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Career Coaching Case Studies

Hailey Lands a Fabulous Microbiology Offer in Just One Month

Black woman cheering her own success at landing a new job while checking online from her home.

Introduction

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Hailey was finishing up her degree in Microbiology at UC Berkeley when she reached out to me. Her long-range plans were to attend medical school, but she wanted to take a break from school to get some work experience.

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She was trying to find a job, but she wasn’t having much luck and the pressure from her parents wasn’t helping.  She dutifully applied for multiple positions and even landed a few interviews, but they had not gone well.  Even more troubling, her lack of success started to erode her confidence and she found her performance in interviews continued to deteriorate:  she didn’t know how to answer questions about her background, her mind went blank when asked tough questions and she even found herself babbling about unrelated topics.  She wasn’t getting called back for follow up interviews and was really frustrated.  She knew she needed help but didn’t know where to start.

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Hailey's Main Struggles

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The biggest hurdles preventing Hailey from landing a great post-college job were:
 

  • She needed help with her resume and cover letters.

  • Her LinkedIn profile needed a touch-up.

  • She felt totally unprepared for interviews as they made her extremely nervous. She found interviews to be super stressful and felt she had flailed in previous interviews.

  • She didn’t really know how or where to look for jobs and had no idea what to expect for starting pay.

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Hailey Worked Hard With Adina

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Hailey and I got right to work. Together, we:
 

  • Revised her resume to highlight her strengths and abilities and create customized cover letters for each job to which she applied.

  • Explored LinkedIn, and I taught her how to use keywords, search for jobs, and follow up with hiring managers after submitting her resume.

  • Went to Glassdoor and PayScale to scope out an expected salary range to set her expectations.

 

Within a week, Hailey was called for an interview by a great company.

 

To prepare Hailey, we:
 

  • Extensively reviewed applicable job descriptions, focusing on framing Hailey’s interview responses to meet the job requirements.

  • Taught her to express her answers in terms of her accomplishments, always focusing on her contributions to the organization.

  • Did some mock interviews, rehearsed her answers to common interview questions, and discussed how to answer a few not-so-common questions.

  • Created a list of questions for her to ask the interviewer to learn about the company and position.

  • Helped her create her STAR (situation, task, action, results) stories to illustrate her strengths and accomplishments on the spot. We practiced her answers and worked on using ways her stories could be used to answer multiple questions.

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Hailey felt prepared and ready to go into her interviews:

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  • She knew what she needed to say and how to make the case that she was the best candidate for the position.

  • Hailey nailed all the interviews. She was unflappable throughout the conversations and responded to tricky questions calmly and with ease. She knew when to end her answers and when to continue her explanations. She connected on a personal level with her interviewers and asked thoughtful questions that impressed the employers. She felt good about her performance and was proud of herself for representing her background accurately.

  • She went from not knowing how to look for a job and dreading interviews to employed with a great company in an exciting position in less than a month.

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Hailey Got the Job!

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Hailey was presented with a fabulous offer working in a lab at a biotech company doing cutting edge Covid-19 research. She happily accepted.

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Past Career Coaching Clients

Client Needing to Build New,
Post-Covid Life

Client's Needs

Middle-aged woman lost her business in the Pandemic. Feeling apathetic and stuck in her life.

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Adina's Coaching

  • Helped secure temporary employment to get out of crushing debt.

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  • Set up weekly exercise goals.

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  • Provided framework for healthy eating plan. 

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  • Gave guidance on repair of strained relationships.

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  • Increased confidence through achievement of attainable weekly goals. 

Early-Career
Professional Seeking Career & Promotion

Client's Needs

Three years after graduation, young professional had been aimlessly working in a variety of unfulfilling positions.  She had recently decided on a new career direction and needed help determining how to proceed.

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Adina's Coaching

  • Identified target positions.

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  • Developed targeted resumes and cover letters.

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  • Researched comparable salaries and assisted with presentation requesting raise.

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  • Helped client secure 25% pay increase

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  • A few years later, satisfied client returned for help securing a promotion.
     

Mid-Career Professional Needing Job Search Support

Client's Needs

Ivy League MBA lost COO
& CFO position when company closed. Contacted Adina after a year of job-hunting left him feeling beaten down by the process. His resume and LinkedIn profile were ready to go, but he was missing the motivation and the direction for the networking he needed to do.

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Adina's Coaching

  • Identified key people within his network.

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  • Provided networking  training.

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  • Led weekly meetings to discuss progress and next steps.

Stay-at-Home Parent Reentering the
Workforce

Client's Needs

Stay-at-home mother wanted to return to work after spending many years caring for her family. She felt like her skills were outdated and wasn’t sure what type of work she was qualified for at that point.

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Adina's Coaching

  • Provided job skills assessment tools.

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  • Identified industries and companies where she would like to work.

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  • Created LinkedIn profile reflecting her experience.

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  • Created elevator pitch highlighting her unique abilities.

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  • Updated resume and cover letter.

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