NCMHCE Exam Review Strategies

welcome to the NCMHCE exam review podcast I'm your host dr. dawn elise snipes this podcast is brought to you by Counselor toolbox podcast and allceus.com counselor continuing education where you can get unlimited on-demand CEUs for $59 or unlimited live webinars for $40.00 go to all CEUs dot-com hey there everybody and welcome to today's episode of the NCM hce exam review today we're going to be talking about group and career counseling now this is not going to be the most exciting episode that you're going to listen to but there's a lot of important stuff here that you will probably need to know for the test we're going to review the indications and contraindications for group therapy and talk about the types of groups and the stages of group formation identify the group curative factors and review the therapists role in group then we're going to move on to just briefly touching on the models of career counseling and looking at career counseling assessment instruments when you're doing your scenarios on the exam you may have a client who would benefit from career counseling and would need some sort of an assessment done it's going to be important for you to know that main instruments that are out there there are tons of them out there so I'm going to present some of the most common instruments hopefully those will be the ones on a test but I've also given you links to a couple of web pages where you can find more information just in case you want to brush up on all the assessment instruments that are out there let's start by talking about group indicators for group generally you know the most conservative approach to group is using group for interpersonal issues like communication issues argumentativeness self-esteem those sorts of things however we do know that group can be really effective with effective issues depression and anxiety we know that group can also bet be helpful for what I call behavioral issues addiction relapse prevention coping skills it can also be helpful for cognitive issues now I'm not talking about psychosis nor am I really talking about personality disorders what I'm talking about is your cognitive behavioral therapy rebt helping people identify cognitive distortions and irrational thoughts that are keeping them stuck and group can also be used to address interpersonal and social issues the client needs to be verbally cognitively and physically able to participate they need to be able to talk in group and receive information verbally and understand what's going on people with fetal alcohol spectrum disorder for example may talk at a very high level however they may receive information and encode information at a much lower level more like at the level of you know sixth or eighth grade there for people with feel alcohol spectrum disorders may struggle in groups especially groups with people that are chronologically similar in age if they are in groups with other people with FASD then you may be able to work that out but you do want to make sure that the client not only can talk the talk but also can understand and benefit from what's being said they need to cognitively be able to participate when I worked in the dual diagnosis facility a lot of times we would have clients in detox and you can't do groups in detox that the clients in detox are you know just there and they are still trying to come out of the haze that was brought on by the substance use therefore group is not appropriate or effective really in detox situations however once they got over to residential or intensive outpatient we could start addressing cognitions the client again needs to be able to take the information encode it and then apply it to their situation they need to be able to understand why is this meaningful to me and physically able to participate is another one that we don't necessarily think of all the time but they need to be able to stay awake in detox again people were often exhausted and they weren't feeling well so they were having a hard time really focusing on what anybody said whether it was the assessment or the psycho-educational support group meetings or whatever was going on in detox we really didn't expect people to get much out of those groups what we wanted them to do was start getting into a routine of getting up and showing up in order to benefit from group though they need to be physically able they need to be not in excruciating pain they need to be not overly sick or detoxing they need to be able to be physically present and you may have some people who have low back issues for example and they can't sit for an hour or an hour and a half straight a lot of us can't do that that's okay as long as you make reasonable accommodations they're physically able to participate with accommodations the client also has to be motivated to change clients who don't want to change are going to go into group they're gonna sit down and they're going to keep checking their watch trying to wait for group to be over we want them to be motivated to be there and it's incumbent upon the therapist to help clients see how can this benefit me and I've done several videos in counselor toolbox podcast on increasing motivation addressing resistance one of the things that we need to look at when we're working with people in group is why are they here what will help them get motivated to change they may not have the same goals that I do in substance abuse I would work with people who are involuntary and their goal was not to stop using substances that's just it wasn't in their in their mindset their goal was to get off probation well okay you want to get off probation I want you to not use substances but you have to be clean you can't test dirty you can't use substances while you're on probation so let's work together to help you figure out how to stay clean while you're on probation and then what you do after that that's you know your business that was a way to start helping them get more motivated to change the client needs to find peer support and feedback beneficial if they are not willing to take in peer support if they are not willing to receive feedback or they can't tolerate feedback they're not going to be appropriate for group and the client needs to have a relatively positive view of group therapy some people have seen too much television that where groups everybody sits around in a circle and they all look bored and one person monopolizes the conversation that's not necessarily how group has to go it's important to orient people to group so they do have a positive view of what can come out of group therapy contraindications for group therapy well like I said earlier people who refuse to participate if they are just a butt in a seat wow that may help your financial bottom line that is not helping them and that's not what the test is about the test is about helping clients not increasing your finances you need to have people who can honor group agreements including behavioral and attendance agreements if they can't do this they are not appropriate for group therapy their behavioral issues could be impulsivity related to mania or ADHD it could be paranoid delusions related to schizophrenia it could be that they have a job where their schedule changes every week and they can't guarantee that they are going to be able to make group every week well that's going to be a problem because that really disrupts the group milieu if people are not committed to it and attending you know each week for 12 weeks or whatever it is people who are in crisis or have a low tolerance for anxiety and frustration or are markedly depressed or suicidal are often not appropriate for group therapy think about group therapy somebody may be talking and it may trigger another client if the other client cannot tolerate distress for even a moment then they may start decompensating which would take the focus off the person who is talking you need to have people who can relate but they can also tolerate distress and tolerate frustration receive feedback and and clients who are markedly depressed or who have significant trauma issues group therapy is generally not the best choice if if they have these issues going on they have a lot of stuff that may be more effectively processed in individual sessions you don't want people's who's people whose defenses would clash with the dynamics of a group some people's defenses are to withdraw which may make the group feel like the person doesn't care some people's defenses are to make light of the situation and be humorous which can be seen as insensitive by group members you want to make sure that you're getting people together who are generally going to be able to create a safe environment you don't want people who can't tolerate strong emotions and I've had groups before in residential where we would have a client in in group and another person would be talking and would start to get upset or start to get loud and it would trigger other people in the group who couldn't tolerate that person's intensity it's important to make sure that people can tolerate intensity if you've got somebody who is a victim of abuse it's really important to recognize that those if somebody in the else in the group starts emoting it could be triggering or traumatizing to your survivors that are in the group you want to have at least a back-up plan for them getting out but in terms of the exam if they can't tolerate strong emotions or are markedly depressed or suicidal or psychotic you're not going to want to put them in group people who experience severe internal discomfort in groups are also not appropriate for group therapy my grandmother for example was raised in a time in her culture it was not okay to be telling everybody your stuff it was not okay to be open with other people especially other people who were not family and whom you very barely knew therefore being in group and sharing was would be terribly uncomfortable to her culturally you want to look at is group therapy appropriate for this person now we'll get in a few minutes to the different types of groups some types of groups may be appropriate psycho-educational groups may be appropriate for a wider range of people therapy groups and support groups may not be well here we go types of groups and I've broken this down into three sort of categories if you will first we're going to talk about is you can have groups that are gender based you can have a women's group or a men's group where you talk about issues that are related to people's gender identity you can have something that's a group that's topic based a depression group a group on PTSD now remember before I said you don't want to have people who who have experienced a lot of trauma in a group and you don't where they're sharing details of what's going on topic based PTSD groups usually focus on identifying symptoms triggers for symptoms and mitigating those symptoms topic based groups can also include addiction or postpartum depression any sort of diagnosis if you will it can all you can also have groups that center around something like divorce if you're you've got a lot of clients who have adjustment disorder that is resulting from a current divorce and you can have skills based groups and these are more psycho-educational in nature where you teach coping skills problem-solving skills interpersonal skills distress distress tolerance skills people are going to that group in order to learn tools to help them deal with their emotions and maybe alter their cognitions so they can live in a happier healthier sort of space so those are generally the different types of groups that are out there or labels I don't know how you want to call it the next category that I have is the method or again the type of group you can have support groups the support groups are not led by licensed clinicians they are led by Pierce and they generally and they provide guess what support a psycho-educational groups tend to be your skills based groups and will often focus on teaching something about the diagnosis and/or skills to address symptoms and then therapy groups can be either gender-based topic based or to a certain extent skill based but generally gender based or topic based and these are the groups where you've got you know eight people in a room and they are relatively homogenous on some dimension whether it's their gender identity or their diagnosis or whatever it is and you're going to work through issues that are common to that group you can also have groups that are open or closed and open groups are groups that people can join any particular day and/or sometimes they're called open-ended groups open groups are great because as a seat becomes vacant you can put a butt in that seat however when new people join the group there is a process you've got to go through to kind of get that person indoctrinated if you will and into the group milieu closed groups are short term task oriented groups they're generally for example a depression management group that may be 8 to 12 weeks when it starts on day one you have ten clients when it ends on week 12 hopefully you still have ten clients the same ten clients new people don't come in and then the next session starts where you can have a whole new group of eight to twelve people when you're doing group it's important to remember and open-ended groups this kind of happens on a relatively weekly basis but you have the stages forming is when everybody gets together and gets to know one another this is the ice-breaking stage if you will storming is when there's jockeying for power you have some people who think that they know a lot more you have other people who tend to be more subordinate or submissive people are trying to find their place in the power structure in the microcosm of society that is represented in that group norming is when everybody finds their rhythm the group has figured out you know how to function effectively as a group once they get to that point it leads to performing you know they know how to operate effectively now so let's operate let's figure out what to do and how to make this happen and then a journeying which doesn't rhyme with the other ones but couldn't find another word is when you start concluding you start wrapping up you know this is the next to last session or the last session you're tying up everything that you learned and translating it to practice to make sure that people can generalize it in their life when they when they're not in group anymore group curative factors have been identified as the social microcosm that allows for multiple transferences when you're in a group you're going to have people that remind you of authority figures that remind you of friends you had that reminds you of your parents maybe who knows people tend to behave once they get into that norming stage people tend to behave in group analogous to the way they behave in the real world therefore observing them in group you can start getting an idea about what may be prompting the difficulties there have in having an interpersonal interactions or things that may be contributing to their unhappiness in their life group also provides a lot of hope people see each other recovering people see each other getting better it provides a sense of universality people understand they're not alone anymore you know oh this person is grieving too this you know we're all grieving in here about something or we've all experienced some sort of trauma group can bring out altruism in people typically a well-functioning group the group members want to help one another as somebody starts to break down or cry you will see other group members go over to try to console that person as people celebrate successes the group gets happy for them and it gets people out of their own head and encourages them to participate interactively with the group community and group also provides self understanding and insight as people interact in group it's possible and we're going to talk about the therapists role in a minute it's possible to help them see how their behaviors may be contributing to their current situation and they start understanding what they're doing what happens when they do that and why they're doing it and then they can make choices from that point about what they want to do if they want to change that behavior or not the therapists role and group it's actually pretty active initially you want to explain the phases in the group process help people understand that initially you know I've never met you before you've never met me before that's okay even if met each other before I'm not expecting you to start telling your deepest darkest secrets on day one of the group day one of the group is what's called forming and this is when we get to know each other and over the next couple of weeks we're going to go through a couple more stages where we start figuring out you know what we're comfortable doing and explaining to people what the group process will look like so they understand that the first couple of sessions may not be as intense as they will get down the road the therapist goal goal and role is to create and maintain cohesion and participation we need to start in that forming stage that first day of group helping people identify similarities between themselves and others in order to get that sense of normative normalcy if you will I don't like normal I don't like that word but so they can understand that they're not alone they can start drawing similarities between themselves and other people and start seeing how they may benefit and be able to help others in that group which leads to culture building there's going to be a time where you've got to talk about what's the culture of this group the culture of this group is to be accepting and validating and you know you're gonna go through discussing what it's like to create a safe environment the therapist encourages people to focus on the here and now and illuminates processes at work if you can see two clients are exchanging hostile or unpleasant nonverbals then that might be something to talk about if you can see one client for example is giving a lot of minimal encouragers and is just really there and listening and being supportive to somebody else who is telling an emotional story you can bring that out and you can ask the person who was talking you know how did it make you feel when Sam was clearly giving you support and encouragement to you know get this story out therapists do need to use appropriate self disclosure you don't want to be just a fly on the wall or a referee in group you want the group members to understand that you're human too and be authentic if something is powerful to you talk about it if something is frustrating to you or if somebody's behavior is frustrating to you then that might be appropriate to therapists facilitate the resolution of interpersonal conflict a lot of times people who are in group do have some deficit or problems with interpersonal skills they may not be comfortable with conflict so they tend to submit to authority figures likewise they may be overly aggressive and it's important to help people figure out how to effectively and assertively resolve interpersonal conflict therapists use linking and blocking in order to maintain this culture linking is where you identify similarities among group members so they can feel a sense of cohesion blocking just like it sounds like is when you use verbal or nonverbal behaviors in order to interrupt and inappropriate behavior if somebody is being aggressive you may have to tell them to stop and if they don't stop you may have to use a hand signal a gesture or worst-case-scenario excuse them from the group blocking serves to keep the group a safe place to be not to squelch expression but to make sure everybody feels safe the therapist needs to model giving and receiving feedback using those I statements and also accepting feedback at the end of group for example asking everybody to go around the room and share something that they got out of group had a group benefit you tonight and something that they would like to do differently or something else that they would like to approach in future groups the therapists can start eliciting feedback and encouraging people to be assertive and identify what they want in need the therapist needs to use structured activities and in your scenarios you may be presented with something that says this group is in the forming stage what types of activities would you use this group is in the performing stage what types of activities would you use obviously in forming you're going to use more in the forming stage you're going to use more icebreaker type activities get-to-know-you activities psycho-educational stuff to get people to start talking but not make them feel like you're ripping the band-aid off an open wound in the performing stage activities may include role plays or art therapy or something that is going to really help them work through their issues therapists need to identify and discuss group themes and patterns if there seems to be a theme going through the group maybe you have a lot of people who are experiencing anxiety about upcoming holidays or something you can identify that one of the things I do in group when I start the group I have everybody give me a recap of what their week was you know how to have have things been going over the past week and what was the most significant thing that happened everybody shares that and then I try to draw connections between what's going on and identify sort of a you defying theme and that guides group maybe it maybe it's an assertiveness or lack of assertiveness that plagued the people in in group over the past week so we may focus on assertiveness skills and talking about you know how it might feel to be assertive you're also going to challenge harm harmful behaviors and address interaction of group members outside of the group as well that kind of sums up really quickly group counseling and you probably had an entire semester of group counseling there are a lot of what's the word I'm looking for flashcard sets on Quizlet for MCM hce group counseling review go to quiz or type in Quizlet and that phrase and you will find some really good review flashcards it may be more information than you need to know or it might be a good review that's kind of up to you let's move on to career counseling career counseling doesn't take up as much of the NCM HCE as you probably saw on the NCE however like I said earlier you may have a client who comes in they are a widow or who needs to transition from being a homemaker to getting a job and you know she has been at home raised the kids etc all her life and now she needs to get a job in order to support herself since her significant other passed on what do you do you have to fit know which assessment instruments are going to be most useful we'll talk about that a little bit more as we get through briefly the models of career counseling trait and factor models focus on individual abilities interests and personalities and work adjustment in order to help figure out what sort of situation what sort of work environment is going to be most congruent between the person's characteristics and their demands for example I tend to be an extrovert I tend to be it I'm going to use MBTI terminology I tend to be extroverted intuitive feeling and judging really strong on the judging I don't do well with spontaneity at all I like structure I of structure but I also really don't like working by myself and being by myself all the time I would not be happy in a lab by myself all the time I am not detail-oriented I would not be good in accounting there are things like that that I know would be incongruent with my characteristics and traits people tend to be happier when they're in environments that are more congruent sometimes they're not and they're in a job or they've chosen a career that is not totally congruent with who they are therapeutic ly we can help them figure out possibly how to modify their environment to be a little bit more congruent but that's you know down the line the client centered model emphasizes self-concept and the existence of choices based on what the client perceives is best in his or her life just like client centered counseling the goal is to talk with the client and help them explore the choices that might be available to them to help them be happier in their career or help them choose a career that's going to make them happy and then make those choices believing that people can make the best choices for themselves if they're given the support and the encouragement and enough information the psychodynamic model stresses internal motivations and coping mechanisms and the person's belief or knowledge about what he or she is able to do psychodynamic basically takes into consideration people's belief system about their capabilities when I was in high school and and even college math wasn't not my strong suit so my belief is that I am not good at math you know that's just not my thing therefore my internal motivations would probably be to avoid that however I wanted to go to medical school so my internal evasion was you know really strong to go to medical school my sense of efficacy to pass calculus and organic chemistry was very low so there's a disparity there unfortunately when I was going through grad school undergrad I did not have effective coping skills to manage the distress and get through the stuff that I wasn't so good at I didn't have enough efficacy or belief in myself to get through it therefore you know I ended up changing my major to something that didn't require as much math my internal motivation was always to help people I wanted to be able to help people and make people healthier and happier however I didn't have the ethicist self-efficacy that I could past the stem classes for medical school therefore I arrived at a different conclusion developmental model's focuses on career as a developmental maturational process now the career maturity index is one assessment instrument that's out there to identify where somebody is in their career if you're talking to somebody who is in high school obviously they haven't started their career so they're in the exploration stage and they're learning and they're moving towards something that's their phase of development as somebody is in once somebody's taken a career then their focus may be on promotion and advancement in that career you want to take a look at where people are at currently a lot of people tend to retire from one job at a certain point and start a second career so at the end of somebody's career they may want to explore a new career it's important to you know take into consideration your clients age and ideas and what they want to do in the future behavioral career counseling focuses on making realistic career choices that's the behavior and eliminating anxiety about making such choices basically we want to educate people about you know what they can do and effectively what their what their skills what they're capable of and help them look at the facts and make realistic choices about what's going to work for them and what's going to what their skills are going to allow them to do the values model helps client choose choose careers in line with their values and there are four dimensions that it looks at the time orientation some people are future oriented and they're looking towards retirement and they want to make as much money as possible right now so they can retire in 50 years some people are past focused they grew up in an unhealthy environment and they want to help people so those people don't have to so other people don't have to grow up in an unhealthy environments there print some people are present focused and they are focused on what's right in front of them right now and accounting can be very good at this because it's you know very tangible and what's in front of you and then you've got people who are unconcerned with schedules they are not tied to the future to the past to the present they are just going along and they're very flexible socially you have people who are individualistically oriented they are very concerned about self promotion making sure they climb up that corporate ladder and start earning more money and a job is a means to an end for them and serve to benefit them collateral or collectivist people explore careers in terms of how it will benefit the greater good socially they want to make sure that their career is going to fit with not only what makes them happy you know money a power prestige whatever but also fits with their other other people in their life so they have enough time to go to their kids soccer games and be home every evening to see their spouse etc and then hierarchical social orientation people prefer to be in environments in which there is some sort of hierarchy or paramilitary structure where there's no confusion about who has responsibility for what the activity value is another dimension that is looked at and this really looks at active versus passive responses does the person value actively trying to change something they see a problem they see something can always be improved they're actively and proactively trying to make changes or are they more passive and reactive to what goes on they are fine handling stuff they're not going to go out and look for it but if something happens they are you know gonna deal with whatever comes their way on any particular day and then life values which can be assessed with the life values inventory go figure some of these are really obviously named which is really awesome the life values inventory helps people see what's important to them and you know is a big house and a lot of money and a lot of power important to them or is being home every night and working 8:00 to 5:00 and having you know ability to take vacations vacation days is that important with what values are important to them and then you wrap all that in a bow and figure out or compare those values to the careers the person is looking at and figure out which career would best and then we move over to career choice people choose and and this kind of goes with trait and factor theory people choose careers based in part on their personality if you will and Holland has a I believe it's an octagon that identifies all of these characteristics but basically it the acronym is Riya SEK the person who is more realistic likes hands-on occupations like landscaping and auto mechanic the investigative person likes problem-solving they are going to be often your lawyer and your police officer and your scientist the artistic person go figure likes making things of beauty and being artistic and contributing to the Arts social personalities like helping others they do what they do because they want to help and encourage everybody in their section of the world to be as happy as possible and to succeed enterprising people these are leaders they're the ones who want to be CEOs they're the ones who want to be changers and power is important to them they like to lead they like to command and your conventional person is somebody who likes things that are routine and systematic they're going to be people who don't mind going to work and doing the same thing actually they prefer it going to work and doing the same thing every day day in and day out because they know what to expect and there's a lot of different jobs that can kind of fall into this you know bank teller is pretty routine accountant can be pretty routine factory worker is often very routine encouraging people to look at what their preferences are most people are a combination of multiple preferences there's one thing that dominates but there are subordinate preferences for me social go figure is my dominant personality trait enterprising and investigative tend to fall underneath it so I have those three dimensions more in common how do we figure it out well let's talk about Holland first since we just finished the rise sec model to identify people's preferences based on Holland's career choice theory you can do the vocational preference inventory and it helps categorize people into the Holland's the six types by having them rate 160 jobs based on I would love to do this or no that sounds awful the self-directed search identifies competencies attitudes and self-efficacy toward occupations and again is based on Holland's six types vocational exploration and insight is used to increase occupations for consideration and help people understand what they want out of careers now all of those are kind of similar my guess is you're not going to be asked to choose between all three of those choose one be aware those are Holland oriented tests so is my vocational situation however my vocational situation is appropriate for somebody who currently has a career because they're going to be looking at their vocation their current vocational situation to identify what parts of that fit with their identity and what barriers there are in their current vocational situation that are making the environment incongruent with their preferences the Ashland interest assessment is for people who have barriers to employment due to disabilities that's the key factor here if you've got somebody who has a disability and it's act and it's acting as barrier the Ashland interest assessment maybe the one you should choose the career assessment in inventory focuses on careers that require zero to two years of post-secondary training you're not going to use this for somebody who is a junior in college or for somebody who's already graduated college you can use it for an adult who never went to college who may want to go back to get additional training you can use it for high school students who may be considering a two-year degree for a career making again making sure you're choosing the assessments that are most appropriate to your client the career attitudes and strategies inventory assesses job satisfaction work involvement career worries family commitments and several other dimensions that will impact their job choice we want to look at what people expect from their career and again help them figure out a career path or a career environment that is best going to fit their attitudes and strategies career beliefs inventory identifies cognitive distortions about themselves themselves in their career it has different sections that help people identify how they feel about their current career situation what they identify as seeming necessary for happiness factors that influence their decisions changes they're willing to make and other dimensions that you know I didn't put on here because that's not what's most important what's most important is to recognize that the career beliefs inventory again is one of those tools that doesn't necessarily help people choose a career based on their traits but it helps them look at their beliefs about what what's important to them and what work should be liked in order to find an environment that's conducive it doesn't focus as much on their actual skills as the trait and factor Theory does and the career interest inventory helps students decide what courses to take and how to prepare for their preferred career the career orientation inventory assesses biology based careers I know I remember seeing this one on when I took the NCM HCE and it's one of those that's kind of thrown in there to throw you off because it doesn't sound like something that's specifically biology oriented make a note mental note of that that the career orientation inventory is only for people who want to be in biology based careers from scientists to physician and everything in between the guide for occupational exploration explores interests in twelve areas and correlates with the dictionary of Occupational titles this is what we used way back when when I did my master's in rehabilitation counseling the vocational interest inventory and the strong interest inventory both help people identify careers based on their interests it asks them guess what of these things which one seemed most interesting to you what would you like doing and then it helps narrow the different careers down to careers that are in those areas the differential aptitude test key word here is aptitude helps identify job-related abilities and aptitudes what are you good at there's what do you like in the interest inventory and then the aptitude test is what are you good at did you do really well in high school math and biology or did you do better in English the discover Career Planning program is a comprehensive computer based career guidance system offered on the internet for grades 5 through adult as important grades 5 through adult so if you're dealing with a young person especially somebody who is in maybe middle school you're probably not going to be doing a career planning assessment for somebody who's five but somebody who's I guess that would be 11 in grade five it's probably gonna be more towards middle school but this would be an appropriate assessment to use with somebody who is 12 13 14 and up it includes inventories of interest abilities and values plus detailed information about occupations the discover Career Planning program encompasses a lot of the different things that we've already talked about not only does it identify interests it also looks at their abilities their aptitudes and their values the system of interactive guidance information or ciggy is designed to help university students and adults make informed career decisions through self assessments and in-depth current educational and job information the discover and the ciggy are newer tests so I don't know if they're gonna make it on the NCM hce however they are really commonly seen in vocational rehabilitation in the real world right now I would suggest just you know making a mental note of them and being aware that they are out there I've also given you a link to a web page that has a litany of other tests to review if you just want to be aware it's important to be aware of the selection criteria for group counseling not everybody is appropriate for group not everybody is appropriate for every type of group some people will be uncomfortable in a co-educational group some people will be uncomfortable in a support group it's important to know what your clients are comfortable with and help them see the benefit of group counseling and how group counseling can help them in order to find the best person fit for the groups that are available in preparing for the NCM hce remember to review your series of career counseling and no the most common tests to use and on which clients those tests are appropriate which test measure values which Testament measure aptitudes which tests measure interests which tests are appropriate for middle school and high schoolers which tests are appropriate for adults you see where we're going here because you will probably be faced with at least one question in your scenarios on that type of testing so let's talk about some scenarios this is you these are your helpful hints if you will tom is a 34 year old white male who completed two years of community college and as him is married with three children he was referred by his employer due to anger management issues at work during the assessment you note that tom is well oriented verbal but appears to have a lot of anxiety especially related to finances right now so the first question is group therapy appropriate for him well he's male okay that's fine whatever he completed two years of community college so theoretically he is cognitively able to participate he does have some anger management issues you'd want to explore a little bit more what that was about but you do notice that a lot of his issues center around anxiety specifically related to finances it's not generalized anxiety disorder it's anxiety about money you know maybe the three children are putting a strain on his bank account prep therapy would probably not be overly helpful for Tom at this point because his issue is very narrow in focus and it's less about anger management and more about helping him reduce his anxiety so he is not always on edge what other resources might be helpful financial counseling career counseling career counseling could definitely be helpful for Tom at this point to help him see if there are other options that might help him make more money those are the things that I would look at individual counseling can be helpful to examine cognitive distortions related to what's going on and potentially help him identify ways to manage his anxiety so he is not constantly on edge and is less likely to bite somebody's head off at work there are more study resources here that you can look at in terms of you know what you might do to help Tom out Julie is a 20 year old student getting her bachelor's degree in liberal arts she does not yet know what she wants to do for a career she's 20 years old which means she's probably a junior she's getting ready to graduate you know in 12 18 months which of the following assessments would be appropriate the Ashland interest assessment well that was for people who have barriers to employment due to disabilities she has no known disability so that wouldn't be appropriate the career assessment inventory well that's for people who want a career that requires zero to two years of college we establish that Judy's Julie is already a junior she's passed that mark and almost finished with a four-year degree so probably gonna have to get a masters or figure out something that a bachelor's in liberal arts will help her get the career attitudes and strategies inventory assesses job satisfaction work involvement career worries family commitments etc she doesn't have a job yet so that's not gonna be helpful career beliefs inventory identifies cognitive distortions about themselves and their career no she doesn't have a career yet so she needs to figure out you know what she wants to do career interest inventory well that might be helpful because it explores interest to help her narrow her career choices the guide for occupational exploration might be helpful because it explores interests in 12 areas and correlates with a dictionary of Occupational titles the guide for occupational exploration is actually online now and they have a lot of online assessments just as a side note the vocational interest inventory or the strong interest inventory those might be helpful because they help people identify careers based on their interests and the differential aptitude test remember the key word here is aptitude helps people identify their job-related abilities so that might be helpful you may choose one of the interest inventories and one of the aptitude tests that's up to you and you know obviously dependent on what they give you in in the scenario but you do need to make sure again you can see that there are a lot of these that sound like they might fit career assessment into inventory sure why not no because that's not going to be appropriate for her flashcards is the best way to memorize those tests and who they're appropriate for I'm sorry I know it's mundane but it is important to be aware of who those tests are appropriate for and yes in regular practice you would probably go online and Google and figure out or search the internet and figure out a test from that point on or your organization would already have some tests there but for the purposes of testing you have to have them memorized at least long enough to take the test okay everybody have a great day and I will see you on the next episode thank you for joining me today subscribe to the NCA MHC II exam review podcast to be notified when new episodes are released and while you're at it subscribe to counselor toolbox podcast to stay up-to-date on current trends and counseling and earn your continuing education on the go

welcome to the NCMHCE exam review podcast I'm 
your host dr. dawn elise snipes this podcast   is brought to you by Counselor toolbox podcast 
and allceus.com counselor continuing education   where you can get unlimited on-demand CEUs 
for $59 or unlimited live webinars for $40.00   go to all CEUs dot-com hey there everybody and 
welcome to today's episode of the NCM hce exam   review today we're going to be talking about 
group and career counseling now this is not   going to be the most exciting episode that 
you're going to listen to but there's a lot   of important stuff here that you will probably 
need to know for the test we're going to review   the indications and contraindications for 
group therapy and talk about the types of   groups and the stages of group formation 
identify the group curative factors and   review the therapists role in group then we're 
going to move on to just briefly touching on   the models of career counseling and looking 
at career counseling assessment instruments   when you're doing your scenarios on the exam 
you may have a client who would benefit from   career counseling and would need some sort of 
an assessment done it's going to be important   for you to know that main instruments that are 
out there there are tons of them out there so   I'm going to present some of the most common 
instruments hopefully those will be the ones   on a test but I've also given you links to a 
couple of web pages where you can find more   information just in case you want to brush up on 
all the assessment instruments that are out there let's start by talking about group indicators for 
group generally you know the most conservative   approach to group is using group for interpersonal 
issues like communication issues argumentativeness   self-esteem those sorts of things however we 
do know that group can be really effective   with effective issues depression and anxiety 
we know that group can also bet be helpful for   what I call behavioral issues addiction 
relapse prevention coping skills it can   also be helpful for cognitive issues now I'm 
not talking about psychosis nor am I really   talking about personality disorders what I'm 
talking about is your cognitive behavioral   therapy rebt helping people identify cognitive 
distortions and irrational thoughts that are   keeping them stuck and group can also be used 
to address interpersonal and social issues the   client needs to be verbally cognitively and 
physically able to participate they need to   be able to talk in group and receive information 
verbally and understand what's going on people   with fetal alcohol spectrum disorder for 
example may talk at a very high level however they may receive information and encode 
information at a much lower level more like at   the level of you know sixth or eighth grade there 
for people with feel alcohol spectrum disorders   may struggle in groups especially groups with 
people that are chronologically similar in age   if they are in groups with other people with 
FASD then you may be able to work that out but   you do want to make sure that the client not 
only can talk the talk but also can understand   and benefit from what's being said they need to 
cognitively be able to participate when I worked   in the dual diagnosis facility a lot of times 
we would have clients in detox and you can't   do groups in detox that the clients in detox are 
you know just there and they are still trying to   come out of the haze that was brought on by the 
substance use therefore group is not appropriate   or effective really in detox situations however 
once they got over to residential or intensive   outpatient we could start addressing cognitions 
the client again needs to be able to take the   information encode it and then apply it to their 
situation they need to be able to understand why   is this meaningful to me and physically able 
to participate is another one that we don't   necessarily think of all the time but they need 
to be able to stay awake in detox again people   were often exhausted and they weren't feeling well 
so they were having a hard time really focusing on   what anybody said whether it was the assessment or 
the psycho-educational support group meetings or   whatever was going on in detox we really didn't 
expect people to get much out of those groups   what we wanted them to do was start getting 
into a routine of getting up and showing up   in order to benefit from group though they need 
to be physically able they need to be not in   excruciating pain they need to be not overly sick 
or detoxing they need to be able to be physically   present and you may have some people who have 
low back issues for example and they can't sit   for an hour or an hour and a half straight a lot 
of us can't do that that's okay as long as you   make reasonable accommodations they're physically 
able to participate with accommodations the client   also has to be motivated to change clients who 
don't want to change are going to go into group   they're gonna sit down and they're going to 
keep checking their watch trying to wait for   group to be over we want them to be motivated to 
be there and it's incumbent upon the therapist to   help clients see how can this benefit me and I've 
done several videos in counselor toolbox podcast   on increasing motivation addressing resistance 
one of the things that we need to look at when   we're working with people in group is why are 
they here what will help them get motivated to   change they may not have the same goals that I 
do in substance abuse I would work with people   who are involuntary and their goal was not to stop 
using substances that's just it wasn't in their in   their mindset their goal was to get off probation 
well okay you want to get off probation I want you   to not use substances but you have to be clean 
you can't test dirty you can't use substances   while you're on probation so let's work together 
to help you figure out how to stay clean while   you're on probation and then what you do after 
that that's you know your business that was a   way to start helping them get more motivated to 
change the client needs to find peer support and   feedback beneficial if they are not willing to 
take in peer support if they are not willing to   receive feedback or they can't tolerate feedback 
they're not going to be appropriate for group and   the client needs to have a relatively positive 
view of group therapy some people have seen too   much television that where groups everybody sits 
around in a circle and they all look bored and   one person monopolizes the conversation that's not 
necessarily how group has to go it's important to   orient people to group so they do have a positive 
view of what can come out of group therapy contraindications for group therapy well like I 
said earlier people who refuse to participate if   they are just a butt in a seat wow that may help 
your financial bottom line that is not helping   them and that's not what the test is about the 
test is about helping clients not increasing   your finances you need to have people who can 
honor group agreements including behavioral   and attendance agreements if they can't do this 
they are not appropriate for group therapy their   behavioral issues could be impulsivity related 
to mania or ADHD it could be paranoid delusions   related to schizophrenia it could be that they 
have a job where their schedule changes every   week and they can't guarantee that they are going 
to be able to make group every week well that's   going to be a problem because that really disrupts 
the group milieu if people are not committed to it   and attending you know each week for 12 weeks 
or whatever it is people who are in crisis or   have a low tolerance for anxiety and frustration 
or are markedly depressed or suicidal are often   not appropriate for group therapy think about 
group therapy somebody may be talking and it may   trigger another client if the other client 
cannot tolerate distress for even a moment   then they may start decompensating which would 
take the focus off the person who is talking you   need to have people who can relate but they can 
also tolerate distress and tolerate frustration   receive feedback and and clients who are markedly 
depressed or who have significant trauma issues   group therapy is generally not the best choice if 
if they have these issues going on they have a lot   of stuff that may be more effectively processed 
in individual sessions you don't want people's   who's people whose defenses would clash with the 
dynamics of a group some people's defenses are   to withdraw which may make the group feel like 
the person doesn't care some people's defenses   are to make light of the situation and be humorous 
which can be seen as insensitive by group members   you want to make sure that you're getting people 
together who are generally going to be able to   create a safe environment you don't want people 
who can't tolerate strong emotions and I've had   groups before in residential where we would have 
a client in in group and another person would be   talking and would start to get upset or start 
to get loud and it would trigger other people   in the group who couldn't tolerate that person's 
intensity it's important to make sure that people   can tolerate intensity if you've got somebody 
who is a victim of abuse it's really important   to recognize that those if somebody in the else in 
the group starts emoting it could be triggering or   traumatizing to your survivors that are in the 
group you want to have at least a back-up plan   for them getting out but in terms of the exam 
if they can't tolerate strong emotions or are   markedly depressed or suicidal or psychotic you're 
not going to want to put them in group people who   experience severe internal discomfort in groups 
are also not appropriate for group therapy my   grandmother for example was raised in a time 
in her culture it was not okay to be telling   everybody your stuff it was not okay to be open 
with other people especially other people who   were not family and whom you very barely knew 
therefore being in group and sharing was would   be terribly uncomfortable to her culturally you 
want to look at is group therapy appropriate for   this person now we'll get in a few minutes to the 
different types of groups some types of groups may   be appropriate psycho-educational groups may be 
appropriate for a wider range of people therapy   groups and support groups may not be well here we 
go types of groups and I've broken this down into   three sort of categories if you will first we're 
going to talk about is you can have groups that   are gender based you can have a women's group or 
a men's group where you talk about issues that are   related to people's gender identity you can 
have something that's a group that's topic   based a depression group a group on PTSD now 
remember before I said you don't want to have   people who who have experienced a lot of trauma 
in a group and you don't where they're sharing   details of what's going on topic based PTSD groups 
usually focus on identifying symptoms triggers for   symptoms and mitigating those symptoms topic 
based groups can also include addiction or   postpartum depression any sort of diagnosis if 
you will it can all you can also have groups that   center around something like divorce if you're 
you've got a lot of clients who have adjustment   disorder that is resulting from a current divorce 
and you can have skills based groups and these are   more psycho-educational in nature where you teach 
coping skills problem-solving skills interpersonal   skills distress distress tolerance skills people 
are going to that group in order to learn tools to   help them deal with their emotions and maybe alter 
their cognitions so they can live in a happier   healthier sort of space so those are generally the 
different types of groups that are out there or   labels I don't know how you want to call it the 
next category that I have is the method or again   the type of group you can have support groups the 
support groups are not led by licensed clinicians   they are led by Pierce and they generally and they 
provide guess what support a psycho-educational   groups tend to be your skills based groups and 
will often focus on teaching something about the   diagnosis and/or skills to address symptoms and 
then therapy groups can be either gender-based   topic based or to a certain extent skill based 
but generally gender based or topic based and   these are the groups where you've got you know 
eight people in a room and they are relatively   homogenous on some dimension whether it's their 
gender identity or their diagnosis or whatever   it is and you're going to work through issues 
that are common to that group you can also have   groups that are open or closed and open groups 
are groups that people can join any particular   day and/or sometimes they're called open-ended 
groups open groups are great because as a seat   becomes vacant you can put a butt in that seat 
however when new people join the group there is   a process you've got to go through to kind of 
get that person indoctrinated if you will and   into the group milieu closed groups are short 
term task oriented groups they're generally for   example a depression management group that may be 
8 to 12 weeks when it starts on day one you have   ten clients when it ends on week 12 hopefully you 
still have ten clients the same ten clients new   people don't come in and then the next session 
starts where you can have a whole new group of   eight to twelve people when you're doing group 
it's important to remember and open-ended groups   this kind of happens on a relatively weekly basis 
but you have the stages forming is when everybody   gets together and gets to know one another this 
is the ice-breaking stage if you will storming is   when there's jockeying for power you have some 
people who think that they know a lot more you   have other people who tend to be more subordinate 
or submissive people are trying to find their   place in the power structure in the microcosm of 
society that is represented in that group norming   is when everybody finds their rhythm the group has 
figured out you know how to function effectively   as a group once they get to that point it leads 
to performing you know they know how to operate   effectively now so let's operate let's figure out 
what to do and how to make this happen and then a   journeying which doesn't rhyme with the other ones 
but couldn't find another word is when you start   concluding you start wrapping up you know this 
is the next to last session or the last session   you're tying up everything that you learned and 
translating it to practice to make sure that   people can generalize it in their life when they 
when they're not in group anymore group curative   factors have been identified as the social 
microcosm that allows for multiple transferences   when you're in a group you're going to have people 
that remind you of authority figures that remind   you of friends you had that reminds you of your 
parents maybe who knows people tend to behave once   they get into that norming stage people tend to 
behave in group analogous to the way they behave   in the real world therefore observing them in 
group you can start getting an idea about what may   be prompting the difficulties there have in having 
an interpersonal interactions or things that may   be contributing to their unhappiness in their 
life group also provides a lot of hope people   see each other recovering people see each other 
getting better it provides a sense of universality   people understand they're not alone anymore you 
know oh this person is grieving too this you know   we're all grieving in here about something or 
we've all experienced some sort of trauma group   can bring out altruism in people typically a 
well-functioning group the group members want   to help one another as somebody starts to break 
down or cry you will see other group members go   over to try to console that person as people 
celebrate successes the group gets happy for   them and it gets people out of their own head and 
encourages them to participate interactively with   the group community and group also provides self 
understanding and insight as people interact in   group it's possible and we're going to talk 
about the therapists role in a minute it's   possible to help them see how their behaviors may 
be contributing to their current situation and   they start understanding what they're doing what 
happens when they do that and why they're doing   it and then they can make choices from that point 
about what they want to do if they want to change   that behavior or not the therapists role and group 
it's actually pretty active initially you want to   explain the phases in the group process help 
people understand that initially you know I've   never met you before you've never met me before 
that's okay even if met each other before I'm   not expecting you to start telling your deepest 
darkest secrets on day one of the group day one   of the group is what's called forming and this 
is when we get to know each other and over the   next couple of weeks we're going to go through 
a couple more stages where we start figuring   out you know what we're comfortable doing and 
explaining to people what the group process will   look like so they understand that the first couple 
of sessions may not be as intense as they will get   down the road the therapist goal goal and role is 
to create and maintain cohesion and participation   we need to start in that forming stage that first 
day of group helping people identify similarities   between themselves and others in order to get 
that sense of normative normalcy if you will I   don't like normal I don't like that word but so 
they can understand that they're not alone they   can start drawing similarities between themselves 
and other people and start seeing how they may   benefit and be able to help others in that group 
which leads to culture building there's going to   be a time where you've got to talk about what's 
the culture of this group the culture of this   group is to be accepting and validating and you 
know you're gonna go through discussing what it's   like to create a safe environment the therapist 
encourages people to focus on the here and now   and illuminates processes at work if you can see 
two clients are exchanging hostile or unpleasant   nonverbals then that might be something to talk 
about if you can see one client for example is   giving a lot of minimal encouragers and is just 
really there and listening and being supportive   to somebody else who is telling an emotional 
story you can bring that out and you can ask   the person who was talking you know how did it 
make you feel when Sam was clearly giving you   support and encouragement to you know get this 
story out therapists do need to use appropriate   self disclosure you don't want to be just a fly 
on the wall or a referee in group you want the   group members to understand that you're human too 
and be authentic if something is powerful to you   talk about it if something is frustrating to you 
or if somebody's behavior is frustrating to you   then that might be appropriate to therapists 
facilitate the resolution of interpersonal   conflict a lot of times people who are in 
group do have some deficit or problems with   interpersonal skills they may not be comfortable 
with conflict so they tend to submit to authority   figures likewise they may be overly aggressive and 
it's important to help people figure out how to   effectively and assertively resolve interpersonal 
conflict therapists use linking and blocking in   order to maintain this culture linking is where 
you identify similarities among group members so   they can feel a sense of cohesion blocking just 
like it sounds like is when you use verbal or   nonverbal behaviors in order to interrupt and 
inappropriate behavior if somebody is being   aggressive you may have to tell them to stop 
and if they don't stop you may have to use a   hand signal a gesture or worst-case-scenario 
excuse them from the group blocking serves to   keep the group a safe place to be not to squelch 
expression but to make sure everybody feels safe   the therapist needs to model giving and receiving 
feedback using those I statements and also   accepting feedback at the end of group for example 
asking everybody to go around the room and share   something that they got out of group had a group 
benefit you tonight and something that they would   like to do differently or something else that 
they would like to approach in future groups   the therapists can start eliciting feedback and 
encouraging people to be assertive and identify   what they want in need the therapist needs to 
use structured activities and in your scenarios   you may be presented with something that says 
this group is in the forming stage what types   of activities would you use this group is in 
the performing stage what types of activities   would you use obviously in forming you're going to 
use more in the forming stage you're going to use   more icebreaker type activities get-to-know-you 
activities psycho-educational stuff to get people   to start talking but not make them feel like 
you're ripping the band-aid off an open wound   in the performing stage activities may include 
role plays or art therapy or something that is   going to really help them work through their 
issues therapists need to identify and discuss   group themes and patterns if there seems to be 
a theme going through the group maybe you have   a lot of people who are experiencing anxiety 
about upcoming holidays or something you can   identify that one of the things I do in group 
when I start the group I have everybody give me   a recap of what their week was you know how to 
have have things been going over the past week   and what was the most significant thing that 
happened everybody shares that and then I try   to draw connections between what's going on and 
identify sort of a you defying theme and that   guides group maybe it maybe it's an assertiveness 
or lack of assertiveness that plagued the people   in in group over the past week so we may focus 
on assertiveness skills and talking about you   know how it might feel to be assertive you're 
also going to challenge harm harmful behaviors   and address interaction of group members outside 
of the group as well that kind of sums up really   quickly group counseling and you probably had 
an entire semester of group counseling there are a lot of what's the word I'm looking for 
flashcard sets on Quizlet for MCM hce group   counseling review go to quiz or type in Quizlet 
and that phrase and you will find some really   good review flashcards it may be more information 
than you need to know or it might be a good review   that's kind of up to you let's move on to career 
counseling career counseling doesn't take up as   much of the NCM HCE as you probably saw on the 
NCE however like I said earlier you may have a   client who comes in they are a widow or who needs 
to transition from being a homemaker to getting   a job and you know she has been at home raised 
the kids etc all her life and now she needs to   get a job in order to support herself since her 
significant other passed on what do you do you   have to fit know which assessment instruments 
are going to be most useful we'll talk about   that a little bit more as we get through briefly 
the models of career counseling trait and factor   models focus on individual abilities interests and 
personalities and work adjustment in order to help   figure out what sort of situation what sort of 
work environment is going to be most congruent   between the person's characteristics and their 
demands for example I tend to be an extrovert I   tend to be it I'm going to use MBTI terminology 
I tend to be extroverted intuitive feeling and   judging really strong on the judging I don't do 
well with spontaneity at all I like structure I   of structure but I also really don't like 
working by myself and being by myself all   the time I would not be happy in a lab by myself 
all the time I am not detail-oriented I would not   be good in accounting there are things like 
that that I know would be incongruent with   my characteristics and traits people tend to be 
happier when they're in environments that are   more congruent sometimes they're not and they're 
in a job or they've chosen a career that is not   totally congruent with who they are therapeutic 
ly we can help them figure out possibly how to   modify their environment to be a little bit more 
congruent but that's you know down the line the   client centered model emphasizes self-concept and 
the existence of choices based on what the client   perceives is best in his or her life just like 
client centered counseling the goal is to talk   with the client and help them explore the choices 
that might be available to them to help them be   happier in their career or help them choose a 
career that's going to make them happy and then   make those choices believing that people can make 
the best choices for themselves if they're given   the support and the encouragement and enough 
information the psychodynamic model stresses   internal motivations and coping mechanisms and the 
person's belief or knowledge about what he or she   is able to do psychodynamic basically takes into 
consideration people's belief system about their   capabilities when I was in high school and and 
even college math wasn't not my strong suit so   my belief is that I am not good at math you know 
that's just not my thing therefore my internal   motivations would probably be to avoid that 
however I wanted to go to medical school so   my internal evasion was you know really strong to 
go to medical school my sense of efficacy to pass   calculus and organic chemistry was very low so 
there's a disparity there unfortunately when I was   going through grad school undergrad I did not have 
effective coping skills to manage the distress and   get through the stuff that I wasn't so good at I 
didn't have enough efficacy or belief in myself   to get through it therefore you know I ended up 
changing my major to something that didn't require   as much math my internal motivation was always to 
help people I wanted to be able to help people and   make people healthier and happier however I didn't 
have the ethicist self-efficacy that I could   past the stem classes for medical school therefore 
I arrived at a different conclusion developmental   model's focuses on career as a developmental 
maturational process now the career maturity index   is one assessment instrument that's out there 
to identify where somebody is in their career if   you're talking to somebody who is in high school 
obviously they haven't started their career so   they're in the exploration stage and they're 
learning and they're moving towards something   that's their phase of development as somebody 
is in once somebody's taken a career then their   focus may be on promotion and advancement in that 
career you want to take a look at where people are   at currently a lot of people tend to retire from 
one job at a certain point and start a second   career so at the end of somebody's career they may 
want to explore a new career it's important to you   know take into consideration your clients age 
and ideas and what they want to do in the future   behavioral career counseling focuses on making 
realistic career choices that's the behavior and   eliminating anxiety about making such choices 
basically we want to educate people about you   know what they can do and effectively what their 
what their skills what they're capable of and help   them look at the facts and make realistic choices 
about what's going to work for them and what's   going to what their skills are going to allow them 
to do the values model helps client choose choose   careers in line with their values and there 
are four dimensions that it looks at the time   orientation some people are future oriented and 
they're looking towards retirement and they want   to make as much money as possible right now so 
they can retire in 50 years some people are past   focused they grew up in an unhealthy environment 
and they want to help people so those people don't   have to so other people don't have to grow up 
in an unhealthy environments there print some   people are present focused and they are focused 
on what's right in front of them right now and accounting can be very good at this because it's 
you know very tangible and what's in front of you   and then you've got people who are unconcerned 
with schedules they are not tied to the future   to the past to the present they are just going 
along and they're very flexible socially you   have people who are individualistically 
oriented they are very concerned about   self promotion making sure they climb up that 
corporate ladder and start earning more money   and a job is a means to an end for them and serve 
to benefit them collateral or collectivist people explore careers in terms of how it will benefit 
the greater good socially they want to make sure   that their career is going to fit with not only 
what makes them happy you know money a power   prestige whatever but also fits with their other 
other people in their life so they have enough   time to go to their kids soccer games and be home 
every evening to see their spouse etc and then   hierarchical social orientation people prefer 
to be in environments in which there is some   sort of hierarchy or paramilitary structure where 
there's no confusion about who has responsibility   for what the activity value is another dimension 
that is looked at and this really looks at active   versus passive responses does the person value 
actively trying to change something they see a   problem they see something can always be improved 
they're actively and proactively trying to make   changes or are they more passive and reactive 
to what goes on they are fine handling stuff   they're not going to go out and look for it but 
if something happens they are you know gonna deal   with whatever comes their way on any particular 
day and then life values which can be assessed   with the life values inventory go figure some of 
these are really obviously named which is really   awesome the life values inventory helps people 
see what's important to them and you know is a   big house and a lot of money and a lot of power 
important to them or is being home every night and   working 8:00 to 5:00 and having you know ability 
to take vacations vacation days is that important   with what values are important to them and then 
you wrap all that in a bow and figure out or   compare those values to the careers the person is 
looking at and figure out which career would best and then we move over to career choice people 
choose and and this kind of goes with trait and   factor theory people choose careers based in part 
on their personality if you will and Holland has   a I believe it's an octagon that identifies all of 
these characteristics but basically it the acronym   is Riya SEK the person who is more realistic 
likes hands-on occupations like landscaping   and auto mechanic the investigative person likes 
problem-solving they are going to be often your   lawyer and your police officer and your scientist 
the artistic person go figure likes making things   of beauty and being artistic and contributing to 
the Arts social personalities like helping others   they do what they do because they want to help 
and encourage everybody in their section of the   world to be as happy as possible and to succeed 
enterprising people these are leaders they're   the ones who want to be CEOs they're the ones who 
want to be changers and power is important to them   they like to lead they like to command and your 
conventional person is somebody who likes things   that are routine and systematic they're going to 
be people who don't mind going to work and doing   the same thing actually they prefer it going 
to work and doing the same thing every day day   in and day out because they know what to expect 
and there's a lot of different jobs that can kind   of fall into this you know bank teller is pretty 
routine accountant can be pretty routine factory   worker is often very routine encouraging people 
to look at what their preferences are most people   are a combination of multiple preferences there's 
one thing that dominates but there are subordinate   preferences for me social go figure is my dominant 
personality trait enterprising and investigative   tend to fall underneath it so I have those three 
dimensions more in common how do we figure it out   well let's talk about Holland first since we just 
finished the rise sec model to identify people's   preferences based on Holland's career choice 
theory you can do the vocational preference   inventory and it helps categorize people into the 
Holland's the six types by having them rate 160   jobs based on I would love to do this or no that 
sounds awful the self-directed search identifies   competencies attitudes and self-efficacy toward 
occupations and again is based on Holland's six   types vocational exploration and insight is used 
to increase occupations for consideration and help   people understand what they want out of careers 
now all of those are kind of similar my guess is   you're not going to be asked to choose between 
all three of those choose one be aware those   are Holland oriented tests so is my vocational 
situation however my vocational situation is   appropriate for somebody who currently has 
a career because they're going to be looking   at their vocation their current vocational 
situation to identify what parts of that fit   with their identity and what barriers there are 
in their current vocational situation that are   making the environment incongruent with their 
preferences the Ashland interest assessment is   for people who have barriers to employment due to 
disabilities that's the key factor here if you've   got somebody who has a disability and it's act 
and it's acting as barrier the Ashland interest   assessment maybe the one you should choose the 
career assessment in inventory focuses on careers   that require zero to two years of post-secondary 
training you're not going to use this for somebody   who is a junior in college or for somebody who's 
already graduated college you can use it for an   adult who never went to college who may want to 
go back to get additional training you can use   it for high school students who may be considering 
a two-year degree for a career making again making   sure you're choosing the assessments that are most 
appropriate to your client the career attitudes   and strategies inventory assesses job satisfaction 
work involvement career worries family commitments   and several other dimensions that will impact 
their job choice we want to look at what people   expect from their career and again help them 
figure out a career path or a career environment   that is best going to fit their attitudes and 
strategies career beliefs inventory identifies   cognitive distortions about themselves themselves 
in their career it has different sections that   help people identify how they feel about their 
current career situation what they identify as   seeming necessary for happiness factors that 
influence their decisions changes they're   willing to make and other dimensions that you 
know I didn't put on here because that's not   what's most important what's most important is to 
recognize that the career beliefs inventory again   is one of those tools that doesn't necessarily 
help people choose a career based on their traits   but it helps them look at their beliefs about 
what what's important to them and what work should   be liked in order to find an environment that's 
conducive it doesn't focus as much on their actual   skills as the trait and factor Theory does and the 
career interest inventory helps students decide   what courses to take and how to prepare for their 
preferred career the career orientation inventory   assesses biology based careers I know I remember 
seeing this one on when I took the NCM HCE and   it's one of those that's kind of thrown in there 
to throw you off because it doesn't sound like   something that's specifically biology oriented 
make a note mental note of that that the career   orientation inventory is only for people who want 
to be in biology based careers from scientists to   physician and everything in between the guide for 
occupational exploration explores interests in   twelve areas and correlates with the dictionary 
of Occupational titles this is what we used way   back when when I did my master's in rehabilitation 
counseling the vocational interest inventory and   the strong interest inventory both help people 
identify careers based on their interests it   asks them guess what of these things which one 
seemed most interesting to you what would you   like doing and then it helps narrow the different 
careers down to careers that are in those areas   the differential aptitude test key word here is 
aptitude helps identify job-related abilities   and aptitudes what are you good at there's what 
do you like in the interest inventory and then   the aptitude test is what are you good at did you 
do really well in high school math and biology or   did you do better in English the discover Career 
Planning program is a comprehensive computer based   career guidance system offered on the internet 
for grades 5 through adult as important grades   5 through adult so if you're dealing with a young 
person especially somebody who is in maybe middle   school you're probably not going to be doing a 
career planning assessment for somebody who's   five but somebody who's I guess that would be 11 
in grade five it's probably gonna be more towards   middle school but this would be an appropriate 
assessment to use with somebody who is 12 13   14 and up it includes inventories of interest 
abilities and values plus detailed information   about occupations the discover Career Planning 
program encompasses a lot of the different things   that we've already talked about not only does 
it identify interests it also looks at their   abilities their aptitudes and their values the 
system of interactive guidance information or   ciggy is designed to help university students and 
adults make informed career decisions through self   assessments and in-depth current educational 
and job information the discover and the ciggy   are newer tests so I don't know if they're gonna 
make it on the NCM hce however they are really   commonly seen in vocational rehabilitation in 
the real world right now I would suggest just   you know making a mental note of them and 
being aware that they are out there I've   also given you a link to a web page that has 
a litany of other tests to review if you just   want to be aware it's important to be aware of 
the selection criteria for group counseling not   everybody is appropriate for group not everybody 
is appropriate for every type of group some people   will be uncomfortable in a co-educational group 
some people will be uncomfortable in a support   group it's important to know what your clients are 
comfortable with and help them see the benefit of   group counseling and how group counseling can 
help them in order to find the best person fit   for the groups that are available in preparing 
for the NCM hce remember to review your series   of career counseling and no the most common 
tests to use and on which clients those tests   are appropriate which test measure values which 
Testament measure aptitudes which tests measure   interests which tests are appropriate for 
middle school and high schoolers which tests   are appropriate for adults you see where we're 
going here because you will probably be faced   with at least one question in your scenarios on 
that type of testing so let's talk about some   scenarios this is you these are your helpful 
hints if you will tom is a 34 year old white   male who completed two years of community college 
and as him is married with three children he was   referred by his employer due to anger management 
issues at work during the assessment you note that   tom is well oriented verbal but appears to have 
a lot of anxiety especially related to finances   right now so the first question is group therapy 
appropriate for him well he's male okay that's   fine whatever he completed two years of community 
college so theoretically he is cognitively able to   participate he does have some anger management 
issues you'd want to explore a little bit more   what that was about but you do notice that a lot 
of his issues center around anxiety specifically   related to finances it's not generalized anxiety 
disorder it's anxiety about money you know maybe   the three children are putting a strain on his 
bank account prep therapy would probably not   be overly helpful for Tom at this point because 
his issue is very narrow in focus and it's less   about anger management and more about helping him 
reduce his anxiety so he is not always on edge   what other resources might be helpful financial 
counseling career counseling career counseling   could definitely be helpful for Tom at this 
point to help him see if there are other options   that might help him make more money those are the 
things that I would look at individual counseling   can be helpful to examine cognitive distortions 
related to what's going on and potentially help   him identify ways to manage his anxiety so he 
is not constantly on edge and is less likely   to bite somebody's head off at work there are 
more study resources here that you can look at   in terms of you know what you might do to help 
Tom out Julie is a 20 year old student getting   her bachelor's degree in liberal arts she does not 
yet know what she wants to do for a career she's   20 years old which means she's probably a junior 
she's getting ready to graduate you know in 12 18   months which of the following assessments would 
be appropriate the Ashland interest assessment   well that was for people who have barriers 
to employment due to disabilities she has no   known disability so that wouldn't be appropriate 
the career assessment inventory well that's for   people who want a career that requires zero to two 
years of college we establish that Judy's Julie is   already a junior she's passed that mark and almost 
finished with a four-year degree so probably gonna   have to get a masters or figure out something 
that a bachelor's in liberal arts will help her   get the career attitudes and strategies inventory 
assesses job satisfaction work involvement career   worries family commitments etc she doesn't have 
a job yet so that's not gonna be helpful career   beliefs inventory identifies cognitive distortions 
about themselves and their career no she doesn't   have a career yet so she needs to figure out 
you know what she wants to do career interest   inventory well that might be helpful because it 
explores interest to help her narrow her career   choices the guide for occupational exploration 
might be helpful because it explores interests   in 12 areas and correlates with a dictionary of 
Occupational titles the guide for occupational   exploration is actually online now and they have 
a lot of online assessments just as a side note   the vocational interest inventory or the strong 
interest inventory those might be helpful because   they help people identify careers based on their 
interests and the differential aptitude test   remember the key word here is aptitude helps 
people identify their job-related abilities   so that might be helpful you may choose one of the 
interest inventories and one of the aptitude tests   that's up to you and you know obviously dependent 
on what they give you in in the scenario but you   do need to make sure again you can see that there 
are a lot of these that sound like they might fit   career assessment into inventory sure why not 
no because that's not going to be appropriate   for her flashcards is the best way to memorize 
those tests and who they're appropriate for I'm   sorry I know it's mundane but it is important 
to be aware of who those tests are appropriate   for and yes in regular practice you would probably 
go online and Google and figure out or search the   internet and figure out a test from that point 
on or your organization would already have some   tests there but for the purposes of testing you 
have to have them memorized at least long enough   to take the test okay everybody have a great day 
and I will see you on the next episode thank you   for joining me today subscribe to the NCA MHC 
II exam review podcast to be notified when new   episodes are released and while you're at it 
subscribe to counselor toolbox podcast to stay   up-to-date on current trends and counseling 
and earn your continuing education on the go

Transcript for:NCMHCE Exam Review Strategies

Transcript for:
NCMHCE Exam Review Strategies