Career Coaching, Career Counseling

A couple of anecdotes came my way recently regarding 2 related subjects. Career Counselors' (as in an academic career counselor) and paid career coaches or job finders.

One came from Linked In: A fellow had apparently been burned by one of these outfits that claimed to have "the secret to the hidden job market". My take on anything related to career search that you as the candidate pay for: No one has the secret to the hidden job market. Only you know what fits you. The most that these places will do is spam your resume' out to a bunch of recruiters and industry contacts, probably ones that they don't know well or at all.

There are cases where you might pay someone for career help; interview coaching, resume' writing, or other discrete tasks, or training on how to do your own search, research, write cover letters, identify prospects. But the less work that you supposedly have to put into it, the less valuable it will be.

The other example came from a network security candidate, a new college graduate. His career counselor at the college cautioned him against pursuing 'too narrow' a field, like network security, and advised him to take a broader curriculum. He then graduated and contacted us about a network security career, and guess what: he didn't have enough studies in the field. He was extremely upset, and rightfully so; I've never met a career counselor that had enough expertise in multiple fields to be making any kind of specific recommendations on a particular career. What they should do, again, is provide guidance on how the student should go about making a decision, the pro's and con's of a broad vs. a narrow curriculum, statistics on growth in particular fields etc. But I would never caution someone with a passion for a particular area to avoid it. Just the opposite; I think the real path to success lies in pursuing your passion, not just 'finding a job'.

Opinions are a dime a dozen, mine included. Your best career resource is going to be you, when you've studied and researched and evaluated numerous opinions of others. Never rely on one person or entity to make decisions for you.

Another note: My impression is that there are plenty of generalists out there. In any field. I frequently see such people struggling with job changes, finding a fit, etc. Top notch people in any field will rarely have trouble finding work, so your goal should be to be one of them. And just make sure that field is not a dinosaur. If you pick one that turns out to be headed that direction, re-train yourself in something related and growing and move on from there. Again, a top notch person will not have much trouble making the transition.