Is a Career Coach Really Worth the Investment?

This question was posed on a LinkedIn group I follow. Being an Executive Resume Writer and Career Coach, I’d like to share my thoughts on this topic with you.

For middle, senior and CXO level professionals who are currently or are soon to be engaged in a job search working with the right Career Coach is a wise investment based on the potential ROI. However working with the wrong coach can be totally catastrophic.

The same can be said about working with a coach for individuals who are just starting out in their career, as well as for mid-stage and late stage career changers and executives who want to learn how to ascend rather than claw their way to the top.

Who is the right or wrong career coach for me?

The way I define the ‘wrong coach’ is anyone who offers outdated advice or a coach who is qualified to coach other people but is ill-equipped as a coach for individuals in your situation or at your level.

To better understand why a Career Coach is so valuable it would be helpful to define what various practitioners offer. In my opinion there are three (3) distinct types of career service providers who fall under the broad umbrella of Career Coaches and each has a distinct value to different types of clients.

Career Coach Type 1
These are coaches who work with people to examine their likes and dislikes, skills, priorities and goals for the future. They generally conduct assessment tests and base their coaching on their interpretation of the compiled data.

For me this is very useful for people early on in a career who have no clue what they want to do, for people who are unfulfilled in their present career and feel a need to change but do not know in what direction they should go, and for older workers whose skills are no longer marketable and need direction in how to reposition themselves to get back to work in a new occupation or vocation.

Career Coach Type 2
These are coaches who work with men and woman who know the direction they want to take in their career – even if they are changing careers – but need help to develop a well defined roadmap in terms of present and future career planning and need assistance on how to conduct an efficient job search to find a new position in less time than the current national average of 285 days.

These Career Coaches, of which I am one, help professionals to effectively transition into new jobs and new roles by understanding and mastering the dynamics of a job search in this new era. We help people identify the hidden job market and penetrate it, learn how to harness the power of social media and networking, learn how to view specific job opportunities based on identifying future goals and determining a clear plan for achievement, improve verbal and non-verbal communication skills in a global business world, and help raise a client’s personal profile and self esteem within their company, industry and community.

Type 2 Career Coaches also help professionals learn to identify and eliminate and/or minimize weaknesses and find ways to capitalize on, or acquire new skills and talents that will be essential for future career growth, along with helping them shatter any pre-conceived and/or negative images others may have about them.

Some Career Coaches also do as I do and mentor clients and make themselves available to answer question and offer advice and guidance when the need is greatest but falls outside the time frame of a pre-scheduled session.

For me this type of coach is useful for professionals at all ages and stages in their career that need help to conduct a job search and/or learn how to manage their career and avoid it from stagnating or going off track.

Career Coach Type 3
Lastly there is the Executive Coach. They do much of what the aforementioned coaches do but also help executives develop leadership and management skills. They coach on team building, time management, culture shaping, taking ownership of initiatives, facilitating meetings and discussions, implementing change management, increasing motivation and productivity in others and on how to make effective business in order to earn more money for a company and themselves.

For me this type of coaching is essential for an executive who does not already have the talent and ability to thrive and survive in the boardroom or the executive suite.

Now that you know what different coaches have to offer maybe it is time for you to explore this route for yourself. After all the ROI of working with the right Career Coach is well worth the up front expense.

Because I Said So: The Wrong Approach to Leadership - Guest Post by Michael Rogovin

I have a friend who is a coach for a little league baseball team and laments that some parents were questioning why he insisted that players show up a half-hour before game time. “I have to treat the parents like children,” he said, “I’m the coach and I said so! Any more stupid questions? They would never question a school drama teacher who told the students actors to arrive a half hour before curtain-time, so why is this any different?” I suppose his reaction might be a perfectly reasonable response, depending on what it is intended to accomplish.

If his goal is to teach unquestioned obedience to authority, then perhaps that is a good start. This is the approach taken in army basic training, where the goal is to teach following orders as one of the highest values. Of course, blind obedience to superiors has its limits, even in the military (as Pete Seeger demonstrated so wonderfully in his classic “Waist Deep in the Big Muddy” [watch it here] and on a more extreme level, the so-called "Nuremberg Defense" of "just following orders"). I don't think that this is the best model for leadership. Besides, don’t we want to teach our children a healthy skepticism of authority (so long as questioning authority is always done appropriately in manner and time; it is not wise to challenge the authority of the police officer that pulled you over; those scenarios rarely end well even if you were, in fact, in the right).

Like parents, coaches need to have authority. But whence comes authority? Is it from fear and intimidation, or respect? If one seeks to assert authority using one of the first two, or to simply silence critics, make them feel stupid, escalate a situation or build up one’s own sense of control, then by all means use the “I said so” approach. But I doubt it will be effective in the long run.

On the other hand, if the goal of asserting leadership is in order to accomplish a task properly, then authority based on respect is a better model. Respect does not come built-in with the job (except perhaps for elected officials, but even there, the respect is for the office, not necessarily the office holder). One earns respect when one conveys that they have knowledge and are reasonable, this leads to trust, and trust leads to respect for the authority (“wow, she really knows what she is doing”), and that can lead to compliance with reasonable requests without much argument.

Besides, sometimes people just don’t think things through the way they should. So questioning a decision may not be a challenge, but a quest for understanding. One can respond by reinforcing the questioner’s ignorance and escalating conflict, or by ignoring the motivation of the questioner, and simply educating the person about the need for the rule. If done simply and without anger, this can defuse any conflict, and reinforce the leader’s role as an authority.
This approach to authority can be applied equally to coaching baseball, parenting, and the workplace. Too often, people with authority are combative and defensive. They don’t like their authority questioned; perhaps they are unsure how much authority they really have, but I don’t want to analyze them. The best leaders in organizations exude authority because people respect their expertise and trust them. They are demanding, but reasonable, and are not afraid to explain why they do things. They listen to criticism and see every interaction as an opportunity to educate and build support for initiatives, and to subtly reinforce why they are the leader in the first place.

About the Author:
Michael Rogovin has 20 years of hands-on executive management experience in the government, education, not-for-profit, and legal sectors with an emphasis in strategic visioning and planning, budgets and performance, operations, human resources, information technology and environmental sustainability. Michael can be reached at mrogovin118@gmail.com.

Tech Sheet, Classic Novel, Best Selling Thriller

Every year for the past four years I have written and critiqued hundreds of resumes from professionals who hired me to transform their fairly good resumes into impressive, targeted marketing documents, and from job seekers who emailed me a professionally or self written resume for a no cost critique and professional advice on how to improve it.

After reading all these resumes I’ve identified three distinct writing approaches; and many people who endeavor to write a resume are not aware of which approach best fits their objective.

So today I would like to share my take on these three approaches and who should be employing them.

A Tech Sheet Resume

My definition of a Tech Sheet resume is one where the writer’s emphasis is on making the reader instantly and easily aware of specific skills sets and it focuses heavily key words usage rather than narrative and achievements.

As you may surmise this is an excellent approach for job seekers on the techie side of IT and in other fields where the screener’s initial focus is to ascertain whether what the candidate brings to the table aligns with the skill sets required for the position such C++, C#, J2EE, AJAX HML, Linux Unix, Siebel, Cognos, Active X, SAP, SAS, Oracle Financials, Cisco Pix firewall etc.

These resume often include lists so the eye can easily scan categories and the skills that go with them such as OS, Software, Hardware, Networking, Languages, Scripts etc., and on occasion I’ve seen these lists creatively broken down into the number of years of experience using them and/or the candidate’s proficiency level.

For these types of positions this is an excellent approach; however I have seen people apply this writing approach to non-technical position resumes and in doing so the final product falls way short of impressing the target audience.

Classic Novel Resume

To me creativity and style in terms of format, content and narrative are essential to making a resume stand out in the crowd, and over the past few years resumes have evolved quite rapidly and creative approaches are no longer frowned upon; quite the contrary, today they are looked upon quite favorably by most decision makers.

However there are certain fields where a resume must follow a time-tested old fashioned traditional format or else it will be rejected out of hand. Lawyers applying for positions in a law firm instantly come to mind. The people who review their resumes expect them to follow the decade’s old tradition in terms of format, style, presentation and content much like a Shakespeare sonnet or a classic 18th to 19th century novel that has a certain period look and feel.

Once again I see way too many resumes of candidate’s in other fields, especially creative ones, that look and read like old fashioned resume fact sheets that rely heavily on describing a candidate’s duties and/or responsibilities, and include way too many key words and skill sets listings ala classic 1980’s and 1990’s style resumes. Unless you are in a traditional or ultra conservative profession people who choose to apply this approach need to rethink their position and try to adjust to what works in 2012.

Best Selling Thriller

There are certain authors whose work constantly lands on the NY Times Best Seller List; among my favorites are James Patterson, David Baldacci, John Grisham, Tom Clancy, Robert Parker, Nelson DeMille and Elmore Leonard.

As a resume writer what I appreciate about these authors is their ability to tell a story that captures the reader’s attention from page 1, and their ability to artfully bring their characters to life, and inform us what makes them so unique and what they are most passionate about.

For me, in most cases this is the task of a resume writer. We must understand the business world the candidate and the person who’ll be reading and screening the resume live in; and we must write a resume in such a way that we tell a very compelling story that piques interest in the candidate’s availability and prompts the reader to invite the candidate in for a job interview.

This for me is what a resume writer must strive to accomplish and what most people who write a resume fail to do.

QUALIFIED BUT CAN’T GET HIRED!

Recently a job seeker posed this question to a professional Linked-In group: “Why is it so hard now a days to get a job on purchasing i know im good but no one gives me an opportunity?”

This very same question is asked daily by other job seekers in every job category and industry.

What perplexes me is this. The majority of people who responded put the blame on the economy and employers hiring policies, and some responders started venting off topic on how employers no longer contact them to explain why they were not chosen. (This last point is a discussion of its own for another day)

Yes it is true that there are fewer jobs available today in most professions than in the past, other than in new and emerging industries and technologies, especially as you are climbing the ladder and want a higher level position at a higher salary level.

What job seekers like the one who asked this question and those that answered it tend to forget is it does not matter if there is a lack of jobs out there for everyone else. What their mindset must be is this, “How do I find the one job out there that interests me and how do I get that employer to take notice and hire me.”

One answer is to keep your guard up and be conscious of how you present yourself at all times, a lesson the person who asked this question evidently never learned.

From this post, I see is a job seeker posing a question to group members who are potential hiring managers, recruiters, and people who are sources to network with.

Considering who his audience, look closely at the question; not the context but his grammar and spelling!

No matter what his qualifications are, in my mind at least this candidate is an un-hirable turn-off. Why, because he exhibited a lack of communication skills which are essential to every employer.

Then, as a professional resume writer I offered to critique his resume for free. When he sent it to me I saw that he did have qualifications but his written presentation was beyond poor. Besides being devoid of any marketing appeal and lacking any achievements, the resume had very poor verbiage that again showcased a lack of requisite communications skills.

The lesson I hope other job seekers take from this is that you must be careful about everything you put in writing i.e. your resume, cover and thank you letters, social media and Linked-In profiles, and especially your participation in group discussions.

When you post intelligent, well worded questions and answers people take notice, even if they do not agree 100% with your opinion and views, and they will not be afraid to reach out to you if they are hiring or to refer you to someone they know who has a job or to network with. Why, because you showed these people that you are thoughtful, articulate and possess some expertise in your field. These are all qualities that make a candidate hirable.

On the other side, if a job seeker posts poorly worded and grammatically incorrect questions and answers, or if they vent and go off topic rather than offer serious feedback, people will see you as un-hirable regardless of what your qualifications are.

Spoken words may be forgotten or explained away as being misunderstood. But once people see it in writing this is rarely the case.