Imagine if anyone in the world could access a career advisor, to get tips on the best move to do to accelerate its career? That is the objective of Jinn. Find out how we want to achieve this goal.
The career management experts
I already mentioned in a previous post the tendency for many people to turn to the experts when they want to be reassured on a complex subject. Some experts are fortunately authentic, and can provide highly useful benefits. For example, if I want to eat very good food, I would rather choose to go to a good restaurant than cooking myself. In the same way, for some events in life, there are some experts you do not necessarily think of, who can still be very useful: the coaches.
Career coach vs career counselor
It is important to understand the difference between coaching and counseling. According to the International Coach Federation, coaching is defined as partnering with clients in a thought-provoking and creative process that inspires them to maximize their personal and professional potential. However it does not mean the coach is a Jedi master and the coachee the padawan. A coach lets the coachee find his/her own answers while counseling is about providing insights, guidance, it can be more linked to mentoring. In other words, coaching is different from mentoring. Coaches are usually specialized in a defined field, such as arts (ex: vocal coach), sports, business (leadership coach), relationships (ex: dating coach) or health and wellness. And of course the career coaches.
The career advisor
A little more about the career counselor, or career advisor. Many people think a career coach is the one you call when you want to change your job, for example. The line of difference between a career coach and a career counselor is indeed very thin. Both can help people in transitioning to a new objective. For a career counselor, this includes providing industry trends, salary expectations, employment statistics, but also tips to improve a resume, train for a job interview or prepare for salary negotiations. They use personality assessments and other skills inventory tests to determine your competencies and find the career, which is a match for your skill set and aptitude. Similar to what school counselors do for students in education. Career counselors can also help in dealing with emotions, or behaviors that are holding you back.
The career coach
Meanwhile, a career coach will ask you more general questions, such as “What is your dream of doing?” or “What do you expect in your career?” He/she tries to get a bigger picture of yourself and where you are today, and then finds ways to move forward towards your goal, so that not only you get the job you wanted, but you also enjoy your job actually. Meaning the role of a coach does not stop with the signing of a new contract. They will encourage and challenge you to identify the steps you need to take in order to reach your career objective, just like a sports coach would do. Contrary to a career advisor, a coach usually does not spend too much time on elements from the past, but rather focus on the present and the future. In short, the career counselor helps you find your job, while the career coach helps you find your passion.
How to make the world a better place with a career advisor
It is safe to say that many people would definitely benefit from such experts, if they knew they existed. But first of all, they don’t. Like I said, many people mix up career coach and career advisor. Even if they do know, there are other disincentive to using a career coach. Although there are organizations and renowned business schools helping on the recognition of the status of career coach with diplomas and accreditations, anyone can claim to be a coach. Lastly, calling in an expertise, whether it is a career coach or a career advisor, represents a cost that few people can afford. Which is the reason why Jinn intends to make career advice affordable for our users, so that they can hope for better career perspectives.
How would a Jinn career advisor look like (at the beginning)
The first requirement to be a credible online career advisor for everybody is obviously a deep knowledge of the job markets, starting with different existing jobs: what are they, what do they consist of, what skills or experience are necessary, what other jobs can they lead to. Such database already exist, but they are most of the time specific to one country, like here for the US, or here for France. To make it more relevant to customers from everywhere, this database should also explain how the same job differs between countries, in terms of title, responsibility, requirements or possible evolution. In a second time, with enough data an algorithm could determine the best career path for a user, by analyzing its current situation, experience, skills and education and suggesting pertinent choices to achieve step by step.
This is what we are trying to make in the career management section of the website. This section contains all the databases we are building today, to help people being better tomorrow. Because of the complexity of making an accurate career advisor, we chose the wiki format, meaning that any user can collaborate by inputting data about careers. So we can make sure our data are as up to date as possible. Moreover, all these data remain in free access to all Jinn users. Of course, it will not be a real career counselor at the beginning, as many services would be still missing to claim to be either of them. Nevertheless, like nearly everything in life, proceeding gradually is the best way to reach your destination: an assistant capable of helping people in the best options to accelerate their careers. This is the first step in our journey to empower the world. Everybody is free to join, so what are you waiting for?
