Coaching and training
can support
professional development
in a targeted and tailor-made
fashion

Coaching
and training support
professional development
in a tailor-made way

Every professional biography is different.

But they all consist of the same building blocks.

Each building block can contribute to personal success in business – individually and in conjunction with other elements.

New and difficult situations at work offer opportunities for personal growth.

Each module can contribute to personal development in coaching and training.

Coaching can provide targeted support – especially if a career has stalled or a new phase is about to start.

Below you will find explanations of each module as well as the corresponding coaching approaches.

The Modular Approach

The Modular Approach of Professional Development

Profile

Your personality remains largely stable across your lifespan, but becomes more mature and experienced.
It is important for your job satisfaction to choose activities that fit your individual preferences, otherwise the mismatch might create a continuous stress factor.

Before starting your career, it is important to choose a vocational training matching your profile, as well as a meaningful career entry point.

As your experience in new positions grows, your profile will sharpen and expand to include new facets.

Your own potential does not remain abstract, but becomes tangible for you by trying yourself out. This process continues with every role – the organization in which you work and the specific tasks, processes, and culture of your job will also determine how you put your skills into practice.

Potential does not take place in a vacuum, but always in context. In the end, it is more important in organizations how others perceive your potential. You demonstrate it to others – via achievement, initiatives, proposals, and sometimes also via your curiosity.

If you would like to become aware of your personal profile, we can use various personality, motivation and professional interest tests in coaching, e.g. the MBTI (Myers Briggs Type Inventory). This will help you choose a suitable profession or a new field of activity.

As your professional experience progresses, you will develop a common thread, but you may not be aware of it yourself – it becomes clearer with coaching.

Your potential can be assessed indirectly by previous results, but also by how easy it is for you to learn certain skills or find your way in new situations. In coaching, corresponding key situations can be identified and evaluated.

Motivation

Every person is shaped by their own motives. Some individuals have a pronounced need for performance, power or social contacts. To reach satisfaction in your job, you need to be aware of your core motives and to look for matching tasks and positions.

In addition to motives, there are additional needs as drivers for your key career decisions, e.g. the desire for security or for challenge, for influence and reputation, for independence, for professional fulfillment or social commitment. Sometimes equally important drivers seem to contradict each other, and you feel trapped in a dilemma situation.

Personal interests vary over time and become more concrete when you mature, especially in youth, during vocational training and in the first years of employment. Some interests are emerging from within, others are more influenced from the outside. If you can’t use your interests at work, you can expect that frustration, boredom or overwhelm will set in, in the long term.

Personal values are becoming strong influential factors for workplace choices – for younger generations, they are crucial. But even in the second half of life, a discrepancy between one’s own values and culture or value orientation at the organization your work for can lead to permanent disappointment or even separations.
Are you aware of your values?

In coaching, we will identify your personal motives, drivers, interests and values via conversations and creative exercises. In the second step, we will shed light on how congruent they are with your current professional situation and your wishes for the future.

Competencies

Functional and technical skills are at the heart of your learning curve, especially in the first third of your professional life.

With every task, with every project and, above all, with every role change, you build new knowledge and skills that expand your profile.

Later, it is important that new competencies complement the existing ones in a meaningful way. It often makes sense for you to specialize in one or more areas.

Make sure that your profile is in demand on the job market by taking clever career steps. Or, if you work as a self-employed person, ensure that you can offer the products and services that are sought after in your target market.

In addition to functional or technical expertise, certain methods are also essential, depending on the profession.

This almost always includes setting priorities, time and calendar management, stress management and an efficient usage of the various communication channels.

As a rule, you build up your professional skills directly through your activities.

In coaching, we can evaluate what you need next to expand your portfolio in a meaningful and future-oriented way, and shed light on various options.

You can also test certain methodological skills directly with the help of coaching, e.g. how to set your priorities and organize your day, how to plan a project and quickly reach the next milestone – or how you can deal more calmly with multiple burdens.

Decisions

By choosing a career, you are setting the course for decades. Nowadays, many people make their career choice several times in life because professions change or new fields of activity emerge.

Your profession should suit you and be fit for the future.

How often does it make sense to change jobs or employers? Which stations would be useful? What kind of experience do you need, or want? What is your personal common thread?

If you find yourself at a dead end professionally, sometimes you need not only a job change, but a new professional direction or even a new profession. Such a fundamental change needs to be well thought out and prepared – and sometimes has to be strategically planned.

Did you ever consider to quit and to become self-employed after years or decades as an employee? Or would you like to take a step back professionally, turn your hobby into a profession, or prepare for retirement?

Central career decisions are often associated with uncertainty and inner roller coaster rides. Coaching helps you to identify and sort all relevant aspects. This allows you to gain clarity and come to a decision that is right for you.

With professional support, you will be better equipped to take an educated decision and to implement the change wisely.

Social Skills

In theory, you know how communication works: sender and receiver, main and secondary messages, listening and expressing yourself in such a way that the other person understands you. Do you apply everything you know about communication intuitively?

Empathy begins with putting oneself in the other person’s shoes – rationally, but also emotionally. When both perspectives are taken into account, win-win solutions can be found.

Respect, fairness and reliability build trust – an important basis for professional success.

Good social relationships with colleagues, superiors and business partners are not only a feel-good factor for many people, but also crucial for professional success.

Conflicts in the workplace arise regularly and are important for achieving results and developing relationships. However, smoldering or poorly resolved conflicts can have a negative impact on the working atmosphere and on your well-being.

We can use concrete examples to explore and improve your communication behavior. They can shed light on existing working relationships and fine-tune them. Conflicts can be worked through in role plays and changes of perspective, so that you can try out new solutions and evaluate the effect.

Leadership

Leadership is complex and encompasses significantly more tasks and facets than the purely functional management of a team.

How do you motivate very different people to consistently perform well and collaborate productively? How do you synchronize the needs of your manager, customers, and employees? How do you manage change? How do you communicate corporate decisions in a convincing way? How do you set new impulses, mediate conflict or develop talents?

How can coaching support you?

If you are aiming for a leadership position or want to improve your existing leadership skills in a targeted manner, individual coaching is a very effective tool.

You start by taking stock of your strengths and areas of development and get to know your own leadership style better.

Coaching helps you sharpen your perception, continuously expand your leadership repertoire and refine nuances in your behavior. The more extensive your leadership responsibilities become, the broader your palette should be. On the way to higher positions, it is often necessary to cut back on previously useful skills and acquire new ones.

Environment

Every industry and every organization have their own values and rules of the game. These are not always obvious. Failure to comply with implicit expectations and taboos is quickly sanctioned. Conversely, a good fit between you and your professional environment is important for your motivation, satisfaction and success.

Building sustainable relationships is professionally essential to achieve goals together and support each other. Networks grow through points of contact and become resilient via moments of mutual interest and support. Quantity does not necessarily mean quality here – you notice that in crises.

Women in particular tend to have an ambiguous relationship to the topic of “power” – but properly understood, using influencing skills to build up power becomes necessary in order to implement professional goals in an organization or a network of different roles and interests. Constructive and responsible use of power has to be learned.

In our fast-paced and ever-changing world, professional change cycles are also becoming shorter and shorter, and everyone needs “change” skills as a natural tool – even if the desire for consistency is often greater than the readiness to constantly adapt.

The perception and conscious handling of the professional environment often only become an issue at an advanced stage of career – whenever one’s own circles and areas of responsibility become larger. In coaching, we discuss these topics and expand your toolbox to get to the upper side of more complex tasks.

Value Contribution

While concentrating on all the other building blocks and improving your skills step by step, you should not lose sight of one thing: In the end, it is the result that counts. You are hired, recognized, and promoted because of results. No matter how beautiful a game you play, the ball has to find its way into the goal.

Results are your value proposition – for your customers and/or your organization.

The other side of the coin is whether what you do and accomplish makes sense to you and others, or serves a purpose you can buy in to. Your results will not satisfy you if you have to answer this second question in the negative.

This core question arises at the beginning of a career and once again pushes itself into the consciousness of many in the middle of professional life, which sometimes leads to a reorientation.

Assuming you’ve reached the end of your career, what would you like to remember? And what would you like to look back on with satisfaction and pride?

Or at the end of your current career stage?

If one or more of these questions raise your doubts or frowns, the time may have come to put your value proposition and the purpose of your work – or the long-term perspective – to the test.

Are you not satisfied with the answers?

In connection with your profile, your motives, interests and competencies, you have the opportunity to develop a new direction for yourself in the coaching process.

Other possible topics for coaching

Other Coaching Topics

  • Onboarding – the first-100-days in a new position

  • Reorientation inside and outside the company

  • Career development of the last third of professional life

  • Preparation for self-employment

  • Preparation for retirement

  • Coaching of female employees and executives

  • Conflict resolution in the workplace

  • Mastering professional crises

More Information

NICOLE CIPA – Coaching | Training | Development

Do you want to grow your employees professionally?

I will be happy to support you on your journey.