TPC-Journal-V2-Issue1

92 The Professional Counselor \Volume 2, Issue 1 providing employee assistance programs that include family counseling, adequate peer support, and supervision and team building exercises. Stokes, Henley, and Herget (2006) offered some concrete suggestions to increase wellness including healthy food options, on-site exercise facilities, smoke-free environments, break stations away from the work areas, wellness challenges, support groups, social activities, health risk assessments, self-care information, employee counseling, financial incentives for long term employees and conflict resolution training for supervisors. Further, Lambie and Young (2007) recommended that mental health agencies reduce stress and promote wellness among their employees (counselors) by reducing paperwork and cutting “red tape,” adopting a collaborative management style, improving interpersonal relationships and teamwork, developing ways to reduce role stress, helping counselors grow on the job (e.g., professional development) and improving environmental conditions. Although the potential hazards related to counselor’s work have received some attention (Gaal, 2009), there is limited research about how counselors conceptualize their wellness in relation to the influence of their work environment. Thus, the purpose of this exploratory study was to gain a greater understanding of how counselors experience wellness and how their work environment influences their sense of wellness. A qualitative phenomenological approach was the most appropriate method to implement because we were seeking to understand the participants’ lived experience of the phenomena (Creswell, 2007). Following the phenomenological tradition, we sought to uncover the central underlying meaning of their experience by reducing data, analyzing specific statements, searching for all possible meanings and creating meaning units (Creswell, 2009). Thus, we developed two research questions. The first question was, “How do you relate to the concept of wellness as a professional counselor?” and the second question was, “How do you perceive your agency influences your sense of wellness?” The first open-ended question was designed to gain information on each of the counselors’ thoughts about wellness and how they interpret the concept. The second question was designed to obtain information about how they believe their work environment affects their sense of wellness. Method Research Team The research team consisted of two counselor educators who at the time of the study were doctoral students at a university in the southeastern U.S. The first author is a Caucasian male and the second author is a Caucasian female. The first author has previous work experience in a residential treatment setting and in a secondary school setting where he experienced a high level of turnover and burnout among the staff. The second author has previous work experience in a variety of agency settings and experienced different levels of emphasis on wellness in each agency. She became interested in researching in this area to assist counselors in the field. Both authors believe a wellness focus is important for professionals in the helping professions. Furthermore, the authors believe that one’s work environment affects each counselor’s ability to be well. Procedure Prior to facilitating the interviews and focus groups, we obtained approval from the Institutional Review Board (IRB) to conduct the study. Next, we recruited the 10 participants through a mixture of criterion-based and snowball-sampling strategies (Teddlie & Yu, 2007). The criterion included contacting counselors or agency directors who were currently or very recently employed at mental health agencies in a southeastern state. The snowball strategy included contacting individuals from the first and second authors’ previous employers, e-mailing invites on group servers for counselors who are alumni from a university that educates counselors and through following up recommendations from other counselors. After we secured participants for the study, we obtained informed consent and confirmed dates for the interviews and focus group. Participants The sample included seven female and three male professional counselors whose ages ranged from 25 to 53. Seven of the counselors were Caucasian, one counselor was of Indian descent, one was Latino, and one was of Middle Eastern descent. Two participants were employed by an agency that provides palliative care by way of in-home visits. One participant was a clinical director of an adolescent residential unit. One was previously a clinical director of a domestic violence shelter and a community counseling clinic. One participant worked in a behavioral hospital while another participant worked in an inpatient facility and previously in a residential setting. Three of the participants worked in a university-based clinic. Three counselors were present in the focus group interview and seven counselors were interviewed individually on separate occasions. See Appendix for pseudonyms and demographics.