Bay Area Business Woman News  |  December 2003

Bonnie Bell Helps Professionals and Entreprereneurs
Find Their Way to Career Success

Ever wonder why career and life planners, coaches and consultants are proliferating at lightening speed? “Because people have finally figured out that it works!,” says Bonnie Bell, owner of Finding Your Way Career Consulting in downtown Oakland.

“When I started my business in 1993, the idea of getting help with life and career questions was much less common than it is now. It seemed that people would ask for help with almost every other kind of problem, but when it came to serious life issues and career questions, most people had an I’ll do it myself! mentality.”  

Bell believes that career questions are possibly the most complex and sophisticated of all, because – unmasked – they are really the much deeper questions of the “Self”:

• Who am I?
• What do I want?
• Where am I going?
• How am I going to get there?

“I like to demystify these questions, bring them down to earth. You don’t have to know everything about yourself, but you can get much clearer about what you do know. It is clarity that transforms into the power to get where you want to go.”

Not every job seeker or career professional is prepared to wade into those deep waters, which include the personal, spiritual and professional dimensions. Bell considers herself prepared to do so. A former social worker and mental health counselor, she holds a master’s degree in counseling and a master’s of divinity from the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley, and has owned three successful businesses.

Five years ago, Bell began graduate level study in business with Hecht & Associates in the Silicon Valley. She graduated from their two-year Business Professionals course in 1999, and continues to study in their post-graduate program, LEIP (Leadership, Entrepreneurship, Innovation and Power) where she is in regular conversation with successful business and professional people from around the country and worldwide. “This gives me a rare perspective on the marketplace, the economy, and business, which powerfully impacts my work.”

Judging from the wall of thank you notes, letters, and emails in Bell’s office, it appears that her unique approach is working. She has worked with managers and executives of such corporations as Sysco, Hewlett-Packard, Bank of America, Kaiser, Palm Computing, Sprint, and Sun Mycrosystems. She has worked with attorneys, engineers, marketing professionals, artists, small business owners, therapists, teachers, technical writers, software engineers and sales professionals. She has helped give birth to several Bay Area businesses, including Dawg Adventures, Recapture, Fleur de Lis Communications, and BarberElla Beauty Lounge. While most of her clients are local, she does have “telephone clients” in cities around the country, including Chicago, New York, Los Angeles, Orlando, Kansas City, and Denver. ”

Finding Your Way Career Consulting is located at 1111 Broadway, Suite 2130, Oakland, CA 945607, right on top of the 12th Street BART Station. For a free in-person consultation, contact Bonnie Bell at (510) 763-5671, or email her at bbell@bellinvest.com. For more information, please consult her website: bonniebellcareers.com.

©2008 Bell Investment Advisors, Inc.