Megan Riksen:

Hello and welcome to the Work Like a Laker podcast. I'm Megan Riksen, and today my co-host is someone special. She's not normally my co-host because this is a very fancy bonus episode of our podcast where we are speaking more to an alumni population here at Grand Valley. Dani Lauer is the coordinator of adult and alumni career resources. So Danny, I'm going to hand it over to you.

Dani Lauer:

Great. Thank you so much, Megan. Happy to be here. And so, yes, today we are talking about the difference between career advising and career coaching. And as an alumni you may be wondering about some of the resources that are available to you through the Career Center. And if you've been on our website recently, you may have seen both of these terms, career advising and career coaching. And you might be thinking they're kind of an interchangeable term, but they're in fact pretty different. And the person and service you need will depend on where you are in your career and what type of support you're looking for. And so today we are joined by Lisa Knapp and Lori Staggs. Lisa and Lori are both career advisors in our office as well as certified career coaches, and they're going to help us dig into what the main differences are between career advisors and career coaches. So thank you so much for being here, Lisa and Lori. Hello.

Lisa Knapp:

You're welcome.

Lori Staggs:

Happy to be here.

Dani Lauer:

Great. So let's just jump right in. So Lori, how would you describe career advising?

Lori Staggs:

So we all consider ourselves career advisors, I would say in, in the career center. And really to me, when I think about career advising, there's a lot of advisors that are here at Grand Valley. So you have academic advisors, faculty advisors, and we consider ourselves career advisors to really give two words that came to mind to me, were short and structured, right? So we're really here to sort of help students not only discover kind of who they are within the world of work, but help them to get connected. So when I think of advisor, I think advice, right? We are sort of there to provide information, but also help students create a plan. So when we talk about, you know, resume reviews and practice interviews and all of those things, to me those are very practical pieces of a person's career journey. And so I really see career advising as helping students get started down that path for their own career development. And so that's a lot of what we're doing in the Career Center. Now sometimes when we're working with alumni, right, we know the needs are different than our current student population. And so I think a lot of times our office is also focused on first destination. Where do you want to get your start? And so I think we structure our services a lot around those ideas. Where are students at in their own career journey? How can we help them get started? What are some practical pieces we can provide? What is some advice we can provide? We hope to be you know, experts in our, in our area, in our career areas. So for Lisa, she is serving our liberal arts majors, our communicators, our arts, right?

Lisa Knapp:

Educators.

Lori Staggs:

And educators. And I'm serving the college of Business and Sport Management and Hospitality, different worlds. So we're going out talking to employers, keeping up on industry standards, and then we're bringing that information back to students. So I see it as a, almost like an educational piece, but more of that giving advice. And then like I said, helping students get started down that path.

Lisa Knapp:

And advising is very good for alum that are, have not yet reached that first destination. Exactly. So maybe zero to two years. Sometimes people take a break for service or to work and make a lot of money and pay off some of those college loans, and then they're ready to find that first true destination. Those are students that are, those are alumni, excuse me, that benefit from advising.

Lori Staggs:

Yes, absolutely. Or even alumni that are having trouble getting connected. I think we do a lot with that too, where we might show an alum how to develop their LinkedIn profile a little bit more, or who are the people that we know in the industry, other alums, recruiters, again, more in that, you know, sort of first destination space that they can really connect to and start to get connected in that way as well.

Dani Lauer:

Yeah, that's fantastic and that makes so much sense. So if I'm an alum coming in for a career advising appointment, how often or what, what does that look like in terms of regularity?

Lori Staggs:

Yeah, I think career advising, you know, I, I feel like there's no prescription for it, right? So we might, I might see a student one time and all they needed was a resume or an alum, a resume review some ideas on how to get started on their job search and that's it. And then sometimes we might see students and alums a little bit more frequently, but there's no sort of like, oh, we're going to go on this journey together and I'm going to be your accountability partner and we're going to keep continue to meet. And so especially because we serve students all through their college journey and career journey, right? We might see a student their first year and then maybe a couple of times their junior year and then maybe when they're a senior and they're now getting job offers and trying to negotiate that, right? So there's no real regularity with it. Typically we have one hour appointments, so we try to get as much done as we can in that, in that timeframe. But there really is no, okay, now we're going to meet this many more times. It's really kind of between the career advisor and the the student or alum to see what else they might need and that we can help with. Yeah.

Dani Lauer:

Perfect. Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. And just on a really practical note, how does someone make an appointment with a career advisor?

Lori Staggs:

Sure. So we do all of our scheduling through our Handshake platform. There's a Career Center tab in Handshake and if you're an alum and you still know your network ID and password, you can still have access to Handshake, we can help with that in our office. But if you go to the Career Center tab very easy. You find appointments, schedule a new appointment, and then pick the career community that you are affiliated with or sort of want to get started in. And and then you'll see the career advisor's availability

Megan Riksen:

And we'll make sure to link that information in the show notes because I know, especially for alums coming back, trying to remember a password? No, thank you.

Lori Staggs:

You're right.

Megan Riksen:

But we can on our website, which we'll link to, we kind of, yeah, if you can't remember, we have ways for you to get back in there.

Lori Staggs:

Yes, absolutely. So we're easy-ish to find, right?

Dani Lauer:

Easy-Ish. I like it. Yes. Awesome. So, okay, great. Let's pivot. And Lisa, I would love if you could explain what career coaching is to us,

Lisa Knapp:

Right? So if career advising is educating a student or a young alum on how the process works and giving them the tools and resources, career coaching is really less of that and more of helping an individual find their own plan and their own map and their own keys to success, right? So kind of some self discovery, some active goal setting and the role of the coach is less, here let me give you this information and more, here let me ask you these questions that help you find and discover your own information needed for your context and your situation. Because everybody comes to us in a different place and space when it's related to coaching, it might be as simple as, I've never updated my resume, could somebody just help me make a grownup resume for mid-career? Or I need an executive resume and I've never needed one of those before. That's a role a career coach could maybe help you with a one time and done. But more likely than not, the career coach is working with you over a transition or a career pivot, or you've been in a role and you're not taking that step forward, up the ladder that you want to climb, a career coach might help you with, with discovering why and formulating a plan for making that happen for yourself.

Dani Lauer:

That makes a lot of sense. And so would you also say then, Lisa, those appointments are a little bit more frequent with a career coach?

Lisa Knapp:

Yeah, it'll depend a little bit on the coach and the client. You'll make an agreement at the front end of meeting with them. You'll kind of discuss what your overarching goals are. The coach might ask you some questions and suggest some timelines. And you know, often if you're feeling stuck, that might take a little longer to unstick whatever's getting in the way. But it might just be about accountability and a biweekly appointment over the course of two months might serve the purpose. And other people, I have a friend who's an executive, she meets with a career coach once a month and has for about three years now and has grown alongside her because the coach asks great questions and helps her make decisions in the workplace so that she can continue, can continue to be successful and develop her own people. So she's coaching her to coach a little bit, right? So a lot of different, a lot of different things, but they're going to help you gather info, they're going to ask you some great questions and they are going to provide kind of support and accountability for you.

Lori Staggs:

Can I add to that? Career coaching, career coaches can really dive down and specialize in certain things. So you might see an executive coach, a leadership coach, a life design coach, you know, they all might have some different, so it's really a reciprocal, the client is choosing the career coach. The career coach is choosing the client, because you want that to be a really solid working relationship, like you said, because if it's going to be an ongoing thing, right? That's your accountability partner. That's someone who's walking alongside you, sort of saying, "Where are you? Like where are you? Let's check in." So it's a real choosing of each other and I think that's very different than career advising.

Lisa Knapp:

Which is more generalized, and if you're connected to an industry and we have that expertise, we can speak to it and help with it. Yeah. When Lori and I were first certified as career coaches so that we could understand the coaching world, of course a lot of people came to us and said, will you be our coach? And we were like, no, we should not be your coach for a number of reasons. Right? Because our specialties are in that early college student, that first destination. And so to help somebody be a better executive just might not be in our repertoire. And so it would be a good meeting and I'm sure we'd all enjoy each other's company, but, but it wouldn't be the most successful use of a coaching session.

Dani Lauer:

Fantastic. So Lisa, how does someone go about finding a career coach?

Lisa Knapp:

Well, like Lori said, you're going to kind of look at what their specialties are and you're going to think about what your needs are and then do a consult with a coach, have a conversation. Here's what I'm kind of thinking about. What are your services that you can provide? And then you will build out from there. But better yet, if you are a Grand Valley alum listening to this podcast you're going to want to check out a great new resource that Danny has built and provided and probably can speak better to than even I can.

Dani Lauer:

Yeah! So I am so excited about this new resource we have and it is a career coaching database. And so we have essentially done the work for you in finding some phenomenal career coaches in the state of Michigan. Not all of them are in Grand Rapids. They're all over and we have vetted them. We have looked at references, we have interviewed them and know that they are all highly qualified and amazing, amazing coaches. And so there are 10 individuals on our database and they all specialize in different areas. So as you were both sharing, you know, there's going to be a, you know, different coaches coaching different areas of your career. And so we really wanted to make sure that we had folks who, you know, were going to meet people in those various stages and those various needs. The most exciting piece is that all of these coaches are willing to provide at least 10% off of their fees and services for Grand Valley alums that access them through this database. And so you can go on our website, we're going to link that website in the show notes. You can search the different career coaches we have listed, look at the different career areas they specialize in. And then if you are wanting to make that initial contact their website and email links are on that coaching database as well. And so we want to encourage you to seek them out. They are so eager and excited and willing to work with Grand Valley's alums and we are very, very fortunate to have them as part of our extended network here in the Career Center.

Lisa Knapp:

Yeah, there are some heavy hitters on that list and there are some phenomenal individuals. So I think everybody would be excited to work with any of them, but definitely finding one that kind of suits what your current needs are makes a lot of sense.

Dani Lauer:

Yeah, definitely. Well, Lori and Lisa, anything else that you would like to add to kind of help understanding these differences between career advising and career coaching?

Lori Staggs:

I would just say, you know, we're all here to help. So if you are looking for something right just contact our office if you're really just, I don't know where to start. I think we get a lot of those types of appointments. I just don't know where to start. Call our office email someone in our office and we can get you routed to the place that we feel like is a good start for you.

Lisa Knapp:

Right. And we always joke about - people are looking for Yoda, somebody who is going to give them all the wisdom and all the knowledge they need to make a great career decision. And unfortunately there aren't many yodas out there. But, and the decision isn't necessarily a simple easy one. Usually when we're trying to make a change in our career or trying to redirect ourselves and move forward or make that pivot, it's complicated, right? It's, it's our lives are involved, our, our significant others are involved. There's just, the economy is involved, there are just so many factors. And so finding a coach who can kind of speak to the center of that and kind of pull the thread, but knowing that you're probably still going to rely on some of the mentors you already have in your circle, as well as some of the resources in your own workplaces. A lot of companies have some great career resources as do our communities, places like Michigan Works and, and other I think there's a new one with Talent 2025 with Michigan First. I'm not sure all the names, but, but those resources are there. So career coach or a career advisor are just one piece of the puzzle as you're moving forward. And I think that if you approach it with that mindset, you're going to have great success and we're excited for that for you.

Megan Riksen:

Okay. Awesome. Well, thank you all. Thank you Dani for co-hosting and really guiding us through this conversation. Thank you Lori and Lisa! That - I learned something. I mean, shoot, that's why I do this podcast I think. So I just learn all the new things. So thank you everybody so much for listening to this bonus episode. If you are an alum who's listening, stay tuned 'cause we're going to have some alumni related content coming up in the future as well. So please, please subscribe so you don't miss out on any of our great episodes. So thank you so much to everybody for listening, and we hope you tune into a future episode soon.