150 journal of employment counseling฀฀•฀฀December฀2011฀•฀Volume฀48 • © 2011 by the American Counseling Association. All rights reserved. cultural accommodation model of counseling Frederick T. L. Leong The current article provides an overview to the cultural accommodation model (CAM) of counseling (Leong & Lee, 2006) that may help guide employment counselors’ work. The integrative multidimensional model of cross-cultural counseling (Leong, 1996), a precursor to the CAM, is also reviewed. The workforce in the United States has become increasingly diversified in recent decades (U.S. Department of Labor, 2001), yet the field of counseling has not kept pace in the development of theoretical models to guide counseling practice with such a diverse cli- entele. To date, there has been only one major comprehensive theoretical model offered to the field (Sue, Ivey, & Pedersen, 1996). CULTURAL฀ACCOMMODATION฀MODEL฀(CAM) As one small step in addressing this gap, the purpose of the current article is to provide an overview of the CAM of psychotherapy (Leong & Lee, 2006), which can be adapted for employment counselors to assist them in their work. As Lewin (1951) indicated, “there is nothing so practical as a good theory” (p. 169). Early components of the CAM were presented in a chapter by Leong and Tang (2002) and then further articulated in an article by Leong and Lee (2006). Leong (1996) presented a multidimensional and integrative model of cross-cultural coun- seling and psychotherapy based on Kluckhohn and Murray’s (1950) tripartite framework. He proposed that cross-cultural therapists need to attend to all three major dimensions of human personality and identity, namely, the universal (U), the group (G), and the individual (I) dimensions. The U dimension is based on the knowledge base generated by mainstream psychology and the universal laws of human behavior that have been supported by substantial bodies of research. The G dimension has been the domain of cross-cultural psychology as well as ethnic minority psychology and the study of gender differences. The third dimen- sion is concerned with unique I characteristics. The I dimension is more often covered by behavioral and existential theories in which individual learning histories and personal phenomenology are proposed as critical elements in the understanding of human behavior. Leong’s (1996) integrative model proposes that all three (U, G, and I) dimensions are equally important in understanding human experiences and should be attended to by the counselor in an integrative fashion. In developing his integrative model, Leong (1996) used a famous quote from Kluckhohn and Murray’s (1950) influential article. As the beginning point for his model, Kluckhohn and Murray indicated that “every man is in certain respects: (a) like all other men, (b) like some other men, and (c) like no other man” (as cited in Leong, 1996, p. 190). Kluckhohn and Mur- ray’s contention was that some of the determinants of personality are common features found in the makeup of all people. This could be interpreted as addressing the biological aspect of the biopsychosocial model generally used in today’s medical sciences. For certain other Frederick T. L. Leong, Department of Psychology, Michigan State University. Correspondence concern- ing this article should be addressed to Frederick T. L. Leong, Department of Psychology, Michigan State University, 262 Psychology Building, East Lansing, MI 48824 (e-mail: fleong@msu.edu).