From Information to Interaction

Do you remember working as a career practitioner before the internet? I remember scouring newspapers and magazines for articles I could share with my clients to help paint a picture of the labour market and the changing workplace reality. Once the internet was launched – all the information I could want was at my finger tips. Now, we have come to rely on the internet for job leads, economic information and career profiles. Can we even imagine working in the careers field without the internet?

Communication technologies now offer us an opportunity to stretch our approach and go beyond seeing the internet as only a source of information and consider its interactive capabilities for career learning and counselling. In our field, we have an opportunity to explore innovative ways of using online spaces in career practice. By utilizing interactive tools, in safe and secure web environments, we can create a new dimension – a new space for conducting career counselling with clients.

I have been involved with online education and counselling since 1997. During this time, I have completed Masters level and Doctoral level studies related to online learning, career development, adult and workplace learning. I have a keen interest in understanding how these disciplines come together and interact to provide opportunities for the delivery of career services online. Professionally I have developed a virtual learning environment and my organization has been delivering online career programming to clients for over 4 years. Now, we also help individual practitioners and other organizations to integrate online services by using our technology and co-developing programming models to meet their business and service needs.

Through this blog, I look forward to sharing some of the best practices we are developing in online career services, posing questions and curiosities that my team and I are grappling with and hearing from many other practitioners from around the world that are exploring and integrating e-career services!