A coach, by definition, is someone who trains a person or team to prepare, specialize, and become an expert in a particular area or topic.
While we may be talking about the boardroom and not a gym, we do think that professional coaches and career coaching provide the same benefit. Both coaches teach you how to think strategically, define, and clarify your vision and put some big points up on the (professional) scoreboard.
Many people in their career only turn to a career coach when they’re feeling stuck, need a little extra motivation, or even need to be held accountable to get to the finish line on particular projects or efforts. While these are all excellent reasons to start paying a professional coach to elevate your efforts, it’s also important to adopt the important mind-management techniques adopted and shared by these coaches to keep focus and on-track the rest of the time, too. By practicing coaching techniques in your own day-to-day work, you can rest assured that you’ll be well-equipped to handle big changes or even crises such as the current Coronavirus pandemic.
Take a look at some of the tried-and-true self-coaching techniques we’ve adopted, and dive deep into the details of becoming your own career coach in my new book, Power Moves: How Women Can Pivot, Reboot, and Build a Career of Purpose.
1. Be Self-Reflective
One of the most important considerations in taking charge of your own career coaching is to think objectively about your work, experiences, and feedback you receive. By getting organized, you can record and create structured opportunities to be self-reflective about the choices you make each day, and why you are motivated to take certain actions. Without the structure of a formal coach checking in on your progress, you will need to create designated techniques that help you be introspective about your objectives in self-coaching.
Make a daily practice of stopping to think about your “why”— much like daily opportunities for physical health and movement at the gym! Your self-awareness will help you think more deliberately about your actions, thought patterns, and decisions.
2. Play to Your Strengths
As I highlighted earlier, a big reason you may be motivated to become your own career coach is that you’re looking to change things up in your professional life. Whether you’re looking for a new job or promotion from your current role, move into a new industry or start your own business, pivoting to a new space means you will not only be learning as you go, but you’ll also be looking to impress others and build key relationships.
Instead of fretting about all of the things you need to learn and do to excel at, make a Power Move and play to your own strengths! Keep a list of times when you have been congratulated for your work, rise to the top in a meeting, or feel your best at work. Brainstorm additional ways you can creatively lean into the skills you are already amazing at. A few questions to get you started:
- What are you good at that’s required for your job?
- Where have you had success at work so far?
- What have others told you you’re good at?
- What gives you energy at work or when do you feel the most energized?
- Where do you enjoy spending your time?
3. Set and Manage Career Goals (that are S.M.A.R.T.)
A major component of career coaching is setting and managing professional goals. If getting or starting career coaching was a previous goal you had—congratulations! You’re halfway there.
Setting and managing professional goals can often feel overwhelming when you first start working on elevating your career. Begin your goal-setting process by thinking about the areas you would like to learn more about, spend energy on or specifically, improve. Spend some time auditing your interests and concerns, and sit down to set up some SMART goals. How do you do that, you ask? SMART goals help you set intentions that you can actually make progress on and measure how you perform, in a few different ways. By definition, they are:
- Specific— these goals are detailed and definable, not broad ideas or concepts.
- Measurable— you can literally count these goals, and determine growth.
- Actionable— they are immediate goals you can make movement on!
- Relevant— they apply to your current life and will help you make changes.
- Timely— you can set deadlines and track your goal progress.
4. Track Your Progress
Now that you’ve reflected on your goals and set some measurable benchmarks for your career, it’s important to create systems and check-ins to track your progress during your self-career coaching. We encourage you to do this in your daily work journal or set up an excel sheet to literally put pen to paper and hold yourself accountable when tracking your progress.
I first learned about the power of progress—and tracking the small wins which add up to bigger milestones—when I started Weight Watchers the summer after my freshman year of college. You see, I skipped the Freshman 15 and went straight to the Freshman 30. When I went home for summer break I was motivated to get healthy (and fit in my jeans again) so, I started Weight Watchers (WW). The general idea with WW is that you set small goals, slowly change your habits, and those add up to bigger moves. I'm proud to say it worked and I learned how to create healthier habits and make them part of my "lifestyle." A similar method can be applied to your career and you can develop your own "career lifestyle" by learning to celebrate progress and let the "perfection" come later.
Just like in the workplace, create some KPI’s for yourself (Key Performance Indicators) to determine what areas of success you want to work on or elevate. Check out some of our self-reflective questions below to help you track your progress and think about what areas of growth you’ve already made!
- What is one lesson (or lessons, if you have many!) that I learned today?
- Did anyone compliment or comment on my work today? What did they say?
- What is one big thing that I accomplished today?
- Did I do anything above and beyond my basic job description today?
- What is one way that I can go above and beyond tomorrow?
5. Commit to Improve
The hardest part of career coaching, and often one of the primary reasons many women lean into actually hiring a coach, is sticking to the plan. To really see success in your own career coaching, you have to actually commit to improving. Self-reflection, strength definition, goal-setting, and tracking your progress don’t really mean a thing if you aren’t able to wake up each morning, map out your day and stay on task to reach your fullest potential. We encourage you to set yourself up for success:
- Map out your day ahead. If you can just get started on projects and work tasks, you can often get into a flow of tons of great work for the day. Start each morning by mapping out the day ahead of you. Create your to-do list the evening before, or block out time on your calendar to make sure everything that gets done, gets done.
- Visualize success. Struggling to see the trees through the forest? Stop getting caught up in the small details and planning around where you want to go with your career, and visualize future success. Coach yourself by planning your end goal ahead of the game.
- Share with a friend. While you may be coaching yourself, it doesn’t mean you can’t share your vision and ideas with others! In fact, letting others in on your goals and intentions is often a great way to help hold yourself accountable to all of your big plans.
6. Stop the Comparison Game
Last but not least, be sure that you take care of yourself, including your mental and emotional health, while you’re digging deep and coaching yourself. Thinking intensely about your own areas of improvement is a quick way to get down and compare yourself to others. Let it go!
Remember that the best way to coach yourself is to consider your unique value and professional contributions. Partner up with your pals and support them with a little Shine Theory. Make the ultimate Power Move and mutually invest in other women, and watch you and your peers rise to the top, together. In the meantime, stop the comparison game:
- Recognize your triggers and label them. This is a great way to stop feelings of comparison before they start.
- Keep a gratitude jar. Place a note inside of one thing you feel grateful for each day. Read them all at the end of the week.
- Set limits for all of your social media apps each day. This is a deep well of “compare and despair” for most of us. If you find yourself exceeding your limits, remove the apps from your phone altogether.
- Use comparison as motivation to improve. If you’re envious of what someone else has, examine that, and, if it’s healthy motivation, use it as a guide for what you want.
- Volunteer your time to a community organization. Through an experience helping others, you’ll often have more appreciation for your own progress, life, career, and more.
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