Telling Tales: Do Narrative Approaches for Career Counseling Count?

Abstract

The chapter begins by exploring the rationale for experimenting with narrative career counseling. Our motivation was to provide space to work with practitioners, who were, like us, concerned about the effects of time constraints and, at times, hasty interventions made with clients. In the introduction we outline the two phases of the project and the development of the research, with reference to the location within which the work took place. Next, we explain the usage of key terms, identifying the debates and confusions involved. We also discuss what we mean when we use the term telling tales. Third, we describe the research project in detail and the context within which the work was developed as well as its impact. This is followed by an explanation of the framework for the narrative career counseling model used. We also provide examples of using the approach in practice, detailing the steps that can be taken, although we stress that a flexible approach is required. We move on to explain how the analysis was undertaken, demonstrating the use of an analytical profoma developed for auto/biographical and narrative research. The findings from the first phase of the project are then discussed, after which we describe in-depth interviews with our four practitioners who ``risked'' engaging with a new model (phase two of the project). We outline the successes achieved, but also discuss the struggles they experienced within, frankly, frenetic environments of work intensification, pressure to achieve targets, and demands for processing larger number of clients in ``efficient'' ways. We summarize the main points resulting from our analysis of the adoption of a new concept within career counseling and consider the relevance of the model for multiple cultural settings. Our conclusions focus on the need to think of career counseling, and education for career counselors, in more creative, culturally significant, and personally meaningful ways. Our aim is to encourage more telling stories.