A New Side Hustle: Coaching Early Professionals
I had the privilege of photographing Esma Delijanin, SHRM-SCP, COO at Hirschen, Singer & Epstein, LLP. She shared a transformational story that led her to a coaching side hustle for early career professionals.
“As COO, I enjoy the numbers and the people interactions. I’ve worked in very different industries because Human Resources work is very transferrable. I can easily move from one industry to another without much of an impact by simply learning what a firm does.
But I want to share about my new side hustle. It is called, Sonam Consulting which is coaching for early career professionals. I love it! We’ve launched our website, and I am excited to share the transformation story of how I got here.
I have five Gen Z children, four are done with their undergrad degrees and one is in college, I am incredibly proud of them. One son, who got his undergrad in real estate, went through a metamorphosis his last semester. He had to do a big project scoping out locations for hospitals and choosing the best. I could see that he was genuinely interested in it and took a lot of pride in his work. But he had physical complications during which he was hospitalized for seven days undiagnosed. Upon deeper investigation and additional tests, it turned out he needed surgery.
That was a turning point for him to think about his life and what he wanted to do. He did get his real estate license with New York State but was not motivated. One day he asked to speak with me about it and said, ‘I'm not sure this is what I want to do.’ He was worried I’d be angry, but I assured him that people change careers all the time.
When we talked about what he liked, it was wellness. So, he went for his personal training certification. Then he decided to move where he wanted to live to begin his career and that was Florida. On the drive down, he said something that resonated with me it’s where I felt that I could have done better with the exposure that I had. My son said, ‘I wish that at the dinner table, we would have had more conversations on the different types of careers out there.
It had me thinking about how young adults feel pressure to have it all figured out trying to find and bring together joys and strengths. I had an epiphany of how I could help them. It’s led me to coaching, though, I’ve been unofficially coaching my whole career. I have my HR certification and now working on completing my ACC certification with the International Coaching Federation. I have fifty hours and the exam to pass till completion.
My husband and I are empty nesters, so I want to use my time to be purposeful. My market is ages 16-25. My HR insight helps in navigating their career choices to help them build a strong foundation. It may be the most important time in their career development. On my website, we also have two kinds of personality analyses. I’m excited and nervous. This is such a great demographic!
About my headshot, I felt pampered! My whole life has been taking care of five kids and others at work. At one of the firms where I worked, they called me Mother Hen because I took care of people.
During the hair and makeup session, I felt out of place because I was the center of attention. But Alissa got me very relaxed and confident about the photo shoot. She gave me small weights to hold which helped eliminate the tension in my shoulders. She kept encouraging me with, ‘You’re doing a great job.’
Alissa captured how I wanted to look perfectly. I feel my headshots will resonate with the demographics I want to reach. They are a combination of professional and approachable. She captured that very well.”