5 Reflections After My First Year in Practice

This wasn’t my plan. At the start of January 2019, I had no clue that four months later I would be launching my career coaching practice, Avenir Careers. I’ve experienced a lot of life in the past 5 years, and much of it has been quite difficult. I lost my mother to pancreatic cancer in 2016. I’ve gotten divorced, found love again, and remarried. In the midst of all of this, at the end of January 2019, I had to resign from my last full-time role for family reasons. It’s been a lot. Life comes at you fast sometimes and we are forced to adjust. This said, I’m honestly grateful for where it has brought me to today because I get to help people one-on-one, which is what I’ve wanted to do since my senior year of high school when I decided I wanted to be a psychologist. The path I took to arrive here has certainly been an interesting one, but it’s real, it’s part of my story, and it’s what makes me and what I have to offer unique. 

In no particular order, here are a few lessons I’ve learned looking back on 1 year in business.

5 Reflections After My First Year in Practice

1. “...mais ce qui compte c’est pas la chute, c’est l’aterrissage.” 

I first heard this quote from the movie, ‘La Haine,’ as a middle schooler learning French, but I never fully appreciated it until literally, right now as I write this. The quote translates to, “...but what matters isn’t the fall, it’s the landing.” In the movie, the context is a joke/story about a man falling from a 50-story building and reassuring himself on the way down of two things: 1) “Jusqu’ici tout va bien” (“so far so good”) & 2) How I land matters more than the fact that I’m already falling. I’ve fallen a number of times in the past few years, but each time, I’ve managed to land ok and I’m still here! My coaching practice is a perfect example. I fell from my last job and landed by starting my own business, which I’ve been able to successfully establish and work on growing to this day. 

We are all going to fall in life -- it’s inevitable. What I finally understand now is the importance of spotting and preparing my landing, whether personally or professionally.

2. Treat everyone with care and respect, because you never know when or how you’ll meet again.

One of the greatest compliments I’ve received thus far in the journey of my practice was when a potential client reached out to me because he remembered how well I treated him during a phone call we had years ago, in my prior role as a career advisor. He had read an article I had posted at the time and decided to reach out to me for help with his job search. Once we reconnected on the phone, I remembered that we did indeed have a very good interaction way back when. Speaking with him again, it was crystallized for me that how you make someone feel has a far greater long-term impact on them than anything you might do or say. 

Start with empathy, care, & a genuine interest in others, and things will flow from there.

3. You never know who’s paying attention to your work, so keep creating quality & authentic output.

It’s validating and encouraging when friends, former classmates/colleagues, and perfect strangers have reached out to me because of something I wrote. While I’m still developing my voice and figuring out who my audience is, the magic of this process is that you and I will never 100% know who will resonate with/be impacted by our work. Publishing can be scary because we all fear either a negative reaction or even worse, no reaction at all. Nevertheless, this shouldn’t discourage any of us from putting our thoughts out there. 

We all have a unique voice and perspective and we all have something worth saying/sharing that will resonate with and/or help somebody. We are all uniquely created, and therefore inherently able to create unique things -- so go for it!

4. Embrace and own your story for no other reason than because it’s yours.

At the start of this piece, I gave you a brief summary of some major events that have happened in my life in the past 5 years. There is, of course, so much more to my story, but the main point is that the sum of my overall story is much greater than these parts I’ve shared. There is no other Nii Ato Bentsi-Enchill on this earth, the same way there is no other you. As I grow more and more into who I am, part of that work is learning to accept all of what makes me, me. It means examining and embracing my strengths as well as my flaws and understanding how they impact my navigation of this world. I can’t authentically share my story or effectively support and encourage my clients to embrace their own if I’m not doing this myself. As a helping professional, I am the tool/instrument. 

To be effective, I have to be willing and able to be vulnerable and offer up parts of myself, the good & the bad in service of others. I can only do this by owning my story and who I am today.

5. It’s important to find community, especially as a ‘solopreneur.’

I wouldn’t be where I am today in the journey of my private practice were in not for the support and encouragement of others. There are a lot of people who have helped me get to where I am, but since November 2019, I have been part of a small group of 4 coaches of color within the career/professional space that has been life-giving. I met Cynthia Pong (Feminist Career Coach for WOC) through her partner with whom I attended elementary & middle school. Through Cynthia, I was introduced to Nadia De Ala (Leadership & Negotiation Coach for WOC) and Rhonda Khan (Public Speaking Coach for Women & Teams). The four of us now hold monthly meetings where we share advice, help each other troubleshoot, encourage/cheerlead, hold each other accountable and simply provide a safe space for us to share what’s going on for us both as people and professionals.

Having these connections and the space we’ve created for each other has been invaluable. Humans aren’t designed to do life or business alone. Find yourself a community that you can pour into and can pour back into you. 

With all that’s going on in the world today between the global pandemic and heightened social justice issues for BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, People of Color), I honestly, almost forgot to mark the 1-year anniversary of my own business. 

I remembered while on a walk with my wife on a forest trail this past Memorial Day. Being in a new environment got me to pause and reflect, which is so needed these days.

Now you. If you were to pause and reflect on your past year, what would it reveal to you? 

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A version of this article also appears on my career advice blog at AvenirCareers.com