In this episode, I welcome Holly Smevog, a globally certified career counselor from HMS Career Coaching.

Holly shares her journey into career coaching and offers valuable insights and strategies for individuals, particularly mid-career professionals, seeking to navigate career transitions.

We discuss ageism, transferable skills, and crafting a compelling professional narrative. Holly also details her four-step coaching process, the role of assessments, and how to leverage AI tools like ChatGPT in job searches.

Whether you're looking to make a career change, re-enter the workforce, or find more meaning in your professional life, this episode provides practical advice and encouragement.

Key Moments:

00:37 Meet Special Guest Holly Smevog

01:53 Holly's Journey to Career Coaching

04:08 Challenges Faced by Mid-Career Professionals

07:44 Career Coaching Strategies and Tools

15:17 The Emotional and Mental Aspects of Career Transitions

22:53 Final Thoughts and Contact Information

Connect with Holly:

Career Counseling, Coaching & Planning - Portland Maine - HMS CAREER COACHING

Instagram

🎧 Let’s go.

Connect with Trista:

Join my free Triggered to Transformed: Emotional Tools That Actually Work class - May 6th at 7PM EDT. Register here: https://fabulous-originator-6309.kit.com/aa9986bd6a

Interested in 1:1 coaching? Book your discovery call here and let's talk.

Follow me on Instagram: tristavguertin

Visit my website: www.tristaguertin.com

LinkedIn: Trista Guertin | LinkedIn

Ready to end the people-pleasing? Get my Validation Shift mini-course HERE. USE COUPON CODE TAKE5 to receive $5 off the price.

Please like, share and subscribe this podcast episode and we'll see you next time!

Welcome to This Daring Adventure podcast

where we work on bridging the gap between

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where we are and where we want to be in

order to live a bigger and bolder life.

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In this podcast, we will provide

inspiration, tips, and skills

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you need to make your life the

adventure you want it to be.

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Here's your host, mindset,

mentor, and life coach, Tri

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Trista: Hi everybody.

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Welcome back to This Daring Adventure,

and today I have a special guest.

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I have Holly Smevog.

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Welcome Holly.

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Holly is with HMS Career Coaching.

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She is a globally certified career

counselor and job search coach, and

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she is connecting people with their

best career through counseling,

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coaching and consulting services.

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And she has experience in both

public and private sectors, in

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organizations large and small.

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And Holly has helped hundreds of people

find their vocational sweet spot.

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And I should also mention that

Holly is a former client of mine.

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Welcome Holly.

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Thank you so much for being here today.

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Holly: You're welcome.

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It's my pleasure.

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I'm excited.

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Thank you.

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Trista: Yeah, it's so nice to catch up

with you and I really was excited to have

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you on because as I was saying just before

we started, I do have a number of clients

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who come to me who are looking to change

careers in midlife or who have, lost

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their job or want to make a job change.

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But it's a struggle.

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And once we get into our fifties

and we can dive into to all of that,

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but welcome and why don't you tell

us a little bit more about yourself

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and the coaching that you do.

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Holly: Sure.

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I myself had a circuitous path to

this career of career coaching, which

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I discovered about 10 years ago now.

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But I worked in Silicon Valley for

technology companies and have a long

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career in marketing, research, product

development, and then started to get into.

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Educational technology

and working in schools.

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And that led me to career, to

kind of college counseling.

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And there was one class in my counseling

program, which was on career counseling.

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And most people hated that class.

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And I absolutely loved it.

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And I knew right away that was my thing.

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When can I hang my shingle?

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And I realized that I had been the person.

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That friends and family had been

reaching out to since, adulthood.

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What should I do with my career?

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I have this interview coming

up, what should I say?

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Oh, can you take a look at my resume?

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And it was all of these

experiences coming full circle

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to the place I was meant to be.

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So I started the company in about 2017.

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And in 2020 with the

pandemic we got busier.

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So I've been working with five

coaches on my team and a couple resume

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writers, and we help individuals,

largely mid-career professionals,

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men and women who get to a point.

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Where they've built a career

over a few decades and they just

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feel like it's time for a change.

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Some people have been laid off or lost

their jobs, but other people realize

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that they really want more meaning

out of their career, or that they've

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followed a path of happenstance, fallen

into jobs along the way, and they.

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Kind of wake up one day and

think, how did I get here?

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And I really wanna put more intention

into my career at this moment.

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And I get, friends and family often,

or get tired of hearing you ask

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what should I do with my career?

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Or giving their advice.

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And so people turn to a career

coach to really, get clear direction

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and get back on their feet.

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Trista: Okay.

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I think this is so interesting because

yes I'm seeing this with a lot of women.

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So you're working with both

men and women, correct?

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Holly: That's

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Trista: right.

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Do you see any challenges that

maybe women face different than men?

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Holly: I do see much more a typical

pattern with women of, they followed

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careers that allowed them flexibility

for things like motherhood or, whatever

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their role in a partner in a relationship

was or just less of a typical.

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Corporate path, oftentimes.

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And maybe they're thinking, I don't

know, I've had all these different jobs.

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How do my skills transfer

into something else?

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Or women who are facing divorce,

for instance, who haven't needed

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to bring in a certain salary.

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And now they're at a point

where I, their needs and their

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values have really changed.

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And how does a career, match that?

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How can they solve this problem?

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Trista: Okay.

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And then of course, I think you've

heard it, I've heard it several

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times, we're in our mid to late

fifties, who's going to hire us?

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What are our options?

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And what do you tell people

when they come to you and are

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feeling like they're just not

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employable any longer.

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Or that these challenges exist.

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Holly: Yeah, I think ageism is a thing and

that it's also the worst thing is when,

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we limit ourselves by believing that,

they're not, that you're not gonna find

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a job and the best way to combat it is to

come from a strong candidate perspective.

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So to set yourself up well, and I think

that people even with really varied

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careers up until, middle age don't,

they have so many transferable skills

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that come together in powerful ways.

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And so that's how we work with

people to really figure out what's

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their most powerful message.

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And where and what, starting from a place

of reflecting internally, let's look at

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you and figure out all the things that

you're bringing to the table right now.

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And also what you really want in

your life, what you need, your values

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and synthesize that in a way that

really resonates with someone, and

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then look, okay, now that we can,

now that we have a great message,

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we've articulated your professional

identity in a way that excites you.

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Where in the market is

someone looking to hire you?

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Where is there are you valued out

there and coming once you're standing

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firmly in your own feet in terms

of owning what you're bringing?

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Your potential, it's a lot easier to

convince somebody else that you know,

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that you have something to offer.

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And I think that older workers really

do have a lot to offer because there can

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be, the softer skills can make someone

a really strong leader can train and be

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great role models for younger people.

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So I think there really is a value and

a lot of employers are seeing that.

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So I do see good hiring

rates for older people.

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In many places there is a

workforce shortage in many states.

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For instance, the state that I live in,

there's a lot of people retiring and

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not as many younger people moving in.

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So the market for older

workers is pretty strong.

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Trista: Okay.

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So then Do you do certain assessments

or certain quizzes or certain.

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Trainings with your clients to help them

narrow some of their skills and strengths?

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Holly: Yeah.

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Interests?

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Yeah, since we've been doing this

for a while, we do have a four step

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process essentially, and we've even

developed a course, an online course.

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It has 37 modules that kind of guides

people through career transition, and

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there's a workbook along with that

and some assessments built in, but.

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Typically.

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First phase, we do use assessments.

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We use sort of Myers-Briggs personality

plus the strong interest inventory,

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which has a career focused element.

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And we have use Gallup

StrengthsFinder, which is more

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about like your innate strengths.

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So what are the unique, what is your

secret sauce like that you're born with?

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And we have a values assessment

that we've created that helps people

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figure out their priorities today.

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And assessments are very much an

instrument in the coaching conversation.

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Not a scientific pointer, but that's

the first thing we do is really take a

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look at you and if people are feeling.

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Insecure and worried.

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There's also that emotional component of,

mental fitness and mindset that we address

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to let's get you feeling really strong.

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And then, and that whole process naturally

lends into what I was talking about, where

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you get direction then in the market,

what job titles might you be looking for.

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And then in the third phase.

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It's about strategy.

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So coming up with your own

personalized plan to crack the

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job search or the career pivot.

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And that is a place where we're working

on your resume and your LinkedIn and

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the resume is a really interesting

project because the resume today isn't

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really a list of responsibilities.

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It's more of a story of highlights,

like the things that you're

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most proud of from your career.

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You start to again, gain confidence

and think about how you would be

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talking to someone in a networking

conversation and then an interview.

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So it all builds on itself.

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And once we get the resume linked

in LinkedIn, we put a networking

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plan together and an application

plan and roll out from there.

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Trista: So then how long, typically, I

know maybe this isn't a precise science,

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obviously, but how long does it take

for someone who's switching careers to

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identify or to get a new job, and how long

typically do your clients work with you?

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Holly: Interesting questions.

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The average time for a job search,

so if someone's been laid off for

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in instance, is about five months.

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We

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usually help people get

jobs in about three months.

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So getting career coaching

helps people land jobs faster.

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Our standard program is actually

two months because that is what we

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found is the right amount of time

to get you on your feet, get your

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direction, hone your messaging, and.

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Get you, ready to hit the market.

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And then people are going out on

their own doing some application.

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Maybe they're already interviewing and

negotiating a job offer, but typically

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eight weeks is enough to get direction

and get you going on the job search.

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Trista: And then is there any sort

of follow up support when people

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are continuing to interview?

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Maybe I.

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What happens when people

are in the thick of it?

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Holly: We provide mock interviewing, of

course, as part of our coaching package.

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We also have an interactive interview

app that you, that people can access even

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after they're done coaching at us, which

is coaching with us, which is a very

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helpful service that actually evaluate

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your performance in an interview and

sets up custom interviews for you.

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And people will continue

to reach out to us.

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We're, we think of our coaching

as a partnership, so we're

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boots on the ground with you.

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Even if we have a set number of

sessions, we're texting and emailing

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in between, and we have a private

LinkedIn ask a coach group where people

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can write in any time questions and

have a coach answer their question.

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Trista: Do you use chat GPT at all?

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Would that be helpful for people

to prepare or to, prepare, maybe

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prepare questions, prepare answers,

are you tapping into that at all?

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Holly: Definitely.

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Yeah.

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So I try to steer people away from having

AI actually write things that they're

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submitting, but it's fantastic for

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analyzing a job description and

pulling out keywords for that,

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you would want to actually copy.

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It's important to actually copy the

exact keywords from a job description

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onto your resume to make it through

the applicant tracking systems.

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So that's where AI really helps out.

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Also be before an interview, you

can put in the job description and

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request, you know what would be

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30 minutes of interview questions

from this job description.

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That's super helpful.

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When I am steering people

towards cover letters, I usually

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suggest AI in a more custom way.

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Give me the top three categories of skills

they're really looking for in this job.

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And then you can gear your

cover letter using that.

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But I think AI is a really helpful tool.

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Yeah.

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Trista: Yeah, I was trying to

think the other day whether

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there would be some prompts that

I could create for my clients.

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I was playing around like whether,

if people are feeling stuck

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and maybe coming, I don't know.

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I was just thinking like there's got

to be a way that we could help them

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to, do some exploration maybe, or

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Holly: I think there are some yeah.

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First of all, really interesting questions

that people should ask themselves.

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You can probably imagine these,

but when, when was the last time

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in your career where you really

felt like in your flow and happy?

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What were you doing then?

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And then similarly, like when

you're around people in a

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professional setting, like what's,

what are those interactions like?

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And trying to ask

yourselves those questions.

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But I think that if certain

things about yourself I.

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You can probably use AI to what

are good jobs for someone who,

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prefers to work as an independent

contributor and has, marketing skills.

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I think there are lots

of ways to get ideas.

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I think that's why career coaching

helps though, because you brought up a

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good point is that AI is so huge, the

world of information is so huge and.

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Even before all this technology, people

would come to us and they're like, there's

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just so many ideas running through my head

and I have all the ideas, but I also have

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all the pros and cons of all those ideas

and I just can't make sense of it all.

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And that's what happens when

people dive out into the internet.

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Trista: Okay.

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Do you touch on a career

as a person's identity?

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I've had, I've been asked that a few

times myself and been part of discussions

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where, trying to shift away from that,

and maybe particularly someone's been

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in a position for a number of decades

and that's been their identity.

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And trying to sh obviously if

you're, you've been in one career

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and you're shifting to another,

that could bring up a lot of issues.

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But also just trying to get

away from that, that your career

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doesn't have to be your identity.

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That you're this whole person and

not placing, because I'm seeing,

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people putting so much emphasis or

importance on the career to define

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them and make them who they are.

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So I don't know whether that

comes up at all for you in

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some of the work that you do.

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Holly: It comes up in a

couple different ways.

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I think you're right.

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Sometimes it's helpful

to compartmentalize.

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We get into these patterns and

sometimes the patterns can become

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boring or unsatisfying over time.

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And so it, I see that happening in

people's jobs where they just start

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to feel, more down about their work.

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'cause it's not new and

it's not exciting and.

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They're just not getting

satisfaction from it.

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So some of the things that happen when

I'm talking with people is when we

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look at interests, there's hobby there.

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Some interests can be hobbies, like

things that you do outside of work,

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and in some cases the end result

isn't getting someone a new job.

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But it's how to build those

satisfying activities into your

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life, outside of work hours.

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And another thing that people do

increasingly is have a side hustle.

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So they'll have a job, but they'll, say

I've always been interested in coaching

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or I've al always been interested in.

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Creating toys for kids

or something like that.

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And so they'll start doing it on the

side and they'll feel more fulfilled

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and that will take the pressure off

of work and they'll think, actually,

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I'm not that disappointed with my job.

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Trista: Yes, exactly.

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I think that's really important

because it is a mind shift or a

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mindset shift where yes, the job

is just a circumstance, right?

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And it's not there to make you happy.

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It's not there to fulfill you.

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It's not there to give

you all of these things.

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You want to show up, you want to do

a good job, you want to be valuable.

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And obviously it provides

you with a livelihood.

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But yes, It's not there to give you value.

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It's not there to e even, fulfill

you or to do anything for you

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other than provide that livelihood.

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And I do understand because I

wanted to do rewarding work.

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And now as a coach it's really important.

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But for me there's also been a shift

to challenging myself to keep learning

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and growing, and it doesn't have

to necessarily be career related.

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And as you said, a side hustle

or hobby or whatever it may be.

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It's that opportunity for us to invest

in ourselves or time or energy, our

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resources to keep growing and to see what

our capacity is and what the possibility.

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What possibilities exist for us

out there that can give us energy

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and light us up and give us joy.

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Holly: I think getting back to what

you said at the very beginning about

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people coming to you who are feeling

stuck, I see that a lot and by the

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time they have a conversation with me,

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everything's shrouded in this

things are bad with my career or,

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and it results in a thinking that

they need to make 180 degree shift.

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Everything needs to change.

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And when we pull it apart, shifting one or

two things could make a huge difference.

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Moving to a different department or

even having this conversation with

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your boss or maybe getting a different

job for a different company, but

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still continuing to do what you do.

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Not completely shaking everything up.

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Trista: Because it, it's okay to make

a change, but you really want to be

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conscious of why you're doing that.

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Because if you think it's going to

be better over there than it is here,

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you're going to be disappointed,

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'cause you're going to

take your brain with you.

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You're gonna have the same thinking

patterns, the same habits, right?

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So you can go to that new position, you

can go to that new department and it's

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going to be exciting and it's going to

be different and it's going to be fun

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because our brain loves that novelty.

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It loves something new and different, and

then that novelty is going to wear off.

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And you're going to go back to

those same thought patterns that you

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know, you were facing previously.

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And I see this because people think

they need to change their house, they

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need to change their relationship,

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they need to change, their

cities, whatever it is.

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And I see that, with some of my clients,

like they think if they find this career

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or they find this job in the same way.

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Someone thinks if I find this man

or this relationship, this is what's

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going to make me happy and this

is what's going make me fulfilled.

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And I'm like, no, it doesn't

necessarily work out quite like that.

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Holly: Exactly.

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When you know, and it's like

when you're meeting a coaching

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client at the beginning.

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You're trying to get really clear on what

they're looking for with the outcome.

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You're trying to also

get, what's that feeling?

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What is, not just the result, like

the new relationship or the new

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career, but what are you feeling

about it that makes it so different?

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And then what you're making me

think, which is super helpful,

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is what are the thoughts that you

are going to hold at that moment

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that will make you feel that way.

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And if I, that's a really

powerful concept to Exactly, yes.

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Plan and to that extent.

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Trista: Yeah.

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And so I tell people, you can

make that change, but don't do

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it from a place of scarcity.

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Or hurry.

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And that you think it's

gonna fix everything.

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You can change jobs, you can change

relationships because you want to, right?

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Have your reasons like them.

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But just clean up your thinking

beforehand and know why you're making

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that change and really like your reasons.

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And then be prepared.

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It's not gonna be all rainbows

and daisies over there either.

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It's not necessarily

gonna be more exciting.

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It's not going to necessarily

be more fulfilling.

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But just you need to be aware and

clean up your thinking every day

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when I'm working with my clients,

you need to clean up that thinking.

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No matter what.

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And whether that's creating your own

business or looking for a job or you're

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in a relationship with your partner,

husband, whomever it is, you, it's work.

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It's going to be work.

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So you need to just really be

aware of what you're thinking and.

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It's not going to be any better over there

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Holly: than it's now.

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Yes, exactly.

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Yeah.

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I'm writing that down now.

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Clean up your thinking.

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That's how I'm going to spend my day.

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Trista: Yeah.

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Good.

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All right.

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I.

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I have loved having you on.

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It's been so great to learn more about

your work and to catch up with you again.

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Do you have anything you, any advice

or tips or guidance you want to

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leave people with as we wrap up here?

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Holly: I would just say, alongside

what I was what we were talking about

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before was that everybody has skills

that are valuable in the marketplace

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and sometimes it's hard to see them.

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I.

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So if people who are having trouble,

there's lots of, free resources or

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coaching, but everybody has a place

in the market where someone's needing

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to pay you for your skills today.

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Trista: That's good.

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I like that.

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And I will make sure we have all

of your information and links in

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the show notes, but if you want to

tell people how they can find you.

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Holly: Sure.

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Yes.

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My website is probably a great

place, HMS career coaching.com.

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And we're on Instagram too.

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HMS career coaching.

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Okay.

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Thank you so much for having me on.

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This has been such a pleasure.

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Trista: Thank you, Holly.

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I think it's been really

helpful for everybody.

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And

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thank you

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for your

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time.

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Thank you for listening to

This Daring Adventure podcast

399

with your host Trista Guertin.

400

We hope you enjoyed the tips and

conversations on how to get excited

401

about life Again, as always, you

can head to tristaguertin.com

402

for additional resources and to

book a one-on-one coaching session.

403

You can also follow Trista on

Instagram at tristavguertin.

404

Don't forget to subscribe, rate

and review us on Apple Podcasts.

405

Thanks again for tuning in

and we'll see you next time.