Blog 4- Mary

Connecting Brown Chapter 5 and Savickas (1995)

In the Brown (2016) reading for this week, I appreciated learning about the application of the Career Information Processing (CIP) Theory in that it walked a subtle balance of using both subjective and objective approaches for addressing career indecision.  While overall I still favor a more subjective, constructivist, narrative-based approach that Savickas (1995) so convincingly made a case for in last week's reading, I have to admit I did enjoy the crisp practicality and seven steps of the CIP model.  Furthermore, I appreciated one thing in particular: the CIP approach does not go directly to the problem (indecision) but instead starts with the person's subjectivity and inner knowledge of self. 

To explain, the premise of the CIP method is that people develop two types of knowledge about careers, self-knowledge and career-knowledge.  If the individual in counseling does not demonstrate a high level of self-knowledge first and foremost, then the counselor will not even begin to delve into career-knowledge assessment or decision making.  That is, in Peterson and colleagues' (2002) seven step model for CIP career counseling, step #1 includes conducting the initial interview where the client's needs are expressed; step #2 is where the counselor and client determine the client's readiness to engage in career decision making. The first factor in determining readiness is if the client demonstrates a high level of self-knowledge and a willingness to use that knowledge (Brown, 2016, pgs. 97-98). If a high level of self-knowledge is not demonstrated in this meeting, I would think that the counselor is unable to move to step #3, where the client and counselor mutually define the problem and analyze causes and instead must focus on the client's sense of self and running narrative.  Admittedly, step #3 is a shift away from the whole person and her narrative as the focus and towards the problem and her indecision as the focus (and I'm not crazy about that shift). However,  I do appreciate that, in the CIP approach, the counselor does not automatically go towards the problem. The client must first express her subjectivity and demonstrate a clear understanding of herself well before she is able to formulate career goals (step #4), develop an individual learning plan (step #5), implement the plan (step #6) and, finally, evaluate goal attainment based on self-knowledge/career-knowledge gained (step #7).  

Again, the focus is first on the whole person in the CIP method of career counseling and only secondly on her career problem, and I am glad to see this order of priorities in the balance between the subjective and objective. Brown does acknowledge, though, that the CIP model is far from perfect in that there is little information about its application to racial and ethnic minorities, disabled, and LGBTQI clients, and it is intrusive enough to be culturally inappropriate for groups such as Asian Americans and Native Americans (Brown, 2016, p. 98).  I would consider these cautions seriously if I were ever to use the CIP method. That being said, I did find it to be an especially balanced and easy-to-grasp method for addressing an individual's career indecision.

Brown, D. (2016). Career information, career counseling, and career development (11^thed.). New York: Pearson Education, Inc. ISBN 978-0-13-391777-2.

Savickas, M.L. (1995). Constructivist counseling for career indecision. Career Development Quarterly, 43(1), 363-373.