Skills for Helping Professionals

Skills for Helping Professionals is intended as a primary text for courses on helping skills. These courses are offered at the undergraduate level in departments of human services, social work, and psychology and focus on teaching students helping skills (as opposed to clinical skills). Students who graduate with bachelor's degree often end up in quasi professional roles as helpers or case managers and need to understand the basics of establishing a helping relationship. Many books on skills are focused on clinical interventions and skills, which is too advanced for this market. The author has been searching for such a book for her undergraduate skills course and has not been able to find one that is at the right level. The book will focus on helping students understand the nature of helping relationships and the specific skills involved in initiating and maintaining a helping relationship. It is a brief, practice and skills based book that is not meant to be theoretical and intended for an undergraduate non-clinical audience. Part I will cover the following topics: self Awareness, the helping process, and ethics in helping. The second part will focus on skills such as listening and hearing, empathy, reflecting, paraphrasing, questioning, clarifying, exploring, offering feedback, encouragement and psycho-education. The last two chapters will focus on individuals in crisis, and helping in groups - two areas often encountered by helping professionals.