Why Great Career Coaches Walk the Journey with Clients, with Itzel Orozco

In this episode of Career Coaching Secrets, host Kevin sits down with Itzel Orozco, founder of Stellum Pro, to explore a radically human approach to career coaching. With nearly 20 years in HR and talent attraction, Itzel shares how a deep personal transformation led her to redefine what it means to truly support executives in career transition.

Unlike traditional career coaches, Itzel works exclusively with clients who are open to personal transformation and self-reconnection. She walks alongside directors and executives not just through strategy and tools—but all the way until they get hired. Together, Kevin and Itzel unpack the realities of building a coaching business, the power of walking with clients through uncertainty, the role of mindset and identity in job searches, and what it takes to scale impact without losing purpose.

Connect with

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/itzelcoach/
Website: https://linktr.ee/itzelcoach

Transcript

Itzel Orozco 0:00

But I have two different, I would say my difference from other career coaches, the closest I have, is that one is this thing I'm telling you about. If they are not open for the personal transformation to reconnect with themselves, I won't be able to be their coach because I will try to learn about them, how they were successful successful before, which are their achievements, and how are they planning to move forward? And the other would be that I work with them through success, on up to success. I don't only coach and then let go. I coach until they get hired.

Davis Nguyen 0:41

Welcome to Career Coaching Secrets, the podcast where we talk with successful career coaches on how they built their success and the hard lessons they learned along the way. My name is Davis Wynne, and I'm the founder of Purple Circle, where we help career coaches scale their business to $100,000 years, $100,000 months, and even $100,000 weeks. Before Purple Circle, I've grown several seven and eight-figure career coaching businesses myself and have been a consultant at two career coaching businesses that are doing over $100 million each. Whether you're an established coach or building your practice for the first time, you'll discover the secrets to elevating your coaching business.

Kevin 1:12

Welcome to Career Coaching Secrets Podcasts. I'm Kevin, and today we're joined by Itzel Orozco. She is the founder of Stellum Pro, been a coach for six years. Welcome to the show, Itzel.

Itzel Orozco 1:24

Thank you very much for having me, Kevin.

Kevin 1:26

Yeah, it's my pleasure. You know, one of the things I always like to ask our guests is the origin story because you could have been a lot of things. You could have been, I don't know, horseback rider, uh, you could have been a teacher, you could have been a lot of different things. Out of all the things you decided, you decided on career coaching. And so my question to you is like, what made you want to become a coach and turn into a business?

Itzel Orozco 1:49

Okay. So I'm a psychologist. And I was working in the HR department for almost 20 years. And after a very big personal crisis, when I had to rethink about what was I doing if I wanted to be the same, be doing the same thing I was doing for the last 20, I decided to move. And making a move was mainly um motivated by my personal needs, my my drive, which is um helping the transformation of others. But for that, I needed to transform myself first. So um I ran a very large um movement of personal transformation myself, and then I was ready to coach. So that was the main reason I decided I know this is my the way I want to impact, but yeah, it was motivated by a very heavy personal change.

Kevin 2:56

Because you were going through a huge transition in your life. Coaching was impact uh very impactful for your life, and so you want to spread that gift to others. Now, there's so many different types of coaches out there, and so yeah.

Itzel Orozco 3:09

My transformation was in almost every single part of a human life. It was personal, it was uh um of my my impact in the world, of my spiritual side, of my health side, everywhere. But when I decided to become a career coach, it was because two main things. I was involved in the career stuff because I was in attraction, talent attraction for a long time. I was head of a department of talent attraction and I felt it really fit me. That was the first. But the second one was that when I was in my transition, in my personal transition, I found out that for me to get the job I was looking for to be impactful for others, it must be through my personal rediscovery, my personal um, yeah, it's uh reconnection. So I found out that personal transformation was for me one of the basics to start a career coaching way of work. So um those were the two main things, and now my career coach, it's built on those. For me to have a client in career coaching, they must be open to transform personally, not only in their jobs.

Kevin 4:36

It's like, well, how do you decide who to help too? And so let's talk about the marketing. Like, who is your kind of like ideal uh client and how do people usually find you? I would love to hear about that.

Itzel Orozco 4:49

Sure. Uh my main client is those uh from director levels and above, executive levels mainly, and I have a big reason when they start looking for a job, it's very common. They are coming from not looking for a job in a very long time. They lost their jobs or they were they were cut off because of other reasons they don't really understand sometimes. So the this standpoint from I am maybe over 40 and I don't know what to do, where to start, how to get involved, how to be seen, I am really lost. And I feel really strong in accompanying them, walking the journey with them through the personal and the job hunting journey. So um, those are my my main type of clients. So I'm sorry, just finishing that that that question. Yes. My my way to get them is through LinkedIn mainly, of course. And to be honest, I have lots, lots of recommendations. It might be almost 50-50%. LinkedIn and recommendations.

Kevin 6:04

Wow. So 50% comes from referrals, it sounds like. And then the other 50 comes from LinkedIn, like through your posts, or like are you using sales navigator? Like uh what does your LinkedIn strategy look like?

Itzel Orozco 6:17

Yeah, um, I'm doing two different kinds of ways. The first one is through um marketing campaigns. I'm using those. And the others, it's uh yeah, um the content posting in in the Stalum Pro page. Those are the two. And the the the ways are very different. I feel mostly attracted to the campaigns because for me, if I cannot have metrics, I cannot improve it. So I really need to see the numbers of what we're doing very well and what we need to change. Yes, those are the two ways.

Kevin 6:55

Okay. And so this is the exciting part. I'm sure as you're outreaching to people, as you're posting content, as you are getting these referrals, people, I'm sure people are finding out a year and just like raising their hands and they're like, It's a how do I work with you, right? And so if you're comfortable sharing, I would love to hear what does a coaching engagement or your offerings kind of look like? Because I know a lot of coaches, they do some do one-on-one, some do group, so there's a lot of different things, right? So, what have you gravitated to?

Itzel Orozco 7:24

I learned that I'm really good at explaining myself and hearing their own problematics personally. So I first have my first interaction with them individually, where I hear their problems, I hear the situation, and then I can address the situation specifically. But I have two different, I would say my difference from other career coaches, the closest I have, is that one is this thing I'm telling you about. If they are not open for the personal transformation to reconnect with themselves, I won't be able to be their coach. Because I will I will try to learn about them, how they were successful before, which are their achievements, and how are they planning to move forward? And the other would be that I walk with them through success, on up to success. I don't only coach and then and then let go. I coach until they get hired. And in Latin America, that's not common at all. Because in Latin America we have a very high unemployment rate. So it's very common to show them the tools and let them go. So I know it's a big difference for me when I show them how, and then I go, I walk the the journey all the way. So uh those would be, I guess, my my main differences.

Kevin 8:56

I see. Right when some when you do work with someone.

Itzel Orozco 8:59

I do.

Kevin 9:00

Okay.

Itzel Orozco 9:01

Almost everything is one-on-one. Maybe maybe the next step uh should be moving, being into groups, but right now everything is one-on-one.

Kevin 9:11

I'd love to ask you this too, because uh if you're doing one-on-one, from my what I've kind of noticed is that it's a really intimate relationship, right? And so how do you manage your current client capacity so that your cup stays full?

Itzel Orozco 9:24

Right now, I'm not yet at the top of my spaces because I let them decide when they are ready to keep moving. So every time I coach, I let them decide their next and their next meeting. So that makes me gives possibility to manage the agenda without any any trouble. I know there will be a time and hopefully soon it's gonna be full enough, and maybe I will need to have a different step. My next move, Kevin, is to try to get some of these contents into video so they will be able to move forward without needing me close. So that will be in the plans of the next three to five months. Everything has to be done in that way so I can reach more more clients. Yeah.

Kevin 10:26

Yeah, and I'm so curious too, because uh, I mean, when we're shooting this, we're kinda at the beginning of the year, right? And so I guess where do you want this coaching business to take you in the next few years? Do you have desires to scale, to hire? Do you have secret dreams or big ambitions no one knows about? Like, we'll love to hear about that.

Itzel Orozco 10:44

Sure. Yeah, the plan is that right now Stellum is is in the very like um start, in the very, very start. We've been working hard for almost a year and a half. And my my co-founder and I, which he's also a coach, but he's a mentality coach. So we've been working very, very hard for the last year in order to let Stellum Pro grow. So the next year, the the target for this year is we're gonna be able to have all the marketing campaigns running by themselves. First, that that's the first goal. The second is to get these contents I just told you into another kind of materials, which would be newsletters and videos, and the project at the end of the year is to have the artificial intelligence involved in some parts of the process. Such as when I am as a coache, I'm learning to reconnect with my success. I need to recall all those successes I've had through my career, and the AI can help me to to uh translate and to help me remembering and maybe to recall. That's right, to get all gathered in in a platform.

Kevin 12:09

Very cool. Man, how exciting.

Itzel Orozco 12:11

Yeah, it is.

Kevin 12:13

We are you you said co-founder too. So I'm so curious. What was the decision for you to have a co-founder versus Goet Solo? I know that's a very hotly debated topic, and so I was kind of curious what made you want to uh get a co-founder.

Itzel Orozco 12:27

Yeah, uh I worked individually for the first four years, and uh there's a big piece of success in learning about myself when doing it by myself. However, joining, getting together with him has been a process of opening my mind to see the world very differently, to open to new ideas, to in innovate, because he's an engineer that became a coach. So he has this part of the brain I do not have developed. So it's been it's been crazy to to mix these two types of brains we both have. Um so it was the smartest decision so far to get together.

Kevin 13:23

How did you find your co-founder, by the way?

Itzel Orozco 13:25

In my certification, my coaching certification program. We met there and we started working together, and we found out we were doing things very good on our side. And then he asked me to be his career coach. And while we were experiencing together, we said, why don't we get this all done in one piece? So yeah.

Kevin 13:52

Beautiful.

Itzel Orozco 13:52

Yeah, it was great. It was great.

Kevin 13:54

Now you mentioned that uh you guys have been working really, really hard for the last 1.5 years. And so the other thing I'm I'm very curious about because sometimes like on Instagram or social media, we just see the highlight reels, right? Like it's kind of like sports, we see the highlight reels of everything going really, really well. But I'm very curious too. Like, what are some of the at this point in your business, what are some of the growing pains that you're just noticing right now? Is there anything that's kind of unexpected?

Itzel Orozco 14:27

Maybe unexpected for me, it was that I was very optimistic and not realistic when I got started. I was saying I could do everything by myself. I meant everything. The the plan, the whole strategy, the marketing strategy, the finance strategy. I thought that would be much, much easier. I wasn't realistic enough. Not because I couldn't, but because it was easier if I had a plan, if I had some people coaching in all those stuff, I was not expert. So um I guess that would be the first. And the second would be that perseverance and and patience and action would be my best friends, and maybe I was not ready for anticipating all those needs from the very beginning. I had to learn through my journey.

Kevin 15:26

What's been the most difficult part during the last 1.5 years for yourself?

Itzel Orozco 15:30

I guess it's being by myself. I worked in a corporation for 20 years, so everything is very well done, very structured. And my I was not ready to get a business structured at the very beginning. I had to give the plan, the form, the way I wanted to work, the methodology. So it took time. It took time for me, and of course it was the hardest. Yeah.

Kevin 15:58

Yeah. Yeah. And what kind of prompted? Well, I know that you kind of talked about this that you went through your own personal transformation, but what was the decision behind uh going from corporate? Because you were there for a long, long time. And to start a business, that's no easy feat. So what was the decision behind that? I'm so curious. What do you feel like was missing?

Itzel Orozco 16:19

Yeah, there were maybe a few things, but the biggest I can say it was I understood I was not meant to belong anymore. Anymore. I I was really grateful for what I have, really grateful, but I didn't belong anymore to them, these kind of systems that are already made and already structured, already built. I really needed to build mine and I had to move by myself. That was like a big, big um request from from my myself from within. I didn't need to belong anymore. I needed to belong to my own project. And the second was that when I realized that coaching was my stuff, I for me, Kevin, the business world is really important. It's really motivating. I love the business world, but I didn't want to belong in the in I wanted to be part of it, but from aside. And being a career coach gives me that. I have the business close to me, but I have my own business. So that mix was my formula, really. I hope I uh I answered.

Kevin 17:38

Yeah. Okay. We're at that point in the podcast where I would love to play a game with you.

Itzel Orozco 17:43

Okay.

Kevin 17:43

And I think we like to play this game through the lens of business investment. Cause uh through business investments. Because as you know, coaches invest into a lot of things like you mentioned certification before, coaching, training, marketing, team members. There's a lot of things because we're business owners too, right? And so what I want to do is I'm gonna give you a prompt. You tell me the first thing that comes to mind. And if there's a story, we'll love to hear the story behind it. Okay?

Itzel Orozco 18:09

Okay, good.

Kevin 18:10

All right, all right. Oh, um, first. So what is the first business investment you ever remember making?

Itzel Orozco 18:19

I'm sorry, the best investment I have had?

Kevin 18:22

The first business investment you ever remember making?

Itzel Orozco 18:26

The the one I'm doing. The one I'm doing. I I've never was risky enough. That was this is my first, really, my first experience.

Kevin 18:36

I see. What's the most recent business investment you made, like in terms of business investment purchase, I guess, financially?

Itzel Orozco 18:43

My coaching certification, I I would say. It led me to what I'm building and that I'm really sure this will be the impact I need to give to the world.

Kevin 18:54

Okay. Best. So what is the best financial uh financial business investment you made so far and why?

Itzel Orozco 19:02

Well, maybe having this co-founder working together would be my financial because of course we're investing financially in it. Working together with someone, I guess it would be my best and my first and my biggest so far.

Kevin 19:18

All right. Last one. This is a little cheeky. It's the worst. There's always like a silver lining for any uh investment, by the way. But what's the kind of like worst business investment that you kind of wish you got your money back from? Doesn't have to be super serious, but like something that you're like, oh man, I wish. Are there any investments like that for you?

Itzel Orozco 19:39

Leadership and coaching, training for eight months. It was a program, and I really didn't enjoy it very much. I didn't feel it was the content I was expecting.

Kevin 19:51

You know, as you're looking at oh, you brought up a great point because these questions are meant to like make you kind of reflect, bring back some good memories. Some like funny memories. And so, like, I guess like as you look at your investments in the past, I guess how has your decision making process changed over the years and what to invest in? But I'm kind of curious from your Yeah.

Itzel Orozco 20:12

Uh my mind has changed a lot on what to invest. I can say right now it's much more into the future. Maybe when I was making decisions of investments before, it was more on the pleasure on or on what was only motivating me. But not thinking about the future, to be honest. When I was studying for being a coach, I didn't think it would be my stuff for lots of years to come. And um I now I make a decision for investment only if that will remain for a period of time in the future for me. It was mainly because of the the the the the instant pleasure that I received. Yeah.

Kevin 21:02

Yeah. Yeah, I sometimes we all fall victim to it because it's like we want to focus on the stuff that we love in the business all the time, but yeah, sometimes that's not what we actually need. So it's really, really interesting.

Itzel Orozco 21:14

That's right. That's right.

Kevin 21:16

Cool. It's so how do people find you and connect with you?

Itzel Orozco 21:20

Sure. Well, they can find me through LinkedIn.

Kevin 21:23

Okay.

Itzel Orozco 21:24

That's one of the main contacts. And I have my LinkTree profile, which I can share with you as well. In Link Tree, I there are my I have another podcast and I have few materials there. So uh yeah, they can reach me that way.

Kevin 21:39

Something that really stuck with me. It's like, man, it took so much courage to kind of take the leap of faith business and development that hey, I appreciate your work. Your work matters, and thank you just so much for sharing your time, your stories, and wisdom on this podcast today.

Itzel Orozco 21:57

Thank you, thank you for having me here.

Davis Nguyen 21:59

That's it for this episode of Career Coaching Secrets. If you enjoyed this conversation, you can subscribe on YouTube, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you're listening to this episode to catch future episodes. This podcast was brought to you by Purple Circle, where we help career coaches scale their business to $100,000 years, $100,000 months, or even $100,000 weeks, all without burning out and making sure that you're making the impact and having the life that you want. To learn more about our community and how we can help you, visit join purplecircle.com.