career paths would be as fully informed and accurate as possible. We
would also, as suggested by SCCT, help him to
- Identify barriers to entering and working in the skateboarding
industry and other career paths that he might have identified - Develop ways to prevent or manage the identified barriers
- Consider how he might build choice supports to enable him
to pursue his preferred option(s) and overcome barriers that
might stand in his way (see Brown & Lent, 1996, for some
strategies)
Particularly relevant to his ability to pursue a career in the
skateboarding industry might be his parents’ expectations (it is pos-
sible that they might not be thrilled about or supportive of such a
choice) and K’s concomitant values for loyalty and responsibility to
his family. If confirmed, the conflict elicited by these values and his
parents’ expectations, which may well reflect important cultural
dimensions, could represent significant barriers to his ability to fol-
low his passion. Counseling focused on choice making and choice
pursuit may, therefore, need to take into account these cultural con-
siderations and their implications for K’s—and his family’s—deci-
sion making.
The Case of E
E appears to come to counseling with different concerns than K.
Whereas K apparently sought counseling because he had yet to
identify viable careers, E indicates that her prior career course gen-
erated too many options. Further, in this case we are given data on
her major goal for counseling, namely, “to narrow her choices to a
few viable occupational alternatives.” Thus the information pro-
vided about E gives us a clearer sense of both the goal toward which
we will work and when counseling should terminate.
E’s assessment data suggest that she has a consistent personality
profile (SE) that is also quite differentiated (at the 71st percentile
300 CAREER CHOICE AND DEVELOPMENT