“Career Counseling”: The ultimate oxymoron

What's the deal with Career counseling?

So let me get this straight.

There are countless industries and people that are able and interested in helping people of all backgrounds find work, I’m sure you can think of the name of an organization or person off the top of your head.

We have career counselors at every level of school, advising and providing guidance. We have career, personality and other psychological tests that can be taken to help direct you to a career that will suit your education, personality, lifestyle, skills, education, and other less tangible considerations.

We have social services, nonprofits and government agencies focused on helping minorities and disadvantaged people find work. We have federal and state regulatory agencies governing and upholding employment law.??We have the EEOC to limit and discourage discrimination. ?We have the SBA to help with small businesses. And we even have a federal agency, The US Department of labor that apparently oversees this all.

Wherever you are in your life, there are people and institutions whose job is to tell you what to do, and take your money, oh I mean help you.

The entire education industrial complex that we pay crazy amounts of money for, who’s purpose is meant to prepare us for adult hood aka prepare us for a job is not really accountable to its students. It’s become harder and harder to figure out which schools and which programs are worth the cost. One of my professors at Irvine said “we the students are the result and product of the schools.”

?Work and educational outcomes have become so subjective, that career counselors mostly just help you decide what path to take, isn’t in odd and interesting that most of the time, once you get a job, all those people usually disappear??They got you to the door, and you impressed the gate keeper to let you in to the organization, and now your main point of contact if you have any issue is the Human resources department. As soon as you get the job, it’s assumed the rest is ALL your responsibility, and your fault if it doesn’t work out.

You’re not meant to complain or talk about the satisfaction of your job to anyone you work with, and sometimes your discouraged from talking about it on your own personal social media in unfiltered ways.

References are used and asked for, and the employer is liable if it’s not true. Your entire term with your current and former employers is up for review, and if you left in a bad way, or ever did anything “not good”, it could haunt you for the rest of your days.

Where is the industry and discipline of people that are meant to listen to you about how your career and job is honestly going? Advise, reflect and act as a sounding bord, giving you custom information based on your specific situation?

People that understand and study the psychology of work? People that can help you navigate the specific and tricky issues that arise in your job your career your industry?

Your boss or supervisors aren’t able to fill this role because most of the time they are part of the problem, and can take action against you. The power dynamic also makes this tricky.

Your coworkers sometimes fill this role, but they are usually in the same boat, and are too close to you and the situation.?

Mentors are a good compromise, but they usually have their own priorities and agenda despite not saying so.?

Coach’s sometimes fill this role, but are usually in different industries.

Consultants often fill this role, but they are usually expensive.?

Isn’t it odd and a huge oversight that “the career”, the checkpoint of adulthood, the result of a life of education, effort, the product of your family income, the direction you will follow for likely the rest of your life, your passion, the thing that is buttressed by all of society, the application of your unique skills, the things that you contribute to society which will determine your personal and professional satisfaction doesn’t technically have a” career specialty”?

Counselors and those who study psychology currently fill this niche, they may understand and study people, but they are usually clueless when it comes to other industries.?That’s like trying to solve an equation with too many unknowns. They usually know local resources. But that is it. Their entire industry usually focuses on helping individuals who suffer from substance, drug or mental health issues.

I can’t believe I’m using this quote, but this is a situation of “making the able more able”.

So, who do we talk to about our career issues?

Answer: our friends.

We need more people willing and able to do this, it not only helps with the bottom line, but it will help with retention, engagement, decrease turnover, and add value and satisfaction.

How we feel and perform at work always bleeds over into all other aspects of our lives.

When I was at Omnicell my boss’s boss, the CTO made some time to just “Check-in” with me, he had no agenda, no plan, nothing. He wanted to make sure I was settling in, and put 10-15 min on his calendar to do this.

I realized I could do this myself at my startup, so I started doing this with everyone not in leadership. At 1st my people were wary, and said everything was fine, but over time they began to open up with me, and tell me their problems. Having that direct line to the head of the organization is how I was able to get the honest feedback to better serve my team.

I know there is a bit of a power dynamic issue, and I know there is a management practice out there that says never be the one to go to someone, make them come to you. Reversing that dynamic takes courage, and if not done right may get messy and confusing. People are used to not hearing from their supervisors unless they did something wrong. But know, from my decade of experience of leading remote teams, you can’t keep the same old expectations.

My former creative art director of 10 years never went to people under him, I asked him to do it, and he refused. He kept the old perspective that people should go to him. That people should email him if they wanted his attention. This was a personality thing but having that power dynamic expectation can set up tears of power, and power is why remote work is feared by a lot of old guard. But that is another subject. He kept his old way of doing things to the bitter end, and lets just say, I’m glad we parted ways, there were a lot of red flags I missed because I was his friend, and was too close to the situation.

We usually ask our friends and family to weight in on our choice of Significant other, it’s time our friends and family spoke truth about our choice of careers and help us before it results in an EA spouse situation.??