The Paradox of Self-Help Expertise with Patrick Sheehan

This is an updated version of the 3rd installment in my series Self-Help, LLC, from 2022. Enjoy!

Our quest for self-improvement requires us to decide who (or what) to trust with our time, energy, and money. What book do you decide to read next? Which coach do you hire? What accounts do you follow? Our consumer choices seem endless—so finding someone or something to put your trust in might feel like an Olympic feat.

On the flip side, as business owners or independent workers whether explicitly or implicitly in the business of self-help, our goal is to cultivate trust. Why would someone trust us with their business, their marriage, or their hopes and dreams for the future?

In this episode, I sit down with sociologist Patrick Sheehan to talk about his study of career coaches and the role they play with job seekers. We examine the roles that both credentialed and experience-based experts play in society and why uncertainty and instability might inspire us—for better or worse—to put our trust in prophets rather than priests.

Footnotes:

• “We’ve stopped trusting institutions and started trusting strangers” by Rachel Botsman (TED Talk)
• “The Change Rules of Trust in the Digital Age” by Rachel Botsman (HBR)
• “Where did all the coaches come from?” by Patrick Sheehan (Work In Progress Sociology)
• “The new economy as multi-level marketing scheme: career coaches and unemployment in the age of uncertainty” by Patrick Sheehan (Work in Progress Sociology)
• “Gun Culture and Wellness Culture Come From the Same Place” by Alan Levinovitz (Huffington Post)

As always, find an essay version of this episode at whatworks.fyi