What is career coaching?

• Career coaching is something HR professionals rarely do
  • Too busy making sure everyone else has career coaching and support to advance!
• It is in fact support and guidance to work out what you want from your career and what you need to do to get it.
• Helps you remove roadblocks – could be structural ones in your organisation, could be psychological ones to do with self-belief or changing actions that you take daily.
  • Examples:
    • How to ensure visibility
    • How to demonstrate increased accountability
    • How to engage with the right people
    • How to build relationships
    • How to increase personal impact
    • How to navigate company politics
    • How to attract respect (take out the “justs” from emails and verbal communication to start with!)
    • How to adapt your style to different people
  • Also career coaching can look at the options you have in front of you.
    • Specialising in a particular part of HR
    • Specialising in an industry
    • Staying put or moving organisation
    • The options you have right now at your organisation and likely future choices
  • It’s guidance, it’s not telling you what you should do. It’s helping you find the answers whilst providing some helpful techniques and tips.

How does it benefit HR professionals?

• HR professionals and coaching have a very similar relationship to the cobbler’s children being the worst shod.
• HR look after everyone else all the time. And this is often to their own detriment.
• Because there are, arguably, fewer HR professionals compared to other professions strategically manging their careers you are at an advantage if you spend time focusing on this and doing so with some professional support.
• In essence, career progression does not happen through luck alone. Except for the lucky few!
• Most of the time people have put in hard work and planning.
• At the junior stages hard work alone can be enough. Producing good quality work is enough to be recognised and promoted.
• As your role becomes more complex and involves tricky decisions, difficult people, complex situations and multiple grey areas it is more than producing good work. You then need to go to the next level with your approach.
• Visibility becomes key.
• Understanding what it takes to move forward – navigating the politics and becoming important to multiple areas of the business – is key.
• Considering what the projects are that will be the big wins.
• Looking at things from the business’s point of view and meeting their needs in order to meet your own.
• It helps you look at problems and challenges differently. To look at opportunities differently and strategically.  To see how other people see you and how other people see the world.  “Seek to understand before you can be understood”.

What does career coaching involve?

• From a practical perspective it involves meeting on a 1:1 basis – video or face to face for a number of sessions.
• Sometimes people just need one session to provoke thoughts and some actions to move forward.
• Mostly people will want 2 to 6 sessions depending on their circumstances.
• In terms of what it involves beyond the practical:
  • A willingness on the part of the coachee to be honest, reflective and dig deep to understand your motivations, strengths and weaknesses.
  • A willingness to share this in a confidential space.
  • On the part of the coach, they will ask you thought provoking questions based on your responses and their expertise.
  • They may also offer suggestions of what you could do if you are struggling to think of an appropriate action.
  • They will help you set goals, both short and longer-term and hold you accountable to these.

What specific strategies can HR professionals use to grow their careers?

• HR professionals are in a uniquely fortunate position. They have an excuse to build relationships with every single person in the business.  No one else has that.
• I would advise every HR person to really capitalise on this. To have people in every corner of the business advocating for you is massive.
• Then it’s a case of looking at two aspects:
  • Professional development and Personal development
• Professional development
  • What skills are you missing that would drive your career forward?
  • How do you get exposure to those skills (is it learning, experience on the job etc)
• Personal development
  • What soft skills do you need to work on? I feel there are four really key areas to work on in general which will have the biggest impact on moving forward in someone’s career:
  • Building relationships
    • Who has a vested interest in your career?
    • Who can help you and who can you help?
    • Whose support do you need to help you move forwards?
  • Taking the initiative
    • What can you involve yourself in?
    • What will showcase your talent and expertise?
    • Take a risk
  • Personal impact
    • First impressions
    • Knowledge, experience, learning, reputation
    • Communicate your achievements
    • Treat everyone as important
    • Be confident
  • Resilience
    • Foundations are emotional wellbeing, physical wellbeing, support network
    • Then build future focus and inner drive (set goals, self-motivation)
    • Step outside your comfort zone

Do you have to move companies to grow your career as an HR professional?

• That depends!
• I’d like to say no but the reality is that sometimes that is what’s required.
• However, let’s look at your options.
• Large company – probably not. It’s a matter of knowing how to progress within your current organisation.
  • What skills are valued?
  • What path do you want to take?
  • Who are your stakeholders?
  • How do you get noticed?
  • What creates personal impact in your specific situation?
  • What initiatives can you take?
• Small company – fewer obvious opportunities. However, there may be more breadth to your role and progression is not measured in job title alone.  If job title is important to you then coaching can help you work through how to have the conversation.
  • First prove that you can add value beyond your current role
  • Step up
  • Move outside your comfort zone
  • Take more responsibility
  • Be seen as the go to person on a broader range of subjects
  • Have impact.
  • There are other ways of doing it and coaching helps with every single one of these.
• At the minimum, you will be making yourself more marketable to move to the next role.

What if you don’t know what your career end goal is, can career coaching still benefit someone?

• Absolutely!
• Most people aren’t sure of their specific end goal.
• Those who know what they want from an early age or early career are exceptionally lucky
• If you’re not sure what you want longer-term, there are still things to consider for the short to medium-term which coaching can help with:
  • Reflecting on your passions and interests within HR (assuming you plan to stay within the field)
  • Reflecting on your core skills – is there something you’re already recognised for as being an expert?
  • Is there something that you’re seen as the “go to” person for?
• If these are difficult questions to answer then it’s about looking at how you maintain a breadth to your skillset and relationships.
• What are the key actions to be taking in order to keep options open?
  • Some of these will be looking at the relationships you have and those you need to develop.
  • How do you go about doing that?
  • What is going to give your personal impact?
  • Is it different compared to if you were already specialising?
  • Is your strength the fact you’re not specialising?
  • Is it about specialising in an industry sector?