Career Coaching for Students

by Amanda Quayle

Ask a few people, “What guidance can you offer to a graduate looking for their first job?”  Along with their responses you are likely to hear, “I wish someone had told me this when I was starting out.”  Coaches focusing on high school and college students help them navigate the complexities and challenges in taking their first steps out of high school or college and then arm them with the confidence, knowledge, and insight.

In this chapter of the book, I liken the process of a student participating in career coaching sessions as similar to going on a mountain hike.  How do you prepare for a hike?  Have you packed the right equipment to sustain your day trip?  What path will you take and what point do you want to reach?  What obstacles can you expect and how will you overcome them?  How will you get there?  What will you gain from this experience?  Together we will take the hike, go on the journey, in support of students stepping into their adult lives.  Explore, navigate, design, discover, transform, and evaluate.

Change is certain in life and our experiences, environment, and the people we meet along the way all contribute to influencing us on our journey.  As coaches we support clients to design and redesign priorities depending on the stage of life they are experiencing.  This chapter explores how a coach supports a student.

Read more in the full chapter of Coaching Perspectives VI.