Counseling has many definitions and approaches, but most recognize the significance of the therapeutic relationship (Nelson-Jones, 2014).
Part of this relationship includes building an appropriate therapeutic framework that provides “a safe and consistent professional structure for the therapeutic work to take place” (Knox & Cooper, 2015, p. 1).
As with any other professional service, especially one that focuses on client wellness and safety, procedures, policies, and forms are required to ensure appropriate record keeping and handling of the client and their information.
This article introduces templates and forms that support the intake, assessment, referral, and other key stages of the counseling journey.
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Counseling typically begins with the intake and the assessment process. Together, they provide crucial opportunities to capture information regarding the client, their needs, and their hopes for treatment (Corey, 2013).
The intake and assessment forms can be merged – their degree of information overlaps and they’re both used in early sessions – or they may remain separate, even if only in terms of form completion.
This article has kept the forms distinct for convenience and clarity. We use the intake form to capture the client’s personal details and their initial thoughts on why they seek treatment, and this may be completed before their first session with the counselor.
In the next section, we introduce sample assessment forms, typically used in the client’s first (and perhaps second) session to assess their situation, concerns, and goals in more depth and form a clearer and shared understanding of where they are and how they may need help.
Treat the intake and assessment forms as templates, designed to be modified as required, and either kept separate or combined depending on the counseling approach, techniques adopted, and needs of the client.
Getting started with new clients and structuring the first counseling sessions requires an initial understanding of their background, concerns, and primary thoughts on how and where they require help and support (Cochran & Cochran, 2015).
The New Client Intake Form can be completed before the first session to capture personal information relating to the client, such as:
Employee counseling can take many forms and may be performed face to face, by telephone, and even live chat or email. It may be offered in response to (Lagerveld & Blonk, 2012):
The Employee Counseling Intake Form is written with a staff member seeking change in mind, but it can equally be used for other purposes. The employee will typically complete it before meeting a counselor and includes:
Couples counseling is “not the same thing as individual counseling, with two clients in the room instead of one” (Williams, 2012, p. 1). The therapeutic relationship with the client will be different, and it is crucial to understand the needs, concerns, and personal history of each individual and the couple as a whole.
Both members of the relationship complete the Couple Counseling Intake Form, and while asking the same questions, the form will often surface different points of view and insights.
Information requested typically includes:
A typical first counseling session is likely to include questions such as “What brings you in?” and focuses on therapeutic listening, where information gathering may form a natural by-product of the therapeutic process (Nelson-Jones, 2014).
The following forms (some general, others with specific uses) provide templates for the initial and ongoing assessment of a client and their needs. There is some overlap with the intake forms, but they offer a continuing opportunity to gather additional and valuable information, particularly in the early sessions.
Whether performed before or during an early session, it is important to understand the reasons for the employee attending or being referred to counseling.
The Employee Counseling Assessment Form can be helpful for understanding and discussing an issue or event that has arisen at work that has led to an employee being referred for counseling. It continues on from the original employee intake form, asking:
It can be helpful for the counselor and a powerful and rewarding exercise for the couple to review how they met (Williams, 2012).
Use the Couple Counseling Assessment and/or the Couple Counseling Relationship History Assessment to review and assess how the couple met, what drew them to each other, and their current degree of difficulties.
Each member of the relationship may have very different answers in response to questions, such as:
Reviewing the answers makes it possible to develop a plan and a commitment to daily caring behaviors.
Sometimes clients lack the skills needed to manage difficult situations or problems (Nelson-Jones, 2014).
Through considering and discussing a problem or situation that has been upsetting, it is possible to identify insufficiently strong skills and potential goals for counseling.
Use the Assessment of Insufficiently Strong Skills worksheet to reflect on and capture the nature of the problem and where there are opportunities to improve, including mind and communication skills.
Work with the client during the session to describe the problem or situation and create goals.
Capturing such areas for skill improvement will direct future counseling sessions.
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Counselors must be sufficiently competent to offer their services to the client. They must be qualified or undergoing supervision, trained according to the guidelines and mandates in the location they are practicing, self-aware, and have worked out their own issues (Sommers-Flanagan & Sommers-Flanagan, 2015).
The idea and practice of informed consent is closely aligned with counselor competence, where “clients have the right to know your training status and the supervision arrangements you have” (Sommers-Flanagan & Sommers-Flanagan, 2015, p. 19).
The counselor should share their qualifications, the techniques they will be using, and how long counseling will likely last.
The following is a selection of examples of informed consent. There are many others available that may be suitable for your needs and can be found via a quick online search.
These three samples of informed consent are not exhaustive and must be created in line with local laws and guidance, and safeguard the rights and needs of the client at all times.
There may be times when an individual is not aware of their need for support or requires help and does not know what to do. Other services and individuals may be called upon to refer them for counseling.
The General Referral for Counseling form can be completed by a concerned other party or by the client themselves if self-referring and includes:
School and college years can be stressful for students, and there may be times when they are unable to cope. Warning signals may include (Anderson University, n.d.):
Playing back their behavior to the student can be helpful in agreeing with them (and their parents) that they would benefit from referral to a school counselor.
The Student Referral to School Counselor form can be completed by the teacher or supervisor, captures their reasons for referral, and includes:
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The provision of remote healthcare or telehealth continues to grow in the fields of counseling and therapy (Kanatouri, 2020).
Powerful online platforms such as Quenza provide a wealth of ready-made tools, functionality, and templates for use with face-to-face or remote clients.
The article titled How to Build and Send Counseling Forms explains how to use telehealth forms effectively and offers the following templates:
Each of the above forms and templates can quickly be built or modified for telehealth purposes with an online tool such as Quenza. The platform was built for practitioners by the PositivePsychology.com founders to meet the need for a user-friendly, engaging healthcare platform.
Group counseling can be a highly effective means of offering support to more clients, with individuals learning from other members and the counselor (Cochran & Cochran, 2015).
“The ultimate goal in process for many groups is to help group members respond to each other with a combination of therapeutic attending, and sharing their own reactions, and related experiences” (Cochran & Cochran, 2015, p. 329).
Group work can be underpinned by forms that act as interventions themselves or capture the work for evaluation during or after its performance.
Use the Support Group Evaluation Form to capture individual experiences of the group’s performance that will help structure counseling going forward.
What did you like most about the group?
What did you like least about the group?
How do you rate the group overall? (0 = had no value; 10 = incredibly valuable)
How much of a difference has this group made to your life? (0 = none at all; 10 = a great deal)
Did you feel safe raising points or asking questions? (0 = not at all; 10 = a great deal)
Like individual counseling, parents’ consent must be sought to attend group sessions.
Use the Group Counseling Permission Form to get consent from parents before introducing a child to group counseling.
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We have many free resources, including forms for counseling, such as:
More extensive versions of the following tools are available with a subscription to the Positive Psychology Toolkit©, but they are described briefly below:
Planning and preparation are integral to goal achievement and a powerful intervention in counseling.
This form facilitates planning in reverse chronological order to minimize the likelihood of viewing the present reality as an obstacle to achieving the client’s desired end state.
Complete this audit form to help clients manage their energy throughout the day.
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A collaborative working relationship is fundamental to a positive therapeutic alliance and should be embedded from the very outset of counseling (Nelson-Jones, 2014).
Creating, completing, and safely storing intake, assessment, referral, and other essential forms help ensure:
Appropriate form use encourages a complete understanding of the client’s circumstances, whether as an individual, part of a couple, an employee, or a student. The forms facilitate treatment by clarifying and communicating the counseling approach and the client’s expectations.
For the student, member of staff, or the couple, the forms record the changing dynamics, understandings, and situation and can be referenced to measure progress toward treatment goals.
The forms and templates in this article can be merged and modified as appropriate to the structure and theoretical approach adopted by the counselor. They provide feedback, learnings, and confidence for the growing professional, potentially marking avenues for future training and skill development.
For a HIPAA-compliant system that creates and stores all your forms electronically, and makes it easy to send them to clients for completion, consider Quenza, built with the practitioner in mind.
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