From career burnout to clarity and confidence

When Karen came to see me, she was feeling burnt out and disillusioned. She had taken on a contract role that required constant fire-fighting, as she’d inherited an underperforming team in a dysfunctional organisation.

After a successful 30 year career, she realised she’d come to be seen as someone who could “sort things out and fix things up”, but that wasn’t how she wanted to spend the remainder of her working life.

Karen decided that it was time to reassess and be deliberate about how she managed the next phase of her career. She didn’t want to fall into the same kind of roles she’d been taking on in recent years. But before she could re-position herself and attract the right kind of roles, she needed to be clearer about what she wanted and needed for her own success and wellbeing.

We worked through a programme of coaching designed to help her understand herself better.

As Karen says: “I gained a much better understanding of my own needs, preferences and values so that I could identify the right opportunities in future.”

She also got a much better sense of the opportunities available to her.

“I realised that my skills and experience were a good fit for a range of roles, including contracting, which could give me more flexibility in future”.

Karen is now working in a government department which is very much aligned with her values as defined in the coaching sessions.

“Without the coaching, I could have made another poor choice when seeking a new role.

I also could have risked underselling myself and my range of skills and competencies. Now I feel much more confident and sure of what I bring to a prospective employer,” she says.

“I would highly recommend coaching to anyone seeking a new direction in their career”.