Professional Services
Individual Sessions:
Career Counseling and Coaching
During our first session, we will decide how my services will fit your unique needs and situation. We'll individualize the counseling/coaching process based on your needs and the questions you have about yourself. Before our first meeting, I will send you a page of questions that will help you examine your needs and values, and help define what you want and expect from a career counselor/coach. More importantly, the questions will help you define where you are in your own questing process.
TIME: Each session lasts 50 minutes to 1 hour.
IN PERSON / PHONE / FACE TIME: I work with clients from my offices in the Yellow Springs, Dayton and Columbus areas, but for those who wish to work with me from a distance, individual sessions are available through the convenience of the phone or FaceTime.
Available services include:
• The Motivated Pattern—A primary activity. All other services follow as needed.
• Myers Briggs Test
• Vocational Card Sorts
• Strong Interest Inventory
• Values Inventory
• Prioritizing Grids
• Caps, Cops, Copes Tests
• Informational Interview
• Resume Development (after we discover your pattern)
• Job Coaching: I will be available to monitor and support your progress towards your goals.
The foundation of our work together is your Motivated Pattern. We start with this process because it helps both of us recognize and define the motivated skills you use regardless of your job titles or even if you have never worked at a job. It is the best method I have found to identify your potentials and those skills which contain your gifts. These gifts may be getting discounted by either you or those in your environment.
The Motivated Pattern has a number of elements including:
• A handful of motivated abilities, those that you use automatically
• How you best work with others
• Your favorite area of creativity
• The type of feedback you need
• Your areas of interest
• The environment that you best work within
After completing the Pattern process we will both know more about your strengths and what work would fit you, not how you will fit the work. Too often in our explorations of work and career, we do what I call the Pretzel Dance. We look at job vacancies on the web or classified ads and think, "I could do that. I could bend myself and go to meetings even though I hate meetings," or "I could work inside even though I prefer to move around and be outside." We take who you are and say, "Given your strengths and abilities, where in the working world would you be recognized and appreciated for using them?"
Within the discovery process, we both come to know what your next steps will be. One welcome side effect of knowing your Motivated Pattern is being able to look at yourself from a different angle and with a new vision. The process itself is a powerful builder of your self worth. The more a person knows about his/her strengths, the better they are able to accept and appreciate theirself. None of these tests and methods will tell you exactly what to do. They are signs along the road, pointers if you will. They are intended to enhance and broaden your understanding of yourself as a person who has gifts to contribute to the world, a purpose to fulfill, and ways of being of service to the world. After the discovery process, we will proceed to brainstorm and then explore those areas where abilities and interests intersect until one or two areas seem worthy of further research.
Right Livelihood Groups
The Right Livelihood Groups are 6-week discovery groups that I conduct in the Dayton area (Columbus area pending). These groups help people learn more about themselves in relation to work. These groups also function as a great source of support to its members. Each session is a separate learning experience, although each one builds upon the previous session. Space is limited to 6-8 participants.
A sample of session topics are:
• Setting priorities using the Prioritizing Grid
• The influence of our parents and ancestors on our careers
• Exploration of enjoyment and enjoyable experiences
• Learning from our previous employment
• The best ways to find work: The fulfilling kind and the kind that are stop-gaps to put food on the table.
Who I Serve
Unemployed or Underemployed
It goes without saying that those people who have been fired, have quit their jobs, or who have just finished school and are looking for work, are people who would benefit from knowing more about themselves and having help with the job search. People who are underemployed may be in a stop-gap job because they have to meet their basic needs. They know they must find other long-lasting and satisfying work but don't know which way to turn except to the want ads. Turning first to career counseling will save them a lot of time and frustration.
Teenagers
Teens are usually fending off the questions from well-meaning adults, "What are you going to do after high school?" If they plan to go to college, interested adults ask, "What do you want to major in?" Many parents try to guide their children, wanting them to be happy and successful adults. Yet as parents, we also fear for our children and want them to be able to support themselves and a family, so we will talk to their children about job security or suggest the teen go into a field where the teen has gotten good grades. It is a difficult job to be a teenager and feel like any decision about career or school will have to stick for a long time. It can become a scary time. Finding out what a teenager's motivated pattern and long term interests are, will help both the teen and his parents.
College Students
College students have an even greater pressure than high school students because a lot of money is being invested in their education and the savings of their parents are at stake. There is a small percentage of students who know exactly what they want to do professionally and head straight for it. Most students don't have a clue and think that everyone else knows their future course. That assumption is isolating because then it is hard to admit one's doubts and engage in conversation about majors and careers. College students benefit greatly from knowing what their motivated pattern is. They can make better decisions about their majors and talk more convincingly to their parents and advisors about their vocational goals.
Job Changers
Who among working people hasn't endured a job that was a poor fit, but didn't know what direction to turn? Or the person who gets unwillingly down-sized? Or the person who has performed the same job for the past twenty years and isn't aware of the other unused and unidentified natural skills that could be used in another line of work?
Housewives Who Want to Return to Work
If a woman has been busy raising children and has not worked since she was newly married, she may question whether or not she has any skills she could market in the world of work. By discovering her motivated pattern, she will be able to identify many skills she can use to begin her career outside the home.
Retired Men and Women
I have met many retired men and women who say that the first year or two of retirement was full of pleasure, visiting friends and family members, doing the home improvement tasks that had been put off, sometimes for years, and renewing interest in a neglected hobby. Then something happens where they begin to feel bored, perhaps useless, and search for meaningful activities they can spend their time on. Even though a person may be in his/her 60's or 70's, there's always time to learn about themselves and the skills they have to offer. There is always something new to discover about what can bring them satisfaction. I delight in helping them find that joyfulness in their elected activities, volunteer or employed, and especially play.
Resources
Jobhuntersbible.com
Richard Bolles’ site with an incredible amount of information and other linkage. If you had only one site to use, this would be it.
Job-hunt.org
More help with resources and employees using the web. Nice index of resources by profession or industry.
bls.gov
The Occupational Outlook Handbook is the government's premier source of career guidance featuring hundreds of occupations.
Workworries.com
Help with people problems at work.
myperfectresume.com
Resume building
careeractionresources.com
Best Practice Self-Assessments for Job Search & Reemployment Planning