How can someone advance their career and leadership skills without having access to good, personalized mentoring? Many – particularly women and minorities – in the workforce lack such access, yet their ambition to contribute to the world does not lack. What are they to do? One thing they can do is check out Janet Bickel’s book. In it, she teaches readers to rely on their “inner coach” and like-minded peers in figuring out how to lead.
In America, recent decades have witnessed legions of new human capital enter the workforce in the form of educated women and minorities. However, despite some retooling, the “good-ole boy” system remains only for privileged white males to access good mentoring. This contradiction between ideals and reality necessitates authors like Bickel to help individuals maximize their efficacy. At Brown University’s medical school and in subsequent private ventures, she has worked her way up into coaching those in medical education how to develop their careers and lives.
In this book, Bickel focuses on three overarching topics: focusing inward, focusing together, and focusing over the long haul. In just about every chapter, she has a special focus on women’s leadership development and the special contradictions that it can offer. Now, I’m a male, not a female, but learning how to better my female colleagues’ careers is of interest to me. Thus, even if these topics aren’t directly applicable to my life (and truth be told, many are directly applicable), they can help me better others’ lives. I appreciate the enhanced empathy that Bickel has offered me in this book.
My favorite two sections include a chapter on “complexity and organizational politics” and an appendix on “what does gender have to do with career development?” These present Bickel at her best. The former highlighted many conundrums that I had not personally thought through while the latter, though an appendix, probably should have been the opening chapter to this book. It provides its sort of raison d’être.
Future women leaders, in particular, should pay heed to this book. Though Bickel’s expertise was built up in the field of medical education, her principles are broadly applicable to many other fields. There’s nothing inherently special or medical about her wisdom. As mentioned, men (like me) wishing to better their workplaces by championing female voices can also benefit from enhanced empathy gained through understanding their colleagues. One does not need to be a blazing feminist to appreciate the value here. And of course, Bickel provides a helpful reading list in an appendix for deeper dives into particular topics.
Prior generations retooled the structure of the American workplace to provide equal access. Today’s challenge is just as pressing: retooling the culture so that the promise of equal access is borne out in equitable results. Bickel’s insights provide a worthy salvo in this struggle.
Equip Your Inner Coach: Personal, Career and Leadership Development in an Uncertain Age
By Janet W. Bickel
Copyright (c) 2022
Independently Published
ISBN13 979821806007
Page Count: 159
Genre: Career Development
www.amazon.com