Am I a good candidate for your services?

This is the most frequent question I receive when talking to someone about our services, and what we do here at the Career Counseling and Assessment Clinic.  While it is best to look at everyone’s situation individually, there are some general guidelines as to whether or not you will receive the most benefit from enrolling in our services.

The first step is to ask yourself (and the first question I ask): What are you looking for in terms of services?

Are you looking for general career direction? An opportunity to learn and potentially discover more about yourself? A chance to speak with a counselor about your career path as of now?

These are some of the services we can provide to you.

If you’re looking for resume building, placement services, or a helping hand with improving various skills related to the workforce (internet skills, interview skills, etc.). While we do not focus on these services, we can refer you to places in the Twin Cities area that may be able to accommodate you.

We also receive several questions related to age.  We don’t impose an age restriction, and we’ve seen clients from early adulthood to those who are of retirement age.  Many parents may call and ask if our services will be beneficial for their child.  It is not uncommon for us to see recent graduates and other young adults looking for guidance.  However, it is important to note that many colleges and universities will offer similar services that may be lower in price and/or may be more appropriate or convenient. 

Similarly, alumni services may be able to direct you to a service within the university or college you graduated from.

We encourage you to investigate all options before deciding on our services.

*The Career Counseling and Assessment Clinic provides a wide range of services, but not all of the services related to career counseling.  It’s important to recognize what we do and what we don’t do to ensure that our services are best for you.   

The FAQ on our blog offers some other general information about our clinic and our services.  If you have any questions about whether or not you would be a good fit for our services, please feel free to send us an email at ccac@umn.edu.   

The Minnesota Ability Estimation Questionnaire

What sorts of tools do we use here at the Career Counseling and Assessment Clinic?

The question above has been posed numerous times, and this brief article will be an overview of one such tool.

The Minnesota Ability Estimation Questionnaire (MAEQ) is a questionnaire in which an individual estimates their ability level compared to the population.  These estimations are made on a 6-point scale, and each number on the scale represents a percentage of the population.

Questions are posed as such:  “How much ability do you have to: ________”

Bottom 10%	Bottom 33%	Middle 33%	Top 33%	Top 10%	Top 1%
2	3	4	5	6	7

For each question, the individual is asked to circle one of the responses.  If I were to circle “5” that would mean I estimate myself to be in the top 33% of the population for that ability.

The abilities the individual rates range greatly and cover topics including math, dexterity, hand-eye coordination, and more.  While the topics cover a wide variety of abilities, no performance or task completion is required.  The Minnesota Ability Estimation Questionnaire is only rating objects based on your belief.

Overall, the MAEQ is composed of 45 questions.  Each of these questions is formatted in the manner detailed above.   

These estimations are used in a portion of the counseling at the Career Counseling and Assessment Clinic to investigate how your estimations compare with your actual scores.

*The Minnesota Ability Estimation Questionnaire is a survey in which you estimate your ability against the population. 

Solution-Focused Therapy

How can therapy help an individual reach a goal?

Different techniques utilized in therapy can lead to different outcomes.  Likewise, different therapies can focus on utilizing different techniques. 

Solution-Focused therapy, as it sounds, attempts to work with the person to find a solution instead of focusing on the issues that may have initially prompted an individual to seek therapy.

When a counselor and client work together using Solution-Focused therapy, the aim of the therapy session(s) is to imagine an ideal future and determine steps to achieve that goal. 

In this portion of the counseling, the client and counselor look back at past experiences and work together to find which aspects of the client’s current life s/he would like to change or improve and which aspects the client would like to remain as constant or similar as possible.   

In order to identify the steps toward an ideal future, the client and counselor must first investigate the client’s current abilities, skills, and resources the client has or may have access to.  Identification of these may help the counselor and client arrive at what sort of steps need to be taken first.

This type of therapy may be found in several settings, including career and personal counseling.

Solution-Focused therapy works toward creating a realistic plan to help the client get to where s/he would like to be by investigating previous experiences to determine ideals.