[Nurse practitioners as counselors]

Giving advice is among the most important tasks of the clinical nurse specialist. In this article, the authors examine various aspects of counselling in order to contribute to the further analysis and development of the specialist's professional agenda. Starting out with a brief discussion of recent changes in nursing, the authors analyse the main activities of the clinical nurse specialist on the basis of their respective areas of expertise. The actual process of counselling is examined against the background of the acquired level of professional counselling skills. The article sums up a thesis completed at the end of a course on organizational development, team counselling, supervision, and coaching under the auspices of the Swiss Association for Applied Psychology (SAAP).