Counseling Skills

Performance Counseling

Counseling has been described by the Institute of Personnel and Development (IPD) as: ‘Any activity
in the workplace where one individual uses a set of skills and techniques to help another individual to
take responsibility for oneself and to manage their own decision-making whether it is work related or
personal’.

Counseling is central to the management and development of people. All managers engage in some
activity which could be termed as counseling as part of their normal working life. It is therefore a
natural component of management – an everyday activity which can arise from immediate feedback.

One of your important aims as a manager is to get individuals to accept much of the responsibility for
their own self-development. What people seek out for themselves, with some guidance as necessary,
is likely to make a greater impact than anything handed out to them by their managers or by a trainer.
Managers have to make clear their expectations of what individuals have to achieve. It is also necessary
to ensure that they have the necessary training and guidance to enable them to meet your expectations.
There will also be occasions when you have to spell out how you expect the job or task to be done.
But you will make no progress in developing the skills and abilities of your staff if you only tell them
how to do things or how they should solve their work problems. Your job is to do as much as you can
to help them to help themselves, because that is the best way for them to learn.

Counseling is a concentrated form of interpersonal communication. In a counseling

program the interchange of idea between the parties involved (manager and his
subordinate) is directed towards a problem or a need that requires in-depth attention.
As such, during a performance counseling session, the primary focus, of course, would
be on performance review and improvement.

In this context, performance counseling may serve at least four basic functions:
 Corrective or remedial: It may identify conditions, attitudes or behavior patterns that precipitate
problems and give advanced set of actions that result in improved performance.
 Therapeutic: It may diagnose personal or organizational ills and prescribe and apply medicine
to the wounds so that some form of normality is restored.
 Informational: It may serve the purpose of conveying information and exchange ideas to prevail
problems than diagnose those already in existence.
 Developmental: Help individuals to more fully utilize their capabilities and to more completely
achieve their own potential and higher level of efficiency.

Performance Counseling, when given to an employee, helps him to:

 assess his existing capabilities
 establish goals for future development
 determine if the goals he has in mind are realistically compatible with his existing abilities and his
aptitude
 develop and to work out a plan of action through which realistic development can occur.

The personal value of these advantages is obvious, but they may also be translated into organizational
advantages. Performance Counseling may reduce absenteeism, turnover, lack of cooperation patterns
and may otherwise result in an improvement for the organization.

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As a counselor you should not content yourself with giving advice (which can promptly be brushed
off); instead, try to help the subordinate develop realistic attitudes and worthwhile goals that he can
successfully achieve through confident decisions. One must be supportive, suggestive, leading the
individual to the threshold of his own self-insight. The counselor must help establish the climate of
confidence.

Performance Counseling – Objectives

 Overall development of employees to have better adjustment with their work environment
 Making employees aware of their potential, strengths and weaknesses.
 Establish better superior-subordinate relationship - a relation of mutual trust and openness - to
increase effectiveness in the organization.
 Help the counselee to reflect on his behavioral pattern by providing feedback.
 Assist the counselee to improve his personal and interpersonal skills.
 Help him see his goals in the organization and make an action plan to achieve those goals.
 Help him prepare alternative action plan to improve his performance and behavior.
 Provide genuine concern about his personal or organizational problems and thereby create an
atmosphere of trust and openness where he can discuss freely.
 Assist him in increasing his understanding of the organization values and objectives, to have better
adjustment, job satisfaction and a sense of belonging to the organization.

The various outputs (expectations) of Performance Counseling are as follows:

From the Organization’s point of view:

a) To create a professional but warm climate between supervisor and subordinate and consequently
throughout the managerial structure.
b) To create an openness and empathy in managers, so that timely action may be taken to prevent
frustrations and conflicts to build up unnecessarily.
c) To initiate target-setting exercise as part of the appraisal system.

From the Appraisee’s point of view:

a) To derive satisfaction from being heard and understood by his immediate supervisor.
b) To get an opportunity to clarify the expectations of superiors.
c) To be able to “grow professionally”, so that the subordinate can give and receive feedback without
feeling threatened.

From the Appraiser’s point of view:

a) To develop better understanding of subordinate’s individuality and approach to work.
b) To be able to clarify expectations.
c) To create a climate in which he might openly share his views on the appraisee’s performance,
strengths and remediable shortcoming.

Approaches to Performance Counseling

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 Counseling Skills
 Tell and Sell Approach - in which appraisers seek first to let appraisees know how they are doing,
then gain their acceptance of the evaluation and finally get them to follow a plan outlined for their
improvement. The problem with this method is that considerable skill is required to get people to
accept criticism delivered in this way and to change in the required manner. There are occasions
when people have to be told what to do.

 Tell and Listen Approach in which the evaluation is communicated to the appraisees who is
then allowed to respond to it. Instead of appraisers dominating the discussion they sit back and
become non-directive counselors during the second part of the meeting. Appraisees are
encouraged to think things out for themselves and to decide on what needs to be done. The
assumption is made that they are more likely to change in these circumstances than if they had
been told what to do. An advantage of this approach is that appraisers can profit more from the
discussion by receiving feedback from appraisees on how improvements can be achieved with
regard to management, work methods, the provision of resources, dealing with problems outside
the control of appraisees and job assignments. However, this method also requires skill on the
part of appraisers in listening, reflecting feelings and summarizing opinions.

 Problem-Solving Approach this requires appraisers to start by encouraging the appraisee to

identify problem areas and then exchange ideas about solutions. An appraisee therefore plays an
active part in reviewing problem areas and in deciding what should be done about them. The
evaluation of performance emerges from this discussion rather than being imposed on an
appraisee. In this approach the emphasis is less on what went right or wrong with performance
in the past and more on ensuring that steps are taken to improve performance in the future. This
method motivates original thinking and provides the intrinsic motivation that can be derived from
the work itself and the process of overcoming work problems. Job satisfaction can be improved
by reorganizing or enriching the job, by changing the appraisees’ perception of their role and by
increasing the appraisers’ ability to provide guidance and help in the form it is needed.

Types of Performance Counseling

While there are many approaches to counseling, the two most discussed styles differ distinctly. They
are known as the directive and non-directive approaches.

Directive Performance Counseling

Directive Counseling is a structured interaction, controlled and propelled by the counselor. If the
purpose of counseling is corrective or remedial in nature, the counselor pointedly asks (or tells) the
counselee the course of action to be taken for improvement. If counseling session is for developmental
purposes, the counselor leads (again through asking or telling) the counselee into what his goals are
or should be and helps to determine what skill requirements will be necessary for each of those goals.
If counseling purpose is therapeutic, the counselor guides in the diagnosis of weaknesses and the
prescription of solutions. If the purpose is to provide information to the counselee or to gather

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information from him, straightforward communication results with little superfluous material
included.

Directive performance counseling may include a large amount of advice giving, admonishment,
exhortation (motivational pep talks on how and why the counselee should improve or change his
behavior), explanation and reassurance (the giving of encouragement).

Non-directive Performance Counseling

Non-directive counseling is counselee-centered. When this technique is used, the counselor plays a
supportive role. The counselor is present primarily to listen and to help the counselee verbalize his
thoughts. The counselee is encouraged to lead the interaction so that it will fit his needs and will
represent his ideas. The counselor adopts the philosophy that the counselee is responsible for himself,
is capable of solving his own problems, wants to be understood, is an important human being, and
has feelings that deserve to be respected.

In the pure form of non-directive counseling, the counselor does not diagnose the employee’s
problems or offer solutions to the employee’s problems. The counselor does not give advice. In his
role as a supportive listener, he reflects the counselee’s thoughts back to him, attempts to increase his
perspective and helps him to explore thoughts he may not have considered previously.

How to conduct a non-directive counseling session? Heckmann and Huneryagen, have given the
following suggestions:

 Be prepared
 Put the counselee at ease
 Establish rapport
 Don’t argue or admonish
 Don’t display authority
 Listen carefully
 Don’t advise
 Help clarify positive courses of action

When to Counsel
Counseling is required when a problem arises. This is the common assumption associated with it. But
this is not always true. Employee can be counseled in two different situations:

I) Reactive Counseling
 The basic aim is to help the employee tackle the problem situation.
 It is done in response to a problem faced by an employee or when the employee himself is
a problem.
 Some employees have the ability to learn out of such counseling to develop themselves
personally along with solving a problem.

II Proactive Counseling
 Basic aim is to help employee work out an action plan in order to develop his strengths.
 Counseling is aimed at helping the employee realize his strengths, potentialities and areas
(knowledge, skills, attitudes etc.) needing improvements.

Who can counsel

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Any one who is interested in the development and who has enough knowledge about the employee
can counsel him.
Manager or supervisors are in a better position to counsel their employee in an organization.

Whom to counsel
When making an assessment as to who might be in need of counseling, there are certain indicators,
which may assist in deciding whom to counsel.

An individual behaves in a different manner when he is under severe stress. This change in behavior
brings out some clues by which the organization can decide as to whom to counsel. Some typical
behavioral patterns are listed below:
 Increased irritability
 Loss of concentration
 Withdrawal from social interaction

 Poor Time keeping

 Increased absence
 Failure to meet performance targets
 Inability to make decisions
 Inability to respond to motivation
 Lack of energy and enthusiasm
 Display of anxiety and tension

Ethics in Counseling
Successful counseling demands a skilled, empathic and trustworthy counselor to guide and support
the client through the change process. Counselors, who violate their client’s trust, are insensitive to
client’s needs and values, use their power exploitatively or experiment with counseling interventions
for which they have no training or experience are acting unethically. In each of these situations, the
counselor is not making the best interests of client the highest priority and is instead serving some
other purpose – usually self-interest. Whenever this happens, the counselor’s behavior is defined as
unethical.

Counselors have two broad ethical obligations: to be loyal to the institution that employs them and to
promote the good reputation of the counseling profession.

Ethical Principles: Five ethical principles are fundamental to counseling ethics: respect to autonomy,
beneficence (doing good), nonmaleficence (avoiding harm), justice (or fairness) and fidelity (or
promise keeping). Ethics’ codes inform professionals as to what behaviors are ethical or unethical;
ethical principles explain why behaviors have been so labeled.

Summary: A counselor is in a position of power and trust and has a duty to be respectful of that
special status. Counselors who act irresponsibly cause real harm to their clients, their employers and
the reputation of the profession. The most fundamental ethical imperative is to act in the best interests
of the client and avoid actions that risk harm to him or her. The responsibility for ethical behavior
rests with the individual practitioner.

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