and Coetzee (2011), personality and development are determined by learning experiences. Shoffner (2006) suggests that it is important for clients to realise how important it is to expand their knowledge, skills and interests by learning and adapting to change and it is therefore an important task of the counsellor to encourage the clients to do

Mitchell and Krumboltz (2012) also argues that a barrier to set goals and to make satisfying choices is to have irrational believes about certain aspects such as career choices and development. Amundson (2009) suggest that clients need to identify these irrational beliefs to move past them and it is therefore important for the career counsellor to help clients identify them. According to the career decision-making theory, the primary focus of decision making and career development is learning through experiences and human interaction (Mitchell & Krumboltz, 2012). The third proposition of the happenstance theory states that it is important to focus on client behaviour (Krumboltz, 2009). “The success of counselling is assessed by what the client accomplishes in the real world outside the counselling session” (Krumboltz, 2009). Mitchell and Krumboltz (2012) also suggests that to shape the behaviour of clients, positive role models and positive reinforcement can be used by