The Career Question Talent Can't Answer
Charlotte had the resume. Abbey had the plan. Neither had clarity — until they got specific.
Charlotte climbed every career rung the "right" way.
IT analyst. Project coordinator. Project manager. Now she runs a portfolio of high-visibility AI and machine learning projects for a major financial services firm.
Multiple degrees. Deep trust from leadership. Financial compensation. The kind of career that made people say "She's got the perfect career."
She was also completely burned out.
When success isn't the same as fit
Her boss needed zero mistakes on her projects. Her clients wanted AI to be a magic wand. Charlotte spent her days managing everyone's expectations and had nothing left for her own.
She didn't want out of tech. She wanted to feel like her work touched actual people again.
We used my M.A.P. Process™ to get underneath the resume — her values, the impact she wanted to have, the parts of her job that still made her light up.
Turns out, the answer wasn't a bigger title. It was books.
Charlotte now works with technology for libraries — connecting her lifelong love of learning and reading with the daily, human impact she'd been missing.
Same sharp mind. Same skill set. Completely different fit.
Talent gets you promoted. It doesn't tell you if you're on the right path. Results don't reveal whether you're choosing your career or just surviving it.
If any part of that landed a little close — killing it on paper, running on empty in real life — that feeling is a signal.
Choosing who helps you get there
Which brings me to Abbey.
She was a finance director at a large corporation. Good career, a resume with experience that could get her hired anywhere. A toxic culture that was wearing her down. A fear of changing jobs because she might land in a corporate culture worse than the one she was in now.
She'd done therapy and it had helped. But she knew the fix wasn't more coping — it was getting out.
Three directions pulled at her. Travel and work with non-profits abroad. Start her own finance practice for small businesses. Or stay in financial services, because her resume already pointed that way and it was easy.
She did a free session with me, and one with a coaching service. She liked us both. She went with the service — it cost less and she had college tuition to pay for her kids.
A few months later, she was back in my DMs.
The service promised certified, professional coaches. But what it didn't promise was continuity. One coach left the company after Abbey's second session. The next coach assigned no-showed her on session 4. She kept re-explaining her situation instead of solving it.
Turns out the real cost wasn't the fee. It was starting over. Twice.
So if you're ever sizing up a career coach — me or anyone else — here's the checklist I wish someone had handed Abbey first:
Do they have an actual process they follow, or just a coaching certificate?
Are they committed to you for the whole ride, not just a session or two?
Will they get to know you enough to say the quiet part out loud — push you to name the fear, the "what if I make the wrong move" paralysis?
A career pivot isn't starting over. It's building the next thing on top of what you already have. That only works if the person helping you is still in the room three sessions later.
Abbey's still in the middle of hers. We're deep in the M.A.P. Process™ now, and I'll tell you how it ends when we get there. Because we will.
When there's a real process behind it, things shift. You stop guessing. You start deciding. The transition stops feeling like a leap off a cliff and starts feeling like the next right step.
What's the hardest thing to spot?
What's the hardest thing to spot when you're figuring out whether you're on the right path — or choosing who to trust to help you find it?
If you're not sure, that's exactly what a Clarity Conversation is for — a free, no-pressure session to talk through where you are and what might be next.
Schedule your Clarity Conversation →
Marie Clark is a Career Transformation Coach and Possibility Partner, and creator of the M.A.P. Process™. She hosts the podcast Recalculating: Your M.A.P. to Joy.
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