Whether you’re fresh out of school and ready to conquer the world, or someone thinking of making a career switch halfway through your employment journey – career coaching is something you can turn to for assistance when making informed decisions about your professional paths. However, what you gain from these sessions is heavily dependent on your ability to absorb the information provided and apply them to yourself.

To help you make the most of your career coaching appointment, we’ve put together a list of steps you should take throughout your journey with your career coach. Read on to learn more.

Learn More: 3 Questions to Ask Before Making a Career Switch

1. Set Clear Goals

We’ve all done some sort of goal-setting growing up. Be it jotting down desired exam results on the first day of school or listing out new years’ resolutions before the countdown, many of us have established goals we want to achieve. But how many of us have actually succeeded in obtaining them? During career coaching, you can no longer push these targets to the back of your mind.

Goal-setting, while thought of as unnecessary, is an important step to take before you embark on any journey. It provides you with a clear sense of direction, helps to define your path, and highlights the objectives you should focus on. When well-defined, these goals can also motivate you and prevent meaningless wandering in your career path. For example, if learning more about social media is your ultimate aim, you can work towards looking for social content strategy courses to enrol in and suitable digital marketing positions to apply for.

With this list, you can effectively communicate your ambitions to your career coach and empower them to tailor their advice and strategies to help steer you towards the right path.

2. Document Your Career History

Have prior job experiences? Noting down the route you’ve taken thus far facilitates self-reflection and helps you gain insights into your journey, successes and challenges. With this career history documentation, career coaches can better identify your strengths and areas for improvement to determine what next steps you need to take to enhance your hireability or push you in the right direction. Besides, having this understanding is crucial to providing more personalised career advice. Combined with a strengths-based approach, your career coach can further maximise your potential by building upon what you already do well in.

3. Prepare a List of Questions

Adopting a proactive mindset and attending your career coaching sessions with a list of questions will benefit you greatly and help you achieve your goals much more effectively. Rather than wasting precious appointment time figuring out the questions you have, coming prepared allows you to quickly clarify your queries, addressing key concerns and seeking advice on specific challenges.

4. Engage Actively

Active engagement during coaching sessions cultivates an atmosphere for open communication, where you can express your thoughts and discuss concerns much easily to help your coach understand how to assist you. But apart from vocalising yourself, it’s important to know when to quieten down and be receptive to feedback and suggestions. This approach will help you to self-reflect and gain insights into yourself, which can be helpful in your journey.

5. Utilise Personality and Skill Assessments

More than just tools to help you understand your friend’s character, personality assessments like the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI), and skill assessments such as the RIASEC Profiling Tool, provides information that can be crucial for setting realistic career goals. These tests also enhance communication between you and your coach, and help them tailor guidance to your needs and character.

What they do is they offer insights to your preferences, natural strengths and weaknesses to give you a clear view of how your personality and abilities align with certain professions. Not only does this show you your possible options, it also enables you to make informed decisions about your professional future.

6. Create a Customised Career Action Plan

Career development plans outline actionables and milestones to achieve, gradually leading you towards your end goal. And in order for it to effectively bring you to your destination, you need to collaborate with your career coach to work out the detailed steps to take, ensuring that it aligns with your personal and professional objectives. Together, you can identify areas for improvement, address challenges and leverage your strengths to enhance your profile.

Within this customised career action plan, establish your SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound) goals to transform your vague ideas into concrete, manageable steps that can be tracked and assessed. Then, regularly evaluate and adjust your strategies with your career coach during each appointment to progress in the right direction.

Looking for training programmes, career advice or need help with impressing a hiring manager during an interview? e2i is where you can find all the career resources you need to propel yourself towards the fulfilling career you envision. Take charge of your career with us.