Career Coaching

The Changing World

Overall, the changing world of work is requiring individuals to be more proactive, adaptable, and committed to lifelong learning in their career management. The traditional career ladder no longer exists.

By staying flexible and open to new opportunities, individuals can navigate the changing world of work and achieve their career goals. Such navigation is not easy and many benefit from career coaching when it comes to successfully managing their careers. In the same way that sailors use a compass to navigate, individuals can use career coaching as a way to more effectively manage their careers.

Career Coaching

Career coaching is a process where a professional coach works with an individual to help them clarify and achieve their career goals. The coach provides guidance, support, and feedback to help the individual develop the skills and knowledge they need to succeed in their career.

Career coaching can be helpful for individuals who are:

• Unclear about their career goals and direction
• Seeking career advancement or a career change
• Facing challenges in their current job
• Wanting to develop specific skills or knowledge
• Seeking to improve their work-life balance or overall job satisfaction.

Approach

The core of a successful career coaching approach is helping individuals to develop and thus use their innate talents to manage their careers more effectively. The focus on turning talent into strengths when used to manage careers, improves career impact significantly.

A strength is the ability to consistently provide near-perfect performance in a specific activity. The key to building a strength is to identify your dominant talents, then complement them by acquiring knowledge and skills pertinent to the activity. Gallup.

The Importance of Influence in Career Management

In our experience, one of the biggest issues in career management is being able to authentically influence career stakeholders in a positive way. A way that gets talent, skill and contribution recognised for the right reasons and demonstrates the potential for future moves.

People who can influence can take charge, speak up and make sure others are heard. They do so by being able to authentically persuade others. Gallup.

Examples of Career Influence

Some examples, where career coaching can help individuals develop their capacity for influencing include:

1. Building relationships: Influence is closely tied to building relationships. Developing strong relationships with colleagues, mentors, and industry professionals can help learn new skills, gain valuable feedback, and stay up to date with industry trends. These relationships can also open doors to new career opportunities.
2. Creating visibility: Building influence can help create visibility within an organization or industry. Reputation and thought leadership are developed by actively engaging with others and sharing knowledge and expertise.
3. Advancing careers: Influence can also help advance a career. By building relationships and creating visibility, new opportunities or promotions are more likely.
4. Leading others: Influence is an essential skill for those in leadership positions. As a leader, the ability to influence others can impact the ability to motivate and inspire a team, make strategic decisions, and achieve organisational goals.
5. Navigating change: In today's rapidly changing work environment, influence is essential for navigating change. By building relationships and establishing a strong reputation, there is a better chance of adapting to new challenges and being considered for opportunities.

A great career coach then, helps others not only set a manageable career direction, but also helps them to develop and use their strengths to do so.