As a career coach I work with clients in ages from 12 to 75. The younger side of this spectrum comes from high school (or soon to be) and the older, from those who have entered retirement and have now realized that dreaming about retirement was far more fun that being in it. During my nearly eight years in this space I have worked with about 4,500 clients globally. They come in all age groups, ethnicity, geography, and specialty. Regardless of their location and gender they all face the same career challenges in their lives. So, in this article I’ve codified their needs for career guidance and made an attempt to present the career needs at different junctures throughout a person’s life. To me, this need is tantamount to a career-coaching life cycle, if “career coaching” itself were to be a product. Those in product management used to managing the life cycle of their products will be able to relate to this metaphor!
There are seven junctures in one’s life when one needs career guidance. I call them points of inflection. In geometry, a point of inflection is where a curve changes its slope. To manage the direction of the “slope,” one must know some basics of what constitutes that particular point in one’s life and what interventions are needed to drive the slope at that point of inflection in the right direction. Here are those seven stages:
- In high-school when you are about 16, before deciding what career to follow,
- In college in your senior year or right after graduation: what job to take,
- After getting into your job, understanding how a career path can be mapped,
- When feeling stuck as an individual contributor, waiting for that manager promotion,
- Not being able to crack that glass ceiling to get into the executive ranks,
- When getting into a venture or when getting back into the job market when it does not pan out, and, finally,
- After retirement, not knowing how to apply all that wisdom purposefully
Each stage represents a different mind-set and requires asking the right questions to get the most insight from available answers. Although the sequence in which these stages are presented is chronological as one’s life evolves, #6 stage can come at any time in their life. In this list above, its position is arbitrary.
This blog presents an overview of the entire career-coaching life cycle; the details of each stage will be published in future blogs. A brief description of the need at each stage is presented here:
- High-school stage: Here what the students need is some guidance on what career path they should follow. Career counseling (not career coaching) would be a better start at this stage, with students going through rigorous assessments and a reading on what career choices (major subjects) will suit them best based on their proclivities. A career coach can further reinforce that insight by showing some avenues for accelerating their growth in that direction and showing some alternatives to get their needs addressed based on the parameters that define their own situation (financial needs, proximity, other needs).
- Final College year: Here students are poised for the real world, but they are not prepared for it. Few colleges prepare students on the realities of a professional career. How to get ready for the job market, how to apply, what works and what does not and so on. A skilled career coach can be of great help in disabusing many notions that students carry in their minds, mostly stemming from “unconscious incompetence.”
- First Job: Going from college into your first job is the biggest transition one makes in a professional life. For starters, a job is about teamwork, not the solitary brain work that one gets so used to doing just to ace a test; College work is about leveraging your high IQ and getting top grades; your job is about integrating the five Qs (IQ, EQ, PQ, CQ, and XQ) to get everyone working with you to deliver the results. Nearly 25% of the first-year employees quit their jobs because deep disconnects of expectations. Getting competent coaching before a crisis hits can work wonders by working with a career coach to mitigate all of these missteps.
- Individual Contributor: The first 3-5 years is the best time when one must master their craft, whatever it is! Then comes the point of getting to the next level: manager. This is yet another big transition that most do not understand. Nearly 60% of the first-level managers fail in their roles, despite being stellar Individual Contributors. Many fail to understand the orthogonal relationships between the two functions. Many also feel stuck after doing an MBA when they have realized that being an individual contributor does not always get them a good management job. Some of these professionals can leverage the advice of their career coach both before and after their MBA.
- Glass Ceiling: Going past the manager/director-level jobs into the executive cadre often requires breaking the glass ceiling. There are specific interventions required to overcome this barrier and a career coach who has “been there done that,” can be a great resource circumventing many avoidable pitfalls.
- Your-Own Venture: The desire to be an entrepreneur can strike any time in one’s life; sometimes even at multiple times at different stages in their life. Regardless, many would-be entrepreneurs overestimate the power of their idea and underestimate what it takes to execute that idea to get that big payoff. A career coach, who has worked with entrepreneurs, can be invaluable in saving time, money, and grief.
- Retired?: Active retirees quickly find out that retirement is not what it was dreamed when they were working. Many retire at 65 and have at least another 20 years’ or more soles left on their shoes. Here they can use good insights on how to best use their wisdom and apply it in productive ways to make their golden years truly count. A career coach can be a good investment at this point.
Trial and error in managing a career is a waste. A good, experienced career coach can be an invaluable resource when conflicting advice from your friends, relatives, and your parents confuses you. In fact, that is one of the worst ways to get good guidance!