Describe the core values and competencies which underpin therapeutic delivery of counselling and psychotherapy applications.
Using analysis of counselling and psychotherapy contexts and settings, discuss how practitioners can develop skills and maintain standards.
This selection of ways of expressing ethical commitments does not seek to invalidate other approaches. The presentation of different ways of conceiving ethics alongside each other in this statement is intended to draw attention to the limitations of relying too heavily on any single ethical approach. Ethical principles are well suited to examining the justification for particular decisions and actions. However, reliance on principles alone may detract from the importance of the practitioner’s personal qualities and their ethical significance in the counselling or therapeutic relationship. The provision of culturally sensitive and appropriate services is also a fundamental ethical concern. Cultural factors are often more easily understood and responded to in terms of values. Therefore, professional values are becoming an increasingly significant way of expressing ethical commitment. (BACP ethical framework )
In order to build a firm foundation in any supportive or caring client-counsellor/therapist relationship strong, clearly defined attending skills must be in evidence. These are skills that require being in attendance in the present, in any situation, and means that a counsellor is giving their full attention, and listening, to the client at all times.
The meaning of attending is being in the company of someone else and giving that person your full attention, to what they are saying or doing. In a one-to-one counselling relationship this is the supportive service that a counsellor must provide. Failure to do this will mean the client is not being supported fully, and may not feel able to disclose or make progress.
Attending means a counsellor must pay attention to everything a client