Whether I am delivering career management services face-to-face or via the telephone, I almost always find something fascinating about clients and how they think. A recent phone coaching session got underway with a client’s matter-of-fact proclamation of these three things:
- You need to know that I am very skeptical of this meeting and how it will help me.
- I am very frustrated and have a bad attitude for the whole job search thing.
- And the real reason I am doing this is because my Mom said I should.
And we were off and running. During the session, my client said something very insightful when I asked her to say more about her attitude as it related to job search. She said it was very bad and that she did not like competition and that she didn’t know why anyone would hire her with so much talent to choose from and on and on and on.
Me: How would you describe your attitude when you got up this morning, I inquired?
Client: Neutral….my attitude was neutral.
Her remark immediately led me to think about the neutral option on my car’s gear shift. Neutral…not going forward, not going back. Neutral. No motion. No action. No commotion. No nothing. Neutral.
Which led us to talk about choices and would she be open to putting herself in “D” for Drive?
Client: Hmmm -- D for drive. Like what do you mean?
Me: You know, D will take you somewhere. Anywhere. D keeps you moving. D keeps you going. With D you gotta’ go…gotta’ move.
Client: Even if you don’t know where you are going?
Me: Even if you don’t know where you are going – you just know you are going!
So, you may wonder, did we talk about a car’s “P” for park and “R” for reverse? You bet your backside we did!
By the end of the session, my client’s voice had become friendlier. I heard her laugh. In review of the “homework” exercise, I could hear a shred of confidence. In inviting the client to complete the exercises, she made a commitment to do so, with an agreement to set deadlines for completion of tasks.
As a job seeker, which gear are you in?
P?
R?
N?
D?
Billie...Great post! Thanks for sharing. Your client sounded pretty familiar. You gave terrific insight on how to handle folks who are just "not in gear" with their search.
~ Scott
Posted by: Scott Woodard | October 04, 2012 at 01:00 PM
Scott -- so appreciative of your comment! So many times, clients give me "ideas" for blog posts and this was another one. Thanks for your feedback!
Posted by: billiesucher | October 09, 2012 at 06:39 AM