Hiring a career coach, particularly in large, industry-diverse cities like L.A and San Francisco, can be overwhelming. While most career coaches tend to have the same objectives with their clients, which is to help them work toward discovering and achieving their career goals, not all career coaches use techniques that mesh well with their client’s perceptions, outlooks, and personalities. Believe or not, some of them don’t have the expertise or experience necessary in order to fully help you. This is an important investment, you want to make sure you get the most for the assests you’re putting in and not taking a huge risk.
In fact, U.S. News reports that “some coaches are great at helping you, and others are totally winging it by Googling exactly what you’re Googling. That’s why you need to know how to find a quality coach and what to expect from sessions – before you invest your time and money.”
Ignite Your Potential, a team of highly qualified, experienced career coaches in both San
- Define and Outline What You Want to Learn
Knowing what you want to learn in order to achieve your career goals can help you easily communicate this to your prospective career coach. Dorie Clark, in her Harvard Review article titled Find the Career Coach Who’s Right for You, reminds readers that because career coaches come from such widely diverse backgrounds that vary from coach to coach, they tend to possess unique sets of skills and insights. In order to choose the right career coach for you, identify upfront what you wish to learn from your experience with them.
Ignite Your Potential has a curated team of career coaches all with extensive professional backgrounds that can help you identify the challenges you’re facing within your current career that has led you on a quest for career coaching. They will also help you formulate a clear set of action steps to get you to a better, more engaged place. For quality, premier career coaching and reliable insight and solutions, contact us today and we will match you with the right-fit coach on our team to help you get to the next level.
- Do Your Research
In an interview with U.S. News, Lisa Quast, author of “Secrets
of a Hiring Manager Turned Career Coach: A Foolproof Guide To Getting The Job You Want. Every Time.” revealed that “literally just about anyone can start calling themselves a coach.” She mentions that “the most important thing is doing your research ahead of time to find the right coach.”
Find the Career Coach Who’s Right for You author Dorie Clark suggests in her Harvard Business Review article that you can start by asking your friends and colleagues for recommendations, and do some Google and Yelp searching. Use words that will spark specific results such as:
- “Reliable career coaches in LA”
- “LA highly reviewed career coaches”
- “Best career coaches in LA”
- Make Sure They Have They’re Own “Model for Change”
A “model for change” is a progression map that outlines the process that will move those seeking career help toward their end goals, objectives, and bottom lines. For example, high-level executives wanting a place to talk through and better understand the corporate political landscape in order to improve their career output and better manage people would adhere to a model for change that outlines the different phases they can go through to achieve that.
In the Forbes article 5 Ways To Find The Best Career Coach In The World For You they mention that you should take a look at the career coach’s change model during your research. Ideally, it will have specific steps and processes for helping you achieve what you first defined in step one. If they fail to articulate a constructive model for change that provides a trail to your desired outcomes that they regularly use to with their clients, don’t consider them.
- See What’s Out There About The Career Coach
At the end of the day, trust your gut and your intuition.
After you’ve followed these 4 smart tips for finding a career coach, next comes the decision to choose the one that