Report: The Counselling Relationship, COU101 - University Name

This report examines the counselling relationship, a crucial element in therapeutic processes. It begins by defining counselling and the roles of both the counsellor and the client, emphasizing the significance of the therapeutic alliance. The report explores the three essential conditions for a successful counselling relationship: empathy, genuineness and congruence, and positive regard. It then delves into the importance of therapeutic alliance across different counselling theories, including cognitive behavioural, psychodynamic, and humanistic approaches. The report highlights the benefits of a strong counselling relationship, such as fostering trust, self-expression, and exploration of new behaviours. It also identifies key factors influencing the counselling relationship, such as therapeutic alliance, client and counsellor characteristics, and client expectations, while acknowledging potential limitations like unrealistic expectations and confidentiality concerns. In conclusion, the report stresses the importance of the counselling relationship and its role in promoting mental and emotional well-being, and the need to address potential negative interferences with the process. It also provides references to relevant scholarly articles and textbooks.

Running Head: THE COUNSELLING RELATIONSHIP
The counselling relationship
Student’s Name
Institutional Affiliation

THE COUNSELLING RELATIONSHIP 2
The counselling relationship
Counselling is a therapeutic process, that involves dealing with mental and emotional
issues in the mind of a human being. The process entails direct conversation between a
therapist and a client in need of emotional or mental help. These conversations can take place
on a face-to-face account, in a group or even over the phone. Counselling can help a client
deal with a variety of issues such as depression and anxiety, issues of one’s identity brought
about by transition of one’s life, lack of motivation, low self-esteem, toxic emotions such as
anger, loss of a loved one among others (Walters and Corey, 2017). Counsellors have a
number of roles in ensuring emotional and mental health in their clients. These roles include
but not limited to holding meetings with their patients to talk about their mental and
emotional issues, discussing and setting the client’s desired goals, making referrals of their
clients to other health professionals where appropriate, as well as liaising with them to keep
their progress on check. A client is the individual in need of counselling assistance. He/she
should be willing and strong enough to seek mental and emotional help from a counsellor.
The manner in which a client and his/her counsellor connect and interact is known as
therapeutic alliance or a counselling relationship (Whiston, Rossier and Barón, 2016). Here,
the counsellor and the client agree on goals and steps which they will take, to achieve the
desired result. In this group, a lot has been covered in counselling theory, including the
importance of knowledge in counselling theory. In this paper, more about the counselling
relationship including its importance and effectiveness, factors associated with it, its
limitations and implications will be covered.
For a successful counselling relationship, certain conditions should be met. The first
condition that should be met is empathy (Wubbolding, Casstevens and Fulkerson, 2017).
Here, the counsellor should seek to understand what the client says as well as their perception
on that issue. The second condition is genuineness and congruence (Norcross and Lambert,

THE COUNSELLING RELATIONSHIP 3
2018). Here, the counsellor should show the client that he/she understands through his/her
actions and words. The third condition is positive regard. Here, the counsellor should see the
best in the client, despite their current situation. This should be depicted in the counsellor’s
behaviour and attitude. Other conditions include respect for clients, being objective, focus on
the immediate needs of clients, ethical consideration, knowledge and competency as well as
good psychological health in the counsellor (McMahon and Patton, 2018).
In the cognitive behavioural theory, therapeutic alliance is important as it allows the
issues facing the therapist and his/her client to be addressed effectively. In psychodynamic
theory of counselling, therapeutic alliance is important as the counsellor and the client can
share beliefs and attitudes towards certain things (Briner and Reynolds, 2017). The counsellor
can get to understand the client more by knowing what motivates him/her to act or think the
way he/she does. In the humanistic approach to counselling, therapeutic alliance is important
in creating warmth, acceptance and trust that the client’s inner motivation will develop and
solve the current issue (Wampold, 2015). The alliance helps the client and the counsellor to
focus on the current issues that encourages the self-growth of the client.
Counselling relationships are vital. They help a client to taste and know how a
relationship with utmost trust feels like. This helps them to relax and feel comfortable to talk
in that environment (Flückiger, Del Re, Wampold and Horvath, 2018). They feel safe and
happier in such relationships. Secondly, the counselling relationship helps a client to be their
real self. The need to pretend or act as a different person is starved. This is because they feel
safe, protected, loved, cared for and not judged (Lewis, 2016). Thirdly, the counselling
relationship gives room for the client to confidently share anything that troubles him/her. It
further allows him/her to confidently talk about his desired process and outcome goals. This
makes the environment clearer for both the counsellor and the client, facilitating quick
healing. Finally, the counselling relationship helps the client to invent and explore new ways

THE COUNSELLING RELATIONSHIP 4
to relate with the counsellor in this safe arena (Noyce and Simpson, 2018). This is a show of
great progress in the healing process. It shows that the client is now ready to engage in social
activities and make new friends. All this is attributed to the role the counsellor plays in
developing the counselling relationship with the client, where he/she feels appreciated,
valued and that his/her thoughts and deeds are meaningful and transformative.
There are a number of factors that are associated with counselling relationship. These
factors have significant effects on the outcome of counselling relationship. One of these
factors is therapeutic alliance. As defined earlier, therapeutic alliance is the manner or extent
in which the counsellor and the client work together, whereby the counsellor provides therapy
and the client trusts the process by talking freely and feeling unrestricted. Here, the
counsellor exhibits warmth, kindness, empathy and love, to make the client feel safe and
comfortable (Norcross and Lambert, 2018). Eventually, this leads to successful therapy.
Another factor is the characteristics of both the client and the counsellor. The personal
attributes of both parties will determine the kind of counselling relationship that will be built.
Not only is counselling a way of solving mental and emotional issues, but also creating a
sustainable relationship between the client and counsellor that will ensure success. No matter
the client’s characteristics, the counsellor should strive to build a relationship saturated with
trust and a friendly relationship (Walters and Corey, 2017). The client’s expectation is the
third factor associated with counselling relationship. The expectations of the client may be
incongruent with the reality (McMahon and Patton, 2018). This may affect the counselling
relationship positively or negatively.
Throughout the counselling process, both the client and the counsellor may face a
number of limitations. One of the limitations they face is developing expectations that are not
realistic (Noyce and Simpson, 2018). Secondly, the counsellor may get drowned into the
counselling process, especially if he/she is working with several clients at a particular time.

THE COUNSELLING RELATIONSHIP 5
Thirdly, both the client and the counsellor may possess uncertainty about being open and
confidential at the same time. In addition, sometimes the counsellor may require to ask too
many questions in order to comprehend the matter at hand. This poses as a limitation because
the client may develop mistrust even when the counsellor tries his/her best to bring the
situation in order (Noyce and Simpson, 2018).
In conclusion, counselling relationships and therapeutic alliance are important aspects
in counselling. Both the client and the counsellor should work together to ensure success in
mental and emotional well-being. It is right to look at the limitations of the counselling
relationship, and put forward strategies to curb any form of negative interference with the
process. The conditions of congruence, empathy and positive regard should be well
articulated into the counselling process.

THE COUNSELLING RELATIONSHIP 6
References
Briner, R., & Reynolds, S. (2017). The costs, benefits, and limitations of organizational level
stress interventions. Journal of Organizational Behaviour, 20(5), 647-664.
Flückiger, C., Del Re, A., Wampold, B., & Horvath, A. (2018). The alliance in adult
psychotherapy: A meta-analytic synthesis. Journal in Psychotherapy, 55(4), 316-340.
Lewis, S. (2016). Therapeutic correctional relationships: Theory, research and practice.
Routledge.
McMahon, M., & Patton, W. (2018). Systemic thinking in career development theory:
contributions of the Systems Theory Framework. British Journal of Guidance &
Counselling, 46(2), 229-240.
Norcross, J., & Lambert, M. (2018). Psychotherapy relationships that work III. Journal of
Psychotherapy, 55(4), 303-315.
Noyce, R., & Simpson, J. (2018). The experience of forming a therapeutic relationship from
the client’s perspective: A metasynthesis. Psychotherapy Research, 28(2), 281-296.
Walters, L., & Corey, G. (2017). Theory and Practice of Counselling and
Psychotherapy. Journal of Family Relations, 29(10), 133
Wampold, B. (2015). How important are the common factors in psychotherapy? An
update. Journal of World Psychiatry, 14(3), 270-277.
Whiston, S. C., Rossier, J., & Barón, P. M. H. (2016). The working alliance in career
counselling: A systematic overview. Journal of Career Assessment, 24(4), 591-604.

THE COUNSELLING RELATIONSHIP 7
Wubbolding, R., Casstevens, W., & Fulkerson, M. (2017). Using the WDEP System of
Reality Therapy to Support Person-Centered Treatment Planning. Journal of
Counselling & Development, 95(4), 472-477