Chipembere: The future of career coaching
THE name Chipembere means “rhinoceros” in Shona, one of Zimbabwe’s official languages. A rhinoceros is one of the world’s rare animal species. While these animals are giants and counted among Africa’s Big Five species, they are also acknowledged as patient, caring and protective.
It is fitting that a rare example of a combination of learning facilitation, career coaching and a focus on holistic life wellness should be led by a person who goes by that name.
Ennie Chipembere stands out in a crowd for her bright smile, positive personality and flowing dreadlocks. When you speak to her, she stands out even more with her razor-sharp intellect and big heart. She has taken young people, leaders, executives and anyone who interacts with her or her work under her experienced care.
Ennie, in her own words, is a Career
Coach, Learning Expert, Life Wellness Coach and a Global Development Worker.
She packs a lot of activities into her day, which always leaves people wondering how she does it. She laughs it off and says it’s about having a clear vision, life purpose and values that are aligned to what you do in your personal life, paid and unpaid work.
“My vision is to impact Africa and anyone who encounters me and my work, for them to value learning, life wellness and proactive career management as a means of living meaningfully and achieving their goals. I also want to be remembered as having lived a meaningful, authentic and purpose-driven life; guided by the values of hard work, honesty, a belief in people and lifelong learning.”
It could all have been so different for her if she had stayed “in the box” after her time at the University of Zimbabwe.
“In Zimbabwe, if you did a Bachelor of Arts Degree, as I did in 19972000 at the University of Zimbabwe, you were destined to be a teacher or follow a non-linear career path. The country had very limited professional career development services. So, when I graduated in 2000, I had no access to career guidance, and I struggled to find a career home.
“Being a deeply spiritual person, I grappled with what my life purpose was and what would be meaningful for me to do. These four issues made me land on career development outreach work as an aspiration for the future (vision) so that no one else needed to go through the struggle I went through. I saw it as the critical work that needed to be done in my country and on the African continent, and it still is. I had a clear mental picture of the institute and services that would be helpful to me. That is how I developed the first draft of my personal vision in 2000.”
A focus on proactive career development and management has come a long way from the career guidance days. This was when professionals or the school alumni would come to a school, address the students and leave, often leaving the students inspired, but without the tools to find their career path or decide what is best for them to study. Today, it is a major part of every student and professional’s life path, continually being shepherded by experts like Ennie.
After her BA Honours degree, Ennie began a journey that has taken her halfway across the world (Canada) and multiple time zones as she built her profile and strengthened her capacity to deliver in a world that is changing rapidly and irreversibly. She charted a course into development work due to her visionary leadership that looked beyond her qualifications and into her skill set.
“I had been working for Konrad Adenauer Stiftung (KAS) Foundation for a year, from 2002, with no development sector qualification. I realised that without the proper knowledge and skills for the sector, I would struggle to progress and reach my goal of working globally in development
“I looked for scholarship opportunities using my doctoral student status with the University of Zimbabwe and an almost complete doctoral thesis as leverage. I also negotiated with my employer for a one-year unpaid leave of absence with a commitment to return and work for a year to share the knowledge and skills gained. This was unheard of in the KAS Foundations, but my Resident Representative, Anton Boesl, agreed as he saw value in me. After all, he had picked a Bachelor of Arts in Economic History recent graduate based on transferable skills learnt mostly from unpaid voluntary work and soft skills that come with an Arts degree.”
In 2003, she went to Canada to do her Master’s degree in International Development Studies.
“With a draft vision and purpose in mind, I organised and planned my life around a vision I had back then of setting up Career Services and a Living with Purpose Institute (LWPI) to serve the people of Zimbabwe and the African continent. For example, my education choices such as going to Canada’s Dalhousie University for a Master’s in International Development in 2003-2004 and not anywhere else, were based on the availability of a career development sector that I could learn from.
“It was a good and strategic decision. In Canada, I invested in my vision despite limited resources and a mother and three siblings who relied on me for food, clothes, medication and school fees. I still have and I am now using strategy documents, career development programme tools, templates and books that I bought while in Canada as a contribution to LWPI in 2004.
After Canada, life took me on a journey of developing my three other career pathways — Learning Expert, Holistic Life Wellness Coach and Global Development Worker. It, therefore, took me another 15 years before I returned to the now more refined Career Development Professional focus. My lesson here is — “fulfilling your vision and passion may be delayed, but it never dies!”
By the time she completed her programme in Canada, the flow of skills was from Zimbabwe outward, but she went against the flow.
“I could have stayed in Canada as Zimbabwe was already going through an economic and political crisis in 2004, but I returned home. I recall telling my mother that development work does not happen in Canada, but in the Global South. The people I want to serve and the work I want to do is relevant if I am closer to Zimbabwe and Africa. So, I returned home to my mother’s chagrin. What she did not know (may her soul continue to be proud of me and be at peace) was that I had factored this return when I planned to go and study abroad in 2003.”
Ennie threw herself into development work with a passion. Ever unconventional, the way she exited the organisation she was working for is an interesting tale of self-confidence and the power of building strong networks.
“At the end of 2005, because of personal pressures of looking after three siblings after mum passed on, I put out an e-mail to all the people in my network that I was ready to move. It paid off. One of my network members alerted me to an opportunity with ActionAid International, connected me to the hiring manager and I was asked to apply.
“It was such a huge leap from working in a tiny office in Zimbabwe, to a global arena that I had never worked in. My interview strategy, therefore, focused on packaging my transferable skills through career stories and the STAR technique to demonstrate via a career portfolio which I submitted to the panel, so they could see that I could take on this global role. It worked!
By January 2006, I had secured my first role at ActionAid International as their International Women’s Rights Technical Advisor. My role was what my master’s thesis had covered. It was to strengthen the organisational capacity of the 46 countries in the federation to integrate gender analysis capacity and women’s rights in programmes, staff capacity and organisational systems and culture. It was a major mandate, but in six years it was done.”
Her path has had its down moments. “The past is usually a rosy narrative. I do not want people to think I did not have career disappointments or missteps. This is the reason I am a Career Development Practitioner and Coach, to help people minimise missteps and successfully navigate career transitions.
One major career disappointment I had happened when I was focused on transitioning my career in ActionAid from an individual contributing Technical Advisor role to a manager and eventually a senior leadership level role. I had done deep work in the organisation because by the time I finished six years, I had done one to two weeks of field in-country assignments in 35 ActionAid countries on women’s rights capacity development and programme design. I felt I had to transition.
So, from 2008, I was applying internally for anything that was management, senior in title and responsibility. I, unfortunately, had lost my spiritual and life purpose compass as guides in this period and relied on external motivation and influences.
In 2009, I was asked to apply for Country Director position with my employer. I interviewed well up to the last two candidates, but did not secure the job. I felt dejected, but I had to go back to the drawing board. I asked myself if managing a country, dealing with fund-raising and a difficult context was what I really loved to do, saw as aligned to my life purpose and my core skills? The answer was No!”
“Sunny Hanson’s Integrated Life Planning Framework provides tips for safely navigating a similarly challenging time in the future. The four career transition tips are: ensure the opportunity is aligned to your life purpose; ensure it is meaningful work that needs doing and is valued; ensure it considers your family situation and negotiate work demands and relationship needs in the family space; and focus on holistic wellness, including spirituality
Ennie is pleased to work within an organisation that has helped her to flourish.
◆ To get in touch with Ennie, follow and engage with her work, you can find her on these online spaces:
◆ Twitter: @EnnieChipembere
◆ Facebook: https://www.facebook. com/EnnieCareerCoach/
◆ LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/ in/ennie-chipembere-chikwema
◆ E-mail: ennielifecoach@servicesgalore.co.za
◆ Read full profile on www.thesundaymail.co.zw