Individualized career counseling outcome assessment: A case study using the personal questionnaire

Abstract

Career counseling evolved to practices that attribute a central importance to context variables and meaning-making processes. Accordingly, there is a call for the assessment of client’s subjectivity and cultural specificity, considering the interface between work and life concerns. The idiographic assessment of outcomes, using individualized measures that involve clients in the definition of person-specific items, is a promising approach. This article aims to highlight the usefulness of the Personal Questionnaire (PQ) as an individualized outcome measure complementing standardized outcome career measures. We begin by identifying factors that determine the emergence of idiographic assessment in career counseling. Then, we review the scarce research available using an individualized assessment of career counseling outcomes to justify the need for PQ use. Finally, a case study of Career Construction Counseling is presented to illustrate the contribution PQ makes to obtaining sensitive and contextualized assessments of career counseling outcomes, guiding intervention, and facilitating meaning making.