TPC Journal-Vol 9- Issue 4-FULL ISSUE

268 The Professional Counselor | Volume 9, Issue 4 In this interview, Ms. Sznaidman shares beneficial insights into her career, her approach to counseling, growth and changes within the counseling profession, her involvement in professional organizations, and the future development of the profession. 1. As an LPC and an LPCS in North Carolina, what led you to pursue a degree in counseling compared to other helping professions? It was in my late high school years when I began to think about engaging in a helping profession due to personal experiences receiving such help and becoming increasingly curious about the human mind. However, political unrest in my country of origin, Argentina, followed by a couple of moves back and forth to the United States, veered my career in a different direction and affected a delay of my initial plans. It was after I settled more permanently in the U.S. that a counseling career became a reality. After examining other specialties within the mental health profession, I decided to pursue professional counseling due to its predominant academic and practice emphasis on the provision of services to clients. Other disciplines seemed to divide their focus between this and macro work in communities, or psychological testing, which was not appealing to me in either the academic or practice realms. 2. As a bilingual counselor with clinical interests in diversity and cross-cultural counseling, what have been your perceptions and observations regarding multicultural competency in counseling? I recall taking a multicultural course in graduate school and truly appreciating it, based on how it set the tone for challenging the notion of mainstream cultural values being the guiding principle for helping clients, and erroneous, stereotypical assumptions about other cultures. Yet, it was quite surprising to witness thereafter that more emphasis was not placed on postgraduate continuing education opportunities in multicultural competency. It seems to me that multiculturalism may be erroneously considered a specialty, particularly in today’s society where cultural differences are embedded in many client–therapist dyads. If we conceptualize multicultural nuances in a more expansive manner, even aspects as subtle as having had an urban upbringing compared to being raised on a farm, it might lend to richer exploration and meaning making in the context of working with clients. Our profession and the counseling field overall would benefit from incorporating multicultural aspects into virtually every realm of training, rather than considering it a separate and unique body of knowledge. By not doing so, we might shortchange the overall growth of our profession in this area and limit how we serve our clients. 3. As a licensed counselor for over 20 years, what in your opinion are the biggest changes within the profession? How have these changes impacted your work as a clinician? Conversely, what are the biggest barriers facing counselors right now?