by sean@higheredcareercoach.com | Oct 15, 2009 | Career Skills, Coaching
During my 15-plus years as a Student Affairs professional, I have had many opportunities to coach students and young professionals through their efforts to explore graduate schools, navigate the graduate school application process, and to prepare for placement conferences and job interviews.
I have a master’s degree in Counseling and Guidance Services and a generation of work behind me, at one of America’s best universities. I’ve served on many screening committees, and conducted interviews by phone, at placement exchanges, and in-person (individually and as part of day-long processes). I’ve always felt good about my skills in this area, and my track record for helping students and young professionals with their resume preparation and interview strategies has been pretty good. Many people who I have coached have been able to find jobs and get into graduate school. I think that having read through a few thousand resumes and conducting several hundred interviews has given me a pretty good idea what people on the hiring side of the table are looking for. Let me put this experience to work for you.
These experiences led me to my own career exploration, and eventually to the path I am currently on, toward certification as a life and career coach, and starting my own independent coaching and consulting practice.
Over the past few years, a confluence of events caused me to take a harder look at my life, and weigh the security of my current position against a few other things: the satisfaction the position was giving me, and the opportunity costs associated with staying on this secure path. I realized that my current position wasn’t rewarding to me in the ways it had been before, and that changes in my personal life (becoming a father, seeing my parents get older and have health challenges, and discovering I have a neurological disorder) had pushed me to reevaluate how I spend my time and energy. In the final analysis, I realized that I’d moved beyond my job, and that it just isn’t a good match for who I want to be, and how I want to spend my time and energy, at this point in my life.
So I decided to take a major leap of faith and try to work for myself, and create a position that would allow me to do the things I enjoy and feel that I do well, every day. I decided to leave my job, in order to move forward in my career. I’m not leaving my profession (Student Affairs in Higher Education)…I’m just going solo.
I recently began a coaching certification program, which started with a five-day intensive class, and is followed by independent work, a critique of my business plan, review of work with practice clients, and a final exam. From here, the program is self-paced, but I intend to finish by the New Year, if at all possible.
In pursuit of this goal, I need to begin coaching and I need practice clients. I’m seeking 2 to 3 clients, and would like to find higher education graduate students and young professionals and help them explore their career possibilities and manage their job search.
Practice coaching clients will receive 4 free coaching sessions (a $300 value). During these 45-minute sessions, we’ll explore current career interests and directions and any roadblocks in the way of your successful search, so that I can help you plot your course, refine your job search strategy and hopefully, land a fulfilling new position. I’ll be using techniques that are part of the Life Purpose Process ©, a proven coaching method that has assisted thousands of people in finding their purpose and setting new goals for leading successful and balanced lives.
If you are interested, please e-mail me at sean@higheredcareercoach.com and we can set up a time to speak on the phone or chat online, to discuss the parameters of the coaching process. If it sounds like something you would be interested in doing, we’ll set up a regular time to speak on the phone or over video chat weekly, to discuss any issues you are dealing with, and to work toward setting and meeting your unique life and transition goals.
A couple of other notes if you are interested:
- These 4 to 6 sessions are offered for free, and no further obligation will exist on either side of the coaching relationship.
- I will not be asking you for money, credit card information, or enrolling you in anything.
- All sessions will be confidential (between you and me) unless you specify otherwise.
- If you are interested, I need you to commit to a minimum of 4 sessions between now and December 31, because I will need to submit evidence of having practice clients as part of my certification process.
- This is not psychotherapy, and I am not a licensed therapist. If issues arise that are better suited for work with a therapist, I will advise you to meet with one.
- If you are interested in continuing with coaching past the 6th session, we will need to discuss a separate agreement, and those sessions will be billed at a regular rate of $75 an hour.
- While we will discuss ways to improve your resume and cover letters, to target them toward your search, extensive resume and cover letter writing and editing are not included as part of this coaching. Resume and cover letter consulting or editing can be arranged separate from the coaching, and we’ll negotiate a rate that reflects the amount of editing/rewriting/redesigning needed. The minimum rate for resume revision/editing is $125, with additional work billed at $75 an hour.
If you know of anyone else who might be interested, please pass this information along. If you have any questions, e-mail me.
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by sean@higheredcareercoach.com | Sep 25, 2009 | Book Reviews
Career Renegade by Jonathan Fields
In Career Renegade former lawyer and self-proclaimed “serial lifestyle entrepreneur” Johnathan Fields take us through his personal journey from being a high-powered Manhattan attorney to owning his own yoga studio to becoming a speaker, writer and business coach.
I stumbled upon this book during a recent trip to our local Barnes and Noble, where I had gone with my almost 4-year-old son, Brendan, to play with the train table and buy a book for bedtime reading. After B inflicted some serious train-crashing on poor Thomas the Tank Engine and friends, he chose Dr. Seuss’s The Cat in the Hat, and we headed up front to see if I could find a book that would help me in developing a business plan for my coaching practice
The title screamed out at me, and the subtitle, “How to Make a Great Living Doing What You Love,” hooked me in. I skimmed the table of contents. Fields divides the book into four parts
- What Makes You Come Alive? explores the connection between personal passion and finding a career you will love.
- What Kind of Renegade Will You Be? introduces Career Renegade paths, and provides a lot of interesting ideas for finding and filling needs for information and stuff, teaching what you know and planning and protecting your vision.
- How to Master Your Passion and Build a Worldwide Following helps readers explore their personal readiness to build a reputation and a following, and provides some great ideas on ways to market ideas and use social media tools to build a community around your vision.
- Let the Revolution Begin engages readers in determining how ready they are to build a “Career Renegade” mindset and build support among family and friends.
As someone currently engaged in redefining my life and career, and seeking to help others do the same, I found Career Renegade to be a very enjoyable and engaging read, and it really helped me solidify my own commitment to this big change I’m planning that will take me away from the security of my current position working for a university. Fields’ practical information and the steps he takes the reader through to imagine their journey are powerful. I especially like his advice about weighing the security of a job against the costs of inaction. This helped me to not only explore my motivations, but to confront my fears about taking such a huge step.
If you are exploring ways to take control of your career, and need some inspiration to overcome your fears, as well as some practical advice to get you up and running, Career Renegade is the book you are looking for. Now that you know this, feel free to spend more time at the train table. Just take it easy on Thomas and his friends. They get enough of the rough stuff from the kids.
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by sean@higheredcareercoach.com | Sep 22, 2009 | Career Skills
Have you ever wondered what it would be like to strip your job down to the core things you like to do, and jettison the parts that suck out your soul, take up more time and energy than they return in satisfaction, and leave it all behind you?
If you are like me, you’ve had these moments more than a few times, and stopped yourself cold, castigated yourself for daydreaming instead of figuring out how to make your current situation more workable, and put your nose back to the same grindstone. No sense in dwelling on things that aren’t going to happen. There’s work to do. Maybe someday. . . .
It’s easy enough to keeping grinding away at your nose when you get small wins here and there along the way. . . a promotion, an award, even a nice letter of thanks or drop-in visit from a student or alum can carry you a long way in this field.
But what should you do when those small wins stop coming as often, or the rewards start to outweigh your efforts?
For me, there has been a lot of trial and error, some big bumps along the road, setbacks and steps forward, and a lot of nose-grinding. Through a lot of introspection and exploration, and a few stark failures, I’ve learned a lot about myself, and what matters the most to me in my life and career.
First, the failures don’t define me. They don’t take away the achievements I’ve made, personally and professionally. They have provided valuable lessons and thinking points for new exploration. I’ve learned something from each of my failures, and I am a better person and a better professional for having had them.
Second, if you spend more time doing things you don’t enjoy than things you do, it’s time to start thinking about doing something different. Really, what’s the point in working for a living when it’s sucking the life out of you? Change is scary, but so is the prospect of beating your head against the same wall for the rest of your career. If y0ur job is keeping you from living the best life you can live, what are you working for? This is the only life you’ve got. Don’t waste your time and energy on wasting your time and energy.
Third, if you can’t see the next step from where you are, it’s time to look for another vantage point. I’ve come to realize that I’ve accomplished everything that was really important to me in my job at Penn State, and that there are no other opportunities here that interest me. Organizationally, I’ve topped out, but I’m not able to do what I am best at in my current job. Opportunities have come up, and I’ve been considered for some of them, but in the end, I didn’t get them. This can be a hard pill to swallow, but it is what it is. I’m not going to hold up all the might-have beens and sigh in desperation. There are other things to do. In my case, I decided to start looking around.
Fourth, if you ask yourself the right questions, you’ll come up with interesting answers. For me, the answers came pretty easily. I’ve always loved to write, so I started writing for the Student Affairs Collaborative Blog and submitting pieces about careers in Student Affairs. It was good to write again, especially about a topic I really enjoy. My interest comes from a couple of places. First, from difficulties I’ve had in job searches in the past. Second, from a hobby of sorts that grew out of this interest. I like helping people with their resumes, grad school applications and interview preparation. Many times, after I’ve helped someone, I’ve received comments like “this is great. I would have totally paid for this,” and gotten referrals from these people to others also in pursuit of career assistance. I guess I heard it enough in the last few years that I finally said to myself “Would people actually pay me to do this?” and “Would I enjoy doing this for a living, rather than what I am doing? I may be nuts to think this, but in both cases, the answer I arrived at was “yes,” so I decided to imagine ways to make it happen, and started researching career coaching certification programs. I’ll be starting one later this month, and I am really looking forward to it. I’ll share what I learn along the way.
Thanks for reading. I’ll be back in touch soon.
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by sean@higheredcareercoach.com | Sep 10, 2009 | Take 5
This week, I’ll wander away a bit from higher ed-specific sites and concentrate on careers. Here are five links to sites and articles with great career advice and perspectives. Enjoy!
My Nine Careers: Lessons Learned Career coach Marty Nemko shares his meandering career path and some simple lessons he took away from them.
Going Above and Beyond: Distinguishing Yourself as a Job Seeker What can you learn about going the extra mile from buying a laptop at Staples.
Screw Your Career Path, Live Your Story by Jason Seiden is a thought-provoking piece that may help shift your thinking about careers.
The Ladders has a great article about how Volunteering can pay off in your job search.
and for some basic interview advice, slanted toward working in student affairs. . . here’s a post I wrote for the Student Affairs Collaborative Blog last April… “They Wouldn’t Listen to the Fact that I was a Genius: 20 Ways to Blow Your On-Campus Interview.”
If you have good articles or resources worth sharing, e-mail me at sean@higheredcareercoach.com and I may share in a future edition of Take 5.
Thanks for dropping by.
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by sean@higheredcareercoach.com | Sep 8, 2009 | Career Skills
Getting a new job can be a really soul-sucking experience, especially in today’s economy. Candidates are a-plenty, jobs are scarce, and even the simplest low-level opening can draw several hundred applicants.
If we’ve come to realize one thing in today’s topsy-turvy world, it’s that colleges and universities are not immune from economic downturns. Budget cuts and a special sensitivity toward raising tuition and fees (because institutions know some people just can’t pay) drive decision-making and hiring, and at some schools, hiring is even frozen.
How can you put your best foot forward and kick-start your job search?
Maybe it’s time for a “tune-up.” For some great advice and perspectives, visit http://www.quintcareers.com/career_tune-up.html
What are some ways to keep your skills current? Visit http://blogs.wsj.com/laidoff/2009/08/25/advice-keeping-skills-updated-during-the-search/?mod=rss_WSJBlog
Why your job search isn’t getting results. http://sweetcareers.blogspot.com/2009/03/five-reasons-your-job-search-isnt.html
These sites should help you examine your strategy and figure out some directions for your search. Do you have any advice to share? If so, e-mail me at sean@higheredcareercoach.com and I will post some of the best advice in a future post.
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