Tweet: This blog is about the roles of a career coach, mentor, champion, sponsor, & your network in how they can help manage & advance your career.

Although I have branded myself as a career and a life coach I often get queries from potential clients asking me if I would be their mentor or if I could champion their start-up venture to get Angel or VC funding. Many career professionals often do not see the difference between a Coach, a Mentor, a Sponsor, or a Champion. Although they all play a catalyst’s role in one’s career each has a different place and how they can help catalyze your career. This blog is about clarifying the role of each catalyst in managing your career and in providing some guidance on how to reach out to the right one at the right time of your needs.

A catalyst is defined in the context of a chemical reaction as the action or effect of an agent in increasing the rate of that reaction without itself being consumed. In the context of one’s career, “reaction” can be interpreted as the rate at which a career progresses and how it is facilitated by someone, who has the power to change its trajectory. So, a well-catalyzed career will have a steeper career arc than its counterpart. Here, a person is struggling to get moving in their career and is frustrated by how they are not able to move forward with sufficient momentum that provides them the growth, rewards, and self-actualization that they are after.

After I lay out the importance of the roles of each of these catalysts and how they can best serve your career needs I also want to touch upon how friends, acquaintances, relatives, and neighbors in your social and professional network can play a role in shaping your thinking about your career. I am doing this because many clients who come to me are often confused or lost because of the conflicting guidance from this group of people willing to offer “help” in their careers.

Career Coach: A career coach is a professional experienced in matters of how a career can be best managed by applying some experiential thinking, practical tips, and individual needs that change as one evolves in their career. A competent career coach has some knowledge of the industry in which you want to grow, but this is not a requirement. Each industry vertical has its own set of career requirements, resources, and lexicon, but a proficient career coach is able to conceptualize that understanding and to provide the guidance required to advance in the direction where the client wants to go. The diversity of clients they service and the range of their clients’ ages, levels, and geographic reach can test a coach’s versatility. In fact, when selecting a career coach this is one of the elements worth asking about.

A good coach is not merely limited to what a client has in their mind, but is able to provide objective input to what the client may be able to achieve if they were willing to make an effort under the guidance of that coach. Such a coach always challenges clients to “to reach beyond their grasp,” and inspires them to act, providing the impetus, guidance, and the tools to achieve the objective. Of course, the client does the “heavy lifting,” with the coach providing the resources, expertise, encouragement, and the tools necessary to stay on track and to achieve the objectives.

A good coach is direct and open in their approach to improving a client’s situation; they may use “Radical Directness” to get the client to change their behavior. They must be open to not merely providing a transactional solution to the client’s problem, but also a strategic one based on some detailed root-cause analysis. This is where clients can benefit the most in breaking the repeat patterns of their limiting beliefs, self-defeating mindsets, and behaviors.

A good career coach is a one-stop shop for majority of a client’s needs (résumé, interview coaching, LinkedIn Profile, Bios, negotiations, final job selection, workplace conflicts, a vast rolodex of contacts, among other needs). Unlike a medical practician, who can send a patient to different specialists in an endless cycle of diagnostic tests and treatments, a good career coach must be able to provide what is needed to improve their client’s station with their own expertise in at least 90% of the situations. They should also be able to refer clients to the right employment lawyers, speech therapists, acting coaches, talent agents, and financial consultants as needed.

My own experience as a career coach is that those who retain coaching services on an ongoing basis benefit the most. Those who see coaching as something that helps them only during a crisis may benefit in overcoming that crisis, but are not able to sustain the required momentum to keep their growth on an aggressive path. They keep coming back to that coach every time the crisis returns to interfere with their career.

Some often look at the cost (hourly rate) as an impediment to seeking coaching advice. This is myopic. A good coach can provide value many times what it costs if the client has a good understanding of where they need help and how to use their own resources, using the coach only as a catalyst instead of a crutch.

As a career coach I help clients manage their résumé; as their life coach I help them manage their obituary when they are gone!

Mentor: A mentor is typically a well-established professional in your very field of endeavor who takes interest in you as a result of your interactions with them. Occasionally, too, someone in a mentorship position will notice a young and upcoming player in their filed who holds much promise and the mentor will take special interest in them to take that person under their wing as their protégé and guide them to success. Examples of mentor/mentee or mentor/protégé relationship abound: Most recent success of J. J. Abrams, the director of the latest Star Wars release, among many others, was noticed early in his career by Steven Spielberg and he mentored him in his early career; Steve Jobs of Apple took Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook and mentored him during his early days at Facebook.

A mentor/mentee relationship is quite different from that of a coach and their client. In a typical mentor/mentee relationship there is no fee involved; mentoring is done as a professional and personal exchange between the two people, with the more senior person guiding the other with their wisdom learned from their specific expertise in their field of endeavor.

It is not uncommon to have many mentors at one time or over a period of one’s career, unlike a career coach. A typical career coach/client arrangement is likely to last over a long period of time throughout the client’s career, although as the client evolves their needs may outgrow what a coach can provide. Because of the paid relationship the client has no obligation to stay with their coach once they feel that they have outgrown its usefulness; such relationships can be mostly transactional.
Clients often ask me if their immediate boss would be a good choice for being their mentor. Such an arrangement is not a good idea for many reasons: For one, if your boss takes special interest in you preemptively then the optics of it can vitiate your own relationships with your immediate colleagues reporting to him; and for another, if the relationship sours for any reason your boss may stop being objective in how they see your performance. Both—and other—factors make this arrangement a bad idea.

Sponsor: A sponsor is a senior member of a company’s management team who has a special relationship with someone up-and-coming whom they want to help. The reasons for this interest may vary from very personal to very professional. Such a sponsor can be of great help in shaping the young person’s career agenda within the company and act as their sponsor in promoting it. In highly political organizations such a relationship can be a major asset—even more than mere great job performance. Such relationship can be a double-edge sword because of this.

Unlike a Champion (see below) a Sponsor can be a long-term benefit in a company. Their influence is mostly limited to the ambit of the organization in which they play; not so much outside it.

Champion: A champion is someone who takes special interest in your CAUSE and decides to help you with it within their organization. A typical champion is in senior management, who may have their own agenda. If they find someone to advance that agenda they may act as your champion if you carry that cause for them. Unlike a Sponsor, a Champion can have relationship interest that is limited to their own agenda. So, it is best to ascertain what that is before entering into a relationship and getting favors from a Champion. Also, in an organization a person can have multiple Champions in various stages of engagement. In such situations make sure that you do not put yourself in political cross hairs and become a target that will compromise your own career.

Friends, Relatives, and Neighbors: It is good to have people in this circle, who can provide you guidance and their own wisdom in managing your career. Before you blindly follow their advice make sure that you acknowledge to yourself that they are not an expert in the area of career management, except perhaps sharing with you what has worked and what has not worked for them in their situation.

Just as you would not consult them in situations involving your health matters—because they require earned expertise—career matters can be deceptively “commonsense,” leading you to take their advice on faith. I have too many cases of clients who were misled by blindly following such advice because the nature of that exchange was limited to the clients’ transactional needs. A career coach can provide a much more studied insight because a good career coach will explore detailed context of your situation and will provide guidance based on that and their much more comprehensive perspective having worked with clients facing similar situations in the past. Besides, when you seek outsiders’ advice and do not follow it you may be blamed later for not heeding what they advised you.

So, the above is a summary of the resources that can help you catalyze your career. Once you understand the role of each of these players it will be easier for you to make the right choice and get the right guidance to accelerate your career.

Good luck!