Disgraced reporter Jayson Blair becomes a life coach

After achieving notoriety as a journalist by faking and inventing stories, serial plagiarist Jayson Blair has now reinvented himself - as a self-help guru whose clients are battling issues from mental illness to career problems.

The New York Times reporter was exposed as a fraud in 2003 when it was discovered that his colourful articles, published with bylines from across the US, were in fact mostly penned in his apartment in Brooklyn and were often rehashed versions of other journalists' work.

The scandal led to the resignations of two senior editors on the paper and a front page editorial which described Blair's actions as "profound betrayal of trust and a low point in the 152-year history of the newspaper".

Blair, who was diagnosed as bipolar after the scandal broke, responded by writing a book in 2004 called Burning Down My Master's House, which catalogued his drink, drug and mental health problems and lifted the lid on newsroom rivalries and shoddy practices at the Times.

After ducking out of the public eye and heading back to his native Maryland he began working with support groups for people suffering from the same disorder as him, and their families. He says that his decision to get involved was not a career choice but says: "As time went on we got more involved with community service and in people's lives, including working with their doctors, so the mental health community got to know me."

The 33-year-old has now become a certified life coach and is working at Ashburn Psychological Services, a Virginia mental health clinic.

"When I first came to Ashburn there was plenty of scepticism among the team of psychologists, who said 'I can't believe we have hired a life coach and I can't believe that it's Jayson Blair'," he says, according to the Independent.

His bosses reportedly see him as a success story, an example of someone who has bounced back from personal and professional disaster and he claims no client has refused to work with him because of his past.

And the man who undermined an American institution even now advises companies on how to deal with staff who are in trouble: "In some cases where my clients are falling apart on the job, I will go with them to their employer, saying I am their life coach and, by the way, I'm Jayson Blair. That's always an interesting conversation. Usually it ends in a good chuckle."