Career Coaching for Professionals in Transition:
How to Enhance Your Skills and Establish Your Goals

By Ashley Warren

Do you feel a tinge of pain as you arrive at work each morning but can’t identify a fulfilling career? Do you want to ace that upcoming job interview but don’t know how to prepare?
 
Working with a career coach might be your solution. Read on for some ideas about how career coaching works and how to begin the search for the right coach.

UPGRADING YOUR PROFESSIONAL PORTFOLIO

Rebecca Zucker, a partner at the executive coaching and leadership development firm Next Step Partners, says its coaches collaborate with business professionals to help them take the next step in their careers.
 
Partners and consultants at Next Step, based in San Francisco and New York, do selective one-on-one coaching and also visit business schools across the country where they conduct career development workshops specifically designed for MBA students and alumni.
 
Zucker recently visited the McCombs School to present a workshop on “Creating a Career Marketing Plan.” Participants learn to “apply a business marketing plan to your career, looking at how to position yourself and the brand you want to develop over time,” she says.
 
Regardless of prior experience, workshop participants acquire skills—such as thinking proactively and strategically—that are relevant at any stage of their careers, she says.
 
According to Zucker, all professionals, despite age or current position, should define their career goals. Workshops help clients focus on this goal-setting process.
 
“Part of the process is helping them tune out the noise, the outside influences and messages about what they should be doing with an MBA,” she says.
 
To achieve results, Zucker says clients must realize “creating a sustainable career that has real momentum and longevity requires doing something that is authentic for you.” Thus, a coach should emphasize building your goals, dreams and plan of action.
 

FINDING BALANCE

Lisa Morrison, MBA ’88, is a certified career coach based in Oakland, Calif. She says a number of her clients have had financial success and want to discover new ways to achieve personal satisfaction.
 
“Many of my clients have reached a point in their careers when they are beginning to explore new definitions of success,” she says.
 
Morrison draws from her own professional background when advising clients. After she earned her MBA, she spent more than 20 years working for large and small businesses before becoming a career and life coach.
 
Clients seek her expertise for various reasons, but “many are stuck in careers and feel they need to stay because they have invested so much time in a particular career, even though they are pretty unhappy,” she says. “For some, it takes a lot of courage to change their career direction.”
 
Often, clients’ professional dissatisfaction affects their personal lives, which is why Morrison focuses on striking a balance between the home and office.
 
“When you’re very career-oriented, it’s easy to lose sight of the other pieces that make life worth living, and I say that as a recovered workaholic,” she says. “But it actually enhances your career, rather than taking away from it. There is less burnout, and happier employees tend to be more productive.”
 
Morrison has two primary pieces of advice for those who don’t jump out of bed, eager to arrive at work on a Monday morning. “If you’re unhappy, begin to look for another career path sooner rather than later,” she says. “Sometimes, people get stuck and stay out of complacency.”
 
Taking proactive measures to secure a more satisfying career is wise from both financial and practical standpoints, she says. “When people reach a certain level of earnings in a particular industry, they often find it harder to switch careers and make the same income right off the bat. In fact, sometimes they need to take a pay cut, so it’s better to go through that sooner when you are earning less,” Morrison says. “It doesn’t pay to invest time and energy in a job or career that isn’t right for you or isn’t a stepping stone to where you really want to be.”
 
Morrison also suggests that clients regularly evaluate their current situations. “At least once a year, apply planning and strategy methods to your own life,” she says. “Ask yourself where you are headed and if the path you are on is going to put you in a better place. Clarify your priorities and develop your personal definition of success.”
 

ATTAINING RESULTS

Elizabeth Quintanilla, a second-year full-time MBA student at McCombs, says she realized after her first semester that her background in engineering didn’t exactly mesh with “the typical MBA career path.”
 
She was unsure if she wanted to complete the program, so she hired a career coach to conduct an assessment, which evaluated her strengths and weaknesses, communication style and preferred working style.
 
“With the analysis and subsequent coaching, I was able to find a path to blend the MBA with my previous career in engineering,” she says.
 
Eventually, Quintanilla decided to continue the coursework and apply her increased knowledge of business to the specialized field of engineering. She plans to pursue a career as a technology product manager, thereby combining her business and engineering skill sets.
 
“Once I took that viewpoint, my classes became more interesting,” she says. “I have a different perspective now.”
 
Quintanilla says she had such a positive experience because she found a coach who was a sounding board who understood and helped guide her. Hiring an advocate who tailors each session to meet your individualized needs is crucial to the process. Finding the right coach requires researching his or her professional experience and evaluating recommendations from past clients.

 “I was able to avoid the distractions and pursue a path that I chose,” she says. “I got a personal champion.”

---