Anyone used an academic 'life coach'?

[resistingreality]

Hi all, I am considering this. I am really struggling with aspects of academia - every rejection knocks me sideways and I have just read a bad review of a book I recently had published (which has mostly had good reviews so far) and feel quite broken by it.

I know intellectually that rejection and bad reviews are central to what we do. But I am wondering whether a coach of some sort might help me manage these feelings so I am not distracted quite so badly each time and can just plough-on. Has anybody tried this, and did it help, if so?

I would add that I do not have a good network in academia (I have no real collaborators for example) and most of the time I feel like a complete outsider and totally isolated. I don't know if a coach might offer practical and moral support to help with both!

Do you have a mentoring (womens?) network accessible via HR in your institution? Friendly with a Professor you trust? Might be a starting point.

two podcasts I have found very useful are Cathy Mazak (if you don’t mind ‘womxn’ and can ignore the marketing of her paid programmes) and more generally, Squiggly Careers.

Academia is extremely harsh. Keep your chin up and know that you’re not alone in these feelings and experiences

I would add that I do not have a good network in academia (I have no real collaborators for example)

Are there some practical steps - they only need to be small - to help develop a network? Conferences are a good start - and speak to people whose work you like. A good social experience can dovetail with a good intellectual experience. Can you collaborate with a close colleague? A PhD student?

Academics need to be self-starters in this sort of thing. I find I like talking to people whose research excites me, and a lot comes from those sorts of simple, low-key social connections.

The spouse of an academic friend of mine does academic coaching and has some clients who are waaaay up the career hierarchy, so it's obviously useful.

In addition to enquiring about a mentor at your place (best outside your department), does your university offer any training internally or externally around this? Also, my university has an employee assistance programme. We can gain access to counselling through it - maybe your place has such a scheme?

I struggled to build networks at the beginning of my career. Now I have a few collaborators that I really enjoy working with, and who sometimes have helped me undertake projects I wouldn't have been able to on my own.
One thought to get rid of, I think, is the idea that a good academic networker is a social butterfly who is always buzzing about at conferences. That can certainly help, but what matters is that you are able to develop those relationships into something productive.
In my case I was about 7 years post-PhD when I started developing productive relationships. One common thread, that I didn't necessarily notice at the time, is that most of my collaborators were slightly behind me career-wise - 2 to 4 years post-PhD.
I found that this kind of dynamic worked well for me, because I felt my collaborators were my peers research-wise (still relatively new, still hugely enthusiastic about research, bringing lots of ideas to the table) but at the same time I was able to bring something extra into the relationship - namely more knowledge of how universities, funding bodies and publication outlets work, by virtue of having been in academia for a few years longer and having a permanent position that most of my collaborators didn't.
Something else that I was able to bring to the table was my organizational skills - I don't know about your discipline or department, but it mine, it seems as if people are having meetings all the time talking about big ideas that they'd like to put into action and coming out of the meeting on a real high, but then nothing happens! So often I am the person chasing up, coming up with practical steps and deadlines we can take towards the goal, making sure deadlines are adhered to, etc.
It might be that this kind of dynamic doesn't really work for you OP. But trying to boil down my experience to practical advice, I would say that what mattered is that: a) I felt I was essentially in a "peer" and not hierarchical relationship; b) at the same time, I felt that I was bringing something tangible (and quite rare) to the table; c) bringing this something made me feel less anxious about not being the social butterfly.
I would also add that the personal connection with your collaborators is really important - it's difficult to explain but I'd say it's a mixture of both having similar research interests, being really excited about your research, having similar values and compatible personalities, etc. Whenever I am going to meet with collaborators in person at a conference or seminar, I am always really excited to catch up with them, doesn't feel like a chore or obligation.
Also this might depend on your field but in mine it's not as if you need dozens of collaborators, it is a relatively small number, so it doesn't have to be so daunting.

I have not but I know 2 colleagues (both v senior profs in RG uni) who speak very highly of their coach. my university will pay for coaching for profs who make a case for it, so they clearly value it too.