What if there was a process for figuring out a career transition or advancement that wasn't mind-bendingly difficult to understand, or so mystical that you just had to take the plunge with the faith of a saint?
In the past, career coaching may have felt that way. But at its best, career coaching is a design-thinking process, which makes it extremely effective for those willing to participate.
Let me explain.
How Is Career Coaching A Design Thinking Process?
Design thinking is a process of thinking divergently and then convergently. In other words, you think of all the options and then narrow them down. A design-thinking process is useful when trying to solve what is referred to as a wicked problem, which is an ill-defined problem, where both the problem and the solution are unclear.
Career problems, such as how to change your career or how to advance, are both examples of such problems. It's often unclear exactly what's holding you back, what you're trying to do and how to do it.
Design thinking in the form of career coaching to the rescue.
The two processes — design thinking and career coaching — are similar. Design thinking consists of five key elements:
• Empathize
• Define
• Ideate
• Prototype
• Test
When it comes to your career, here's what it might look like:
Empathize
What constraints do you have that inform your career decisions? A mortgage? Three kids? An aging mother you have to stay in the area to care for? Student debt? Empathizing with the situation and understanding the complexities involved is the first step.
It's about understanding all of the parameters that must be accounted for when creating a solution for it to be an effective one.
In my experience, this is often where people get stuck -- believing that their situations are too complex to be able to discover a solution. These constraints hold people back from even trying to find a job or career that might fit them better than their current situation.
Define
What's the problem you're actually trying to solve? Do you really need a new career or just a new job? What work do you really want to do?
Ideate
One of my clients likes to call this the throwing-spaghetti-on-the-wall stage. That's exactly what it is, and it's that messy. Come up with any and all ideas: good ones, bad ones, ideas that don't quite make sense, parts of ideas. Whatever comes to you, just throw it on the wall.
Prototype
This is your dry run. There might be nothing worse in a career change or other major career move than going for it without first testing the waters. This is where you do your research on the good ideas that you have come up with and schedule lots of informational interviews and networking meetings. Learn from other people so you don't have to learn everything yourself the hard way. The hope is that you don't make it all the way to the testing phase before figuring out that something is wrong.
Test
This is the stage where you try it out for yourself. You might do an internship, take a class or volunteer. You could also choose the ultimate test: getting a job in your new field. You're getting feedback from the real world, and the question you're trying to answer is, "Does this solve the problem?" If not, you're back to prototyping or ideating until you find a solution that does.
Why Career Coaching Means Massive Success For You
Career coaching is engaging in a process of decision-making with someone else who is skilled at helping you through a specific type of wicked problem, one that has the capacity to cut you off at the knees, emotionally and financially.
Deciding that you're going to engage in this type of exercise means that you can get through blocks and come up with ideas and solutions that you may have never thought of before. Once you do, you can arrive at an aha! moment, the moment where there is suddenly a clear path forward (another concept in design thinking and also coaching).
Certain people who would never consider coaching might get behind the idea that a process of design thinking their career might be a good one. But the truth is that they are one and the same. If this process is good enough for top businesses, it will do wonders for your career.
When you use the best strategies to solve problems in your career and life, you will maximize your chances for success.
