Career counselling is a process whereby an employee is guided by a manager in performance-related behavior. The employee is unable to perform the job satisfactorily. His work behavior is inconsistent with the work environment and organizational culture. It is manifested in fighting, stealing, unexcused lateness and absence.
Career counselling involves guiding of employee by a manager to overcome performance problems. The problem is desire-created based on unwillingness.
Career counselling involves the following steps:
- Identification of the performance problem – The reason for poor performance should be identified. Specific job behavior should be objectively documented in terms of date, time, and what happened. The manager should have good listening skills to uncover the reason for performance problem. The manager should focus on job performance problems only, not the employee as a person. He should treat the employee objectively, fairly and equitably.
- Make sure the employee owns up the problem – The employee should own the identified problem. He should take responsibility for the behavior-related problems. There is no chance of correction until the employee accepts the problem. Employee tends to be defensive while owning up the problems. The manager should keep calm.
- Offer assistance to help the employee – The manager should offer assistance to solve the problem. He should work with employee to find ways to correct the problem. The assistance can be manager-based or organization-based.
- Develop action plan – An action plan should be developed to correct the performance problem. Expectations from employee are clearly specified. Resource commitment by organization to assist the employee are also specified.
- Control progress – The employee’s progress in correcting the performance problem is monitored. Feedback is given to the employee. Good behavior is reinforced.