Haliotou Catherine , Greece

This article examines the multidimensional nature of professional competence in school and career guidance counseling. Grounded in qualitative and interpretive research, it explores how counselors enact and interrelate communicative, relational, informational, reflexive, and ethical competencies in practice. Drawing on a corpus of anonymized counseling sessions, the study integrates theories of situated action, reflective practice, and dialogical ethics to construct a comprehensive understanding of professionalization in guidance work. Findings indicate that competence functions not as a fixed attribute or measurable skill but as an ongoing, context-dependent process of reasoning, reflection, and ethical judgment. The discussion highlights the implications of this conceptualization for counselor training, continuing professional development, and policy frameworks in the field of educational and career guidance.

Professional competence; guidance counseling; reflective practice; professionalization; dialogical ethics; qualitative research.