14/10/2019

MSc Counselling : Professional

Training
1st year
Session 2
Hopes, Fears and Expectations

Recap on • A place to process what feelings are

around for you, including:
What is – Interpersonal dealings
PD? – Emotions that have been brought up for
you
– To make sense of what has been
taught/experienced that day
– To develop as a person, not just to gain
knowledge/ skills
– To improve our emotional literacy

What is PD?
• This is achieved through:-
• Open discussion with each other
• Offering and receiving feedback
• Taking risks (being uncomfortable)
• Staying with difficulty rather than trying to resolve it
• Sharing your own experiences
• Listening
• Holding the boundaries

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Individual
reflection
exercise
• Reflect on any good and bad experiences you have had in
groups in your life
• Debrief in big group

Roles in groups

Social roles
• Encouraging others
• Trying to instil Harmony
• Seeking Compromise
• Ensuring people are included
• Setting Standards
• Group observer
• Following others lead
This Photo by Unknown Author is licensed under CC BY-SA-NC

Benne and Sheats (1948)

Roles in groups
Individualistic roles – these are not always helpful to the group as
they put the needs of the individual above those of the group-
but may lead to useful work being done if the group identifies
and processes their behaviour.

• Aggressor
• Blocking
• Recognition seeker
• Self-confessor
• Dominator
• Help-seeker
This Photo by Unknown Author is
licensed under CC BY

• Special interest pleader

Benne and Sheats (1948)

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Other • Your birth order

Factors • Family roles

• Whether you subconsciously feel you
affecting are ‘at work’ or ‘at home’ when in the
Roles group

Hopes and fears about groups on the

course

In small groups, discuss hopes and fears

about groups on the course

Begin to think about ground rules for the

group which would minimise the bad
experiences and maximise the good ones

• We are going to be dividing into 4 PD

groups
• Choosing groups is not a process to be
rushed. The process itself can produce
considerable learning, since it
sometimes taps into previous
experiences of being chosen or rejected,
of actively choosing or passively waiting
to be chosen etc.

Choosing a PD Group

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Choosing a PD • It raises questions such as:-

Group
“Do I ask for what I want, or do
I take what I’m given?”,
“Am I active or passive?”,
“Do I sit on the sidelines
because I daren’t risk asking
and being rejected?”, and
“Do I bulldoze my way in and
expect everyone else to go
along with my choices?”
This Photo by Unknown Author is licensed under CC
BY-SA-NC

Choosing a • Bear in mind when picking

a PD Group that you will
PD Group learn most from a
group that has in it 2
different things
• 1, members who are on
the same wavelength -
who you expect to
support you - AND
• 2, members who will
present more of a
challenge.
• Similarity and difference

Personal • You might like to think

about the following:
Goals for
PD Group • What do I need?
• What do I want?
• What do I offer?
• What would I like to happen
in them?
• What will I find difficult or
enjoy about them?
• What am I prepared to do
in order to get what I need
from them?

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Formation of PD groups
Guideline criteria ( in order of importance)
• It is expected that you will not choose to be in a PD group
facilitated by your skills tutor
• You need to also consider the affect on yourself and others
of going in group with students you have another
relationship with e.g. work colleagues
• Also, give careful thought to the implications of going in a
group with students you’ve been in a PD group with before
on a previous course
• Think about the impact of going in PD group with students
you have been on any other previous course with ( it will
probably be impossible to avoid this completely!)

Responsibility

• You all hold the responsibility for sorting out the groups equally.
• Sometimes, when we divide into groups, there may be one person who
can make the numbers match/make the configuration work etc.
• However, one person should not feel the pressure to ‘make it work’, just
because the rest of you are dodging taking your share of the
responsibility.

Process • You are going to, as a group, split the

of
group into four PD groups
• This is so that you have some sense of

Choosi
ownership over how it is done
• It is also so you have an experience of

ng
how you operate in a group situation-
be aware of how you are during the
process

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• Move around the room, in and out of other people.

• Read your reaction to the people near you
• Slowly, over time, allow yourself to experiment configuring into a
group
• The groups are not fixed until they are deemed fixed by the
facilitators
• Right up until the final point, they are flexible and you can
experiment being ‘in’ or ‘out’ of a particular group.

Process of Choosing

Division • Move Around

Time!
• Form Groups

Next • From next week, the

Week… final hour and a half of
the day will be spent in
your smaller PD Group,
with your PD facilitator.
• Rajita’s group: MS L607
• Alison’s Group: MS 1.60
• Chris’ Group: MS273
• Leigh’s Group: MS 329

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References • Benne, KD, & Sheats, P. (1948).

Functional roles of group
members. Journal of Social
Issues, 4, 41-49.