This practical book enables students to develop key counselling skills that can help to enhance their practice and help to place the service-user at the centre of the decision making process. Relationship building will be a key area of the text and relevant counselling skills for achieving this in social work settings such as empathic responding will be illustrated in detail together with examples of dialogue and analysis of interventions. The role and importance of self-awareness will be discussed together with various exercises to develop the readers' own knowledge of themselves.A complete guide to understanding and using counselling skills in social work.Introduction Counselling Skills and Social Work Building Relationships Empathic Responding Overcoming Barriers Using Challenging Skills to Raise Concerns Service-Users Managing Their Own Lives Working with Loss and Grief Working with Conflict Counselling Skills in Groupwork Counselling Skills in Different Settings Conclusion