The Gap in Career Coaching

In the landscape of career development, many professionals face a challenging reality: generic advice that doesn’t account for individual values, life circumstances, or authentic career aspirations. Traditional career services often focus on quick fixes—resume updates, interview prep, job placement—without addressing the deeper question of how someone wants to spend the precious hours of their professional life.

Enter Joa Ahern-Sarand, a trained therapist turned entrepreneur who recognized this void and decided to fill it with something revolutionary: a career coaching practice that helps people build professional lives aligned with their authentic selves, values, and long-term vision.

“I help people figure out how to live their best professional lives,” Joa explains. “There is no one size fits all for planning a career trajectory, and what that really amounts to is how are you choosing to spend the hours of your one wondrous life?”

A Journey of Discovery

Joa’s path to entrepreneurship began with her psychology background and training as a therapist at Lesley University. Her experience working with families and children taught her the power of authentic presence and the importance of meeting people where they are rather than where you think they should be.

This foundation led her to co-found Gem Achievement, an admissions consultancy helping people navigate graduate degree programs, particularly MBAs. Working with international clients who approached business school with 8-10 years of work experience, versus American students applying fresh out of undergrad, revealed a crucial insight: the most successful professionals made strategic, values-based decisions about their career investments.

“I wanted to work with people after they got their degrees too,” Joa reflects. “I wanted them to come back to me and say, like I got this degree and now I’m so excited about this next thing.”

This vision led to the creation of Carte Blanche Careers, a comprehensive career coaching practice focused on helping people build sustainable, fulfilling professional lives that evolve with them over time.

Finding the Right Support: The Catalyst Difference

Despite her success with Gem Achievement, Joa faced a common challenge in entrepreneurship: the isolation of building alone. After a year of working with a co-founder, she was already recognizing that “it was a lonely ride oftentimes and that building without having anybody to like really share in what you were building didn’t always feel as good as I knew it could feel with more people around me.”

When the Create the Rules Catalyst launched, Joa’s response was immediate. She had been following the program’s founder for nearly a year, drawn to the business coaching philosophy but assuming one-on-one support would be financially out of reach.

“I had been casually following you and interested in all of your business coaching things that you talked about for like probably a year… I was like this is the time, this is the moment, this is the thing I will be able to work with her, plus so much more,” Joa recalls.

What she found was more than just a business program—it was a space that supported both strategic business building and authentic personal growth at her own pace.

The Power of Intentional Growth

The impact of the Catalyst’s approach became clear in how Joa navigated one of her most challenging business decisions: separating her career coaching vision from her existing partnership. Using the Catalyst as a sounding board, she worked through the complex process of determining whether to keep her new ideas within Gem Achievement or create a separate entity.

“Through our conversations, through my internal work and the supported work in the catalyst really got to, you know, the bottom line, which is this this new set of ideas was its own entity,” she explains.

But the journey toward independence wasn’t straightforward. Even after launching Carte Blanche Careers, Joa initially sought another co-founder, still believing she needed a business partner to succeed. When that second partnership didn’t work out, she faced a moment that would become transformative.

The day Joa announced to the Catalyst community that her second business partner was leaving became a defining experience. Rather than shame or judgment, she found herself held by a supportive silence that felt powerful and healing. This moment of authentic sharing created a ripple effect throughout the community, with her vulnerability giving others permission to address their own business challenges.

The Power of Community in Business

One of the most striking aspects of Joa’s approach is her understanding of how authentic community functions in business building. Her background in psychology taught her that transparency and presence create deeper connections than surface-level networking.

“I really value authenticity and I really value transparency… I think that saying it out loud is better than not nine times out of ten,” she shares.

This approach proved transformative within the Catalyst community. When members learned about her business challenges, including her lack of proper contracts, it sparked a wave of others addressing their own foundational issues. Her transparency gave others permission to acknowledge their own gaps and take action to address them.

The community impact extends beyond emotional support. Joa has both purchased services from and provided services to other Catalyst members, creating a thriving micro-economy of mutual support and collaboration.

Revolutionizing Revenue:
From Survival to Strategic Pricing

A profound shift in Joa’s approach to pricing and business growth emerged during her time in the Catalyst. Initially, as a self-described “baby entrepreneur,” she priced her comprehensive career coaching package—including five hour-long sessions, complete resume and LinkedIn overhaul, job search preparation, and interview coaching—at just $750.

“Moment of silence for baby Joa,” she reflects with humor about those early pricing decisions.

The Catalyst’s profit planning process was a revelation that brought her to tears—the good kind of tears that come with clarity about what needs to change. “I cried doing the profit plan,” Joa admits. “But doing the profit plan helped me understand some things in a really different way.”

The transformation wasn’t just about raising prices—it was about understanding the hidden costs of providing excellent service and recognizing that her work’s value wasn’t measured in hours but in outcomes. This insight revealed that true career support extends far beyond the scheduled session time and encompasses the deep thinking, preparation, and follow-up that creates lasting change.

Strategic Growth Through the Catalyst

Using the Catalyst’s framework, Joa implemented strategic growth that aligned with her values rather than pursuing rapid expansion. She focused on building long-term relationships with clients who valued deep, sustained transformation.

“I’m now selecting clients who want to do that kind of work – a deeper, longevity of work, not a quick fix here and there,” she explains.

This approach has led to remarkable client relationships, with some returning multiple times over several years as their careers evolve. The depth of these relationships allows for truly transformative work—helping clients think about five to ten-year career plans and even business continuity planning.

The results speak for themselves. Joa regularly receives enthusiastic communications from clients celebrating career breakthroughs, like the recent client who didn’t get the role she applied for but was offered an even better position that better aligned with her long-term goals. This was the third time they had worked together, demonstrating the ongoing value of sustained career partnership.

Transforming Business Practice

Through her time in the Catalyst, Joa has developed a distinctly different approach to career coaching. Rather than pushing for quick job placements or surface-level resume fixes, she focuses on building sustainable, long-term relationships with clients who want to create authentic professional lives.

This approach has led to remarkable developments in her practice. She’s now working with clients on five- to ten-year career plans, helping them think about professional sustainability not just in terms of immediate job satisfaction, but in terms of long-term fulfillment and values alignment.

Her willingness to be vulnerable about business challenges has also created a ripple effect throughout the Catalyst community, where her model of authentic sharing and strategic thinking influences how other entrepreneurs approach their own business building.

Looking Forward: A Vision for the Future

As Joa looks toward the future, she’s launching a new three-month cohort program focused on strategic positioning, specifically designed for women doing incredible work in the world. This expansion represents the evolution of her thinking—from individual career coaching to building communities of strategically positioned professionals.

“It feels like the foundation of what I’ve been doing all along,” she says of the new program. The cohort will focus not just on individual career development, but on how participants can strategically position themselves to create broader impact in their fields.

Her future plans demonstrate how business success can serve as a foundation for broader professional community building, showing that when we align our work with our values, we can create something that transforms not just our own lives, but the lives of everyone we serve.

The Impact of Authentic Business Building

Joa’s story isn’t just about individual success—it’s about reimagining what career coaching can be when it’s built on authentic relationships, strategic thinking, and long-term vision. Her focus on values-based practices, community building, and sustainable growth offers a powerful alternative to traditional career services that often focus on quick fixes rather than lasting transformation.

Through her work in the Catalyst and her evolving practice, Joa is showing that business success doesn’t have to come at the cost of authentic relationships or personal values. It’s possible to build something sustainable, impactful, and true to one’s identity—it just takes the courage to do things differently and the support to make it happen.

Her journey continues to inspire others in the Catalyst community, showing that when we give ourselves permission to build businesses at our own pace and in alignment with our values, we can create something truly transformative—not just for ourselves, but for the professional communities we serve.