Life Coach Resume: Crafting a Compelling Resume to Land Your Dream Job

Hey there, coach! Ever feel like your life coach resume is missing that special spark to grab your dream job?

We totally get it – crafting a standout life coach resume can be tricky, but we’re here to help you shine!

In this blog post, we’re going to share the ultimate guide to creating a life coach resume that stands out from the crowd and lands you those dream opportunities.

By the way, we’re Cass and Tee, the dynamic duo behind Lovely Impact – your go-to biz resource website for coaches like you.

With our years of experience in the coaching industry, we know exactly what it takes to create a resume that impresses. Let’s dive in and transform your life coach resume into a job-winning masterpiece!

Key Elements of a Life Coach Resume

You have one page to nail down the most important things about you. 

Every sentence and section should fall into place like a complete and satisfying puzzle and give a colorful and vibrant picture of who you are as a life coach superstar!

Let’s look at the most important elements of your life coach resume. 

Summary or Objective Statement

Kickstart your resume with an eye-grabbing summary or objective statement. 

A summary is a bite-sized caption of your professional accomplishments and an objective statement lets hiring managers know what the purpose of your resume is.  

“Don’t hiring managers already know my objective is to land a job? Why should I include this and waste space?”

That coach, is a wonderful question.

The problem these days with career objectives and resume summaries is that they’re BORING! So they get a bad rap. 

However, when written to impress, they can give you the boost you need to get into the interview phase.

• Use a resume summary as a way to tie in your most relevant skills to the position that you’re applying to. Plus, you can use these precious few sentences to highlight your greatest achievements or something interesting that you bring to the table. 
• Use a career objective when the position you’re applying for doesn’t match your previous experience. For example, if you are switching from nursing to health coaching… These positions both help people. This is your chance to explain why you’re taking a leap into a new position. 

Relevant Education and Certifications

It’s time to hit the backspace on your high school diploma displayed on your life coach resume. Sorry! 

While an accomplishment in itself, you should be at the point where you have more relevant and stronger education and certifications that back you up as a solid candidate. 

For example, you should have proudly listed your life coaching certification from the International Coaching Foundation. 

➡️ No certifications yet? Get the deets on the Best Affordable Life Coaching Certification in 2024 here.

If you have higher education such as a psychology, counseling, or nursing degree, cozy it up next to your certification. 

Both a life coaching certification and a college degree make a heavenly match employers LOVE to see. 

This is the proof in the pudding that you’re capable of doing a great job. 

Coaching Experience and Achievements

Embarrassed to toot your own horn? Here’s the thing coach, someone else will soak up the spotlight if you don’t! 

Step out and own your AWESOMENESS!

Your unique accomplishments and experience are the bread and butter of your resume. Without them, your life coach resume is just a hollow skeleton with no life!

Let’s fix that. 

Again, think of it this way. You’re not just flaunting your achievements, you’re showing how you’ve helped people in the past. 

Focus on things like the number of clients you’ve been able to impact. Or maybe there’s a client success story that’s too good to pass up. 

Are your clients getting outstanding achievements with your guidance? Spill the beans!

Let hiring managers know the juicy details of your coaching success. 

“But what if I don’t have experience? Who’s going to take me seriously and pay me money if I don’t have results?!”

A terrible catch-22 to be in. We know, because we’ve been there!

However, don’t let that stop your journey to success. We all start at square one with no results to share or no experience. 

Here’s how you can find something to write in your life coach resume. 

Use volunteer experiences, or shadow another coach who is willing to take you on. 

BE coached. 

Last, dare we say it? Coach someone for free or in exchange for services. 

This will help you get experience, feedback, and a testimonial all in one go. Be courageous and ask! You never know who’s willing to help you out.

Tailoring Your Resume to the Job Description

Are you a skimmer of job descriptions? 

Trust us, we know it’s rough! Job hunting is a process, and takes focus. It’s SUPER tempting to skim a job description and fling your life coach resume at it and go on to the next one. 

But we encourage you to slow down and immerse yourself in the little universe of a job description. ESPECIALLY if it’s one you REALLY want. 

Analyzing the Job Requirements

When you start reading a job description carefully, think of it like a game of matching.

Apples to apples and oranges to oranges. Look for the key skills and qualifications that make up the job and line them up with YOUR skills and qualifications. 

If you have a lot of matches, it’s all systems go. Take the plunge and submit your life coach resume!

If you don’t have a lot of matches, you might want to think about reworking your life coach resume or working on some of your qualifications. 

Customizing Your Life Coach Resume Content

You want your experience to fit the job description like a glove. 

If you’re worried about not having paid experience, shut out the inner critic! That experience is valuable. If it’s relevant, include it!

You can include in your life coach resume:

• Volunteer work
• Freelancing positions
• Shadowing
• Internships
• Academic related work
• Collaborations
• Training

And of course, include previous paid experience. We want to emphasize that you include these experiences ONLY if they are relevant and align with the job requirements. 

If your experience is not related, save it in a document somewhere else. 

Want to capture the attention of hiring managers like a lime green luxury car on the highway?

Quantify your experience.

For example, instead of writing, “Facilitated successful coaching program.” Try writing, “94% client satisfaction rate.”

Instead of, “Helped clients with goals.” Try, “96% goal completion rate.”

Instead of “Helped clients with professional development.” Try, “83% of clients saw significant increases in professional development.”

Numbers paint a wonderful picture of your accomplishments on your life coach resume. 

Bonus points if your measurable successes align with the company’s mission and goals.

Using Keywords and Industry Terminology

Why is it ULTRA important to adapt your life coach resume? 

Because your life coach resume is scanned by an ATS (applicant tracking system) long before it ever meets the eyes of a human. It searches your life coach coach resume looking for keywords, so it can get through applicant resumes faster. 

That’s why we suggest reading job descriptions to find keywords and industry terminology. 

If you fill your resume with the right keywords, the ATS will alert hiring managers that your resume is just what they’re looking for. 

Here’s how to do it:

• Notice what’s listed multiple times in the job description. For example, if you notice a job description that says “Uses interpersonal skills to help clients,” “Demonstrates excellent interpersonal skills,” or “Guides clients with interpersonal skills.” This is a hint that the hiring company values interpersonal skills a lot!
• Use the keywords from the job description in your resume. Using the example above, be sure to mention having solid interpersonal skills in the skills and qualifications section of your resume. 
• Use relevant skills and experience and be concise. Space is limited. If you’re the go-to pro for fixing a printer having a melt down, that’s fabulous! However, it’s not relevant to the job listing and can probably stay out. List skills on your life coach resume and experience that relate directly to the job. Be specific and leave out the fluff.

If you have the time, try to tailor your resume for each job listing. But if you’re pressed for time, skim through several listings and note the common industry terms and phrases. Then, tweak your resume to include those.

When you infuse your resume with industry terminology, you show you’ve got the insider scoop and you’re a seasoned expert. Note that the terms you use in your resume should be easy to understand. Don’t go overboard with it!

Use these tips to boost your chances of getting your resume through the scan and into the hands of hiring managers who’d love to meet you!

Formatting and Design Tips

Your life coach resume should look tidy and clean-cut. A jumbled-up mess of colors and words will make a hiring manager look away faster than a high-speed train. 

When your formatting is orderly and spaced out, you make your application appear more professional and down to business. 

Let’s jump into the aesthetic of your resume. 

Choosing a Clear and Professional Layout

Your life coach resume doesn’t have to be a boring word document. You can add a touch of personalization to make it stand out. 

However, it’s important to leave plenty of white space to make it easy for hiring managers to read. 

Avoid complicated designs or excessive use of graphics. 

Divide your resume into easy-to-read sections:

1. Summary or objective statement
2. Relevant Experience
3. Education
4. Certifications
5. Achievements
6. Skills

It can feel like a brain teaser squeezing all your fabulous qualifications onto one sheet of paper. But, getting the right message across with precision wording is much more valuable than an elaborate resume design. 

Next up is stringing together your resume content in a way that makes sense. 

Try a “reverse chronological structure” (the most common structure). This is listing your current or most recent job on top, then the previous one below, all the way to the oldest. This puts your most relevant content at the top. 

⚡ProTip: Canva has some great Resumes to help you get started.

Maintaining Consistency and Readability

Rather than a flowing work of art (as much as you might want to be) your life coach resume should look perfectly lined up, uniform, and meticulously crafted. 

The key is to be consistent throughout: 

• Be consistent with bolds, underlines, and periods.
• Use an easy-to-read font like Arial, Calibri, Cambria, and Helvetica. Times New Roman is a safe bet to use all around. 
• If you use color, use colors that aren’t too harsh or bright. 
• Be consistent with font sizes (ideally, use 10-12 for the main text and 14-16 for headings).

In the end, it’s not how fancy your life coach resume looks, but more about showing your skills and fantastic qualifications to your dream employers. 

Optimizing Length and Content

Cut and paste, and hit the backspace button until you get your life coach resume down to one page. No need to include your babysitting job in high school. 

Stick to the most relevant experience you have. 

It’s also important to make sure your content has an easy-to-follow content structure. 

The most used type of format is bullet points with keywords inserted to keep things organized. Whole sentences take up way too much valuable space.

Not quite sure how all the dots connect? Take a peek at these two examples below to see how it all comes together: 

Proofreading and Editing Your Resume

You’ve pounded your keyboard and researched your unique employment history down to a “T.”

Even though you’ve dissected and pieced together your life coach resume several times, there’s always that one pesky typo or formatting error that always pops up out of nowhere! 

We know you’re ready to be done with it! Hang on, coach! Let’s put on the last polishing touches. 

Reviewing for Clarity and Coherence

Give your resume a couple of read-throughs. Look for areas that may need clarification or feel a little clunky. 

If the words seem jumbled to you, they’ll feel jumbled to hiring managers, too! 

Take a moment to review your experiences and qualifications. 

Are they presented logically and are they coherent?

Re-work your wording to present your qualifications and experiences seamlessly. 

Checking for Grammatical and Spelling Errors

Read your life coach resume backwards! This is an old-time trick to prevent your brain from getting lost in the flow of words. By reading backward, you’ll be able to catch spelling errors much more easily. 

But if you want a modern solution, try Grammarly. This is a free and powerful tool to help you spot grammar and punctuation errors. 

We can’t stress enough the importance of keeping your resume tidy and error-free. This is an excellent way to stand out and show you care about professionalism. 

Seeking Feedback from Others

Tap a buddy on the shoulder and have them give it a read-through and provide honest feedback. 

If you have a trusted colleague or mentor they can give you a fresh set of eyes that will lock onto errors and areas for improvement like laser beams. Plus, they’ll have industry know-how and can give you pointers to spruce up your writing. 

Take it a step further and hire a professional resume reviewer to turbocharge your life coach resume. If you don’t have the network, this is a surefire way to make sure you’re going in with sirens blaring and all the attention-catching strategies. 

Frequently Asked Questions

We know that crafting a life coach resume can feel like a daunting task, so we’ve gathered some of the most frequently asked questions about it to help you out. Let’s dive in and tackle these questions together!

How do you describe life coaching on a resume?

When describing life coaching on a resume, highlight your role in helping clients achieve their personal and professional goals. Use action verbs like “guided,” “facilitated,” and “empowered” to show your active involvement. For example: “Guided clients through personal development plans to achieve their career objectives and improve life satisfaction.” Focus on specific outcomes and achievements to demonstrate the impact of your coaching.

How do you put coaching skills on a resume?

To showcase your coaching skills on a resume, create a dedicated “Skills” section where you can list relevant abilities such as active listening, goal setting, empathy, and motivational interviewing. Additionally, weave these skills into your job descriptions. For instance: “Utilized active listening and empathy to understand client needs and tailor coaching sessions accordingly.” This approach ensures that your coaching skills are prominently featured and linked to real-world applications.

What is the job description of a life coach?

A life coach’s job description involves working with clients to help them identify their goals, overcome obstacles, and create actionable plans for personal and professional growth. Life coaches provide support, motivation, and accountability through one-on-one sessions or group workshops. They use a variety of techniques and tools to assist clients in self-discovery and achieving a balanced, fulfilling life. Key responsibilities include conducting assessments, developing personalized strategies, and tracking progress to ensure clients reach their desired outcomes.

What skills does a life coach have?

Life coaches possess a diverse set of skills that enable them to effectively support and guide their clients. Key skills include active listening, empathy, effective communication, problem-solving, goal setting, and motivational techniques. Additionally, life coaches often have strong organizational and time management skills to handle multiple clients and sessions. These skills, combined with a genuine passion for helping others, make life coaches invaluable in fostering personal and professional growth.

Conclusion

We hope this guide has given you all the insights you need to craft a life coach resume that lands you your dream job!

To recap, we started by discussing the importance of creating a strong resume when applying for life coaching jobs. We covered the key elements of a life coach resume, including writing a compelling summary or objective statement, listing relevant education and certifications, and showcasing your coaching experience and achievements.

We then delved into tailoring your resume to the job description by analyzing the job requirements, customizing your resume content, and using keywords and industry terminology. Finally, we provided formatting and design tips, emphasizing the importance of a clear layout, consistent readability, and optimizing the length and content of your resume.

Now we’d like to turn it over to you:

What’s the #1 tip from this post that you’re excited to implement first?

Are you going to start by analyzing job descriptions more carefully, or maybe focus on customizing your resume content to align with job requirements?

Or perhaps you have a question about something you read.

Either way, we’d love to hear from you! Leave a comment below and share your thoughts or questions about creating your life coach resume. Don’t forget to share this blog with your fellow coaches who might also benefit from these tips. Happy resume crafting!