Coaching Blog

The Trouble with Empathy

Posted by Julia Stewart

Coaching and Empathy

We live in an age when empathy is extolled as a virtue.

 

And so it is. Without empathy in the world, all our relationships would be transactional. Our need for love and belonging could never be met. Kindness and social intelligence would be nonexistent. No one would have a  sincere desire to help and meanness would reign, instead.

 

Not pretty.

 

Many personal growth programs offer to help you develop more empathy. And that's good. But have you thought about how much is enough? Can you ever have too much? How do you know if you have the right amount of empathy? And once you do have enough, how do you manage it?

Please read on...

So what is empathy, exactly? There are three major types:

 

  1. Cognitive Empathy: Basically, you know what others feel. You understand and can imagine what someone else has experienced, both positive and negative.
  2. Emotional Empathy: You feel what others feel. This occurs, in the moment, mainly when you are physically with someone or are talking by telephone, but you may continue to carry those feelings even after the interaction.
  3. Compassionate Empathy: You want others to feel better. This is empathy + a desire to help + action. When you understand or feel a need that another is experiencing, you want to help, and you do.

 

Which types of empathy do you need to coach effectively?

 

Cognitive empathy can help a coach perform the skills of coaching. But without emotional and compassionate empathy, the coach may be more likely to manipulate their clients, by directing or controlling, or may simply be unmotivated to coach.

Compassionate empathy does motivate coaches. But they need to practice discipline in the ways they help. If they also have cognitive empathy, that can help them imagine how their help will impact clients in the longrun. Will they become relient on the coach or will they grow? If the coach creates dependency in the client, that's good for the coach's ego but not for the client. Because no one reaches their full potential if they need someone else as a crutch.

Emotional empathy is, literally, at the heart of great coaching. Without it, many advanced coaching skills taught in coaching schools like this one, will make no sense to the learner. But coaches with emotional empathy need to develop the ability to distinguish their own emotions from those they pick up from others. Cognitive empathy can help with that, but it takes effort.

 

So what's the trouble with empathy?

 

Western culture, with its emphasis on independence, seems to encourage less and less empathy. Social media has been found to excelerate this. And psychologists tell us that leadership and success both tend to diminish a person's levels of empathy. The result is a culture that is increasingly manipulative and often mean. So more empathy might be the answer, but that's only half the problem.

Some people are born with a higher capacity for emotional empathy. But until they develop self-awareness and self-management skills, they may just experience chaos, especially when around others who are highly-emotional.

 

Living with high emotional empathy is like riding a wild bronco until we develop emotional intelligence.

 

When I was a little girl, I tried to ride my grandmother's horse, Danny, but he tried to buck me off. Within seconds, with both feet out of the stirrups, I was perilously close to being trampled as I hung off the side of the bucking horse, with just one little hand gripping the saddlehorn. Seeing what was about to happen, my grandmother ran out, grabbed the reins, and calmed Danny down. And yes, she made me get right back up on the horse and ride him around the corral again, so I wouldn't develop a fear of horses.

 

My grandmother's courage, calm, and skill saved my life that day.

 

So that's the problem with empathy and also the answer. When we have too little, or only one type, we tend to treat people unkindly. When we use it in an unskilled manner, we can harm people without meaning to. And when we have too much empathy with too little management, we're out of control. Other people can get hurt, and we are prone to trauma, depression, and anxiety.

 

If you have high levels of empathy, especially emotional empathy, and you develop the courage, calm, and skill to manage it, you have the raw material to become a great coach.

 

In addition to managing yourself, learn manage your environment so you can be at your very best. Develop your courage to set boundaries, your calm with self-care, and your skill at getting your needs met.

 

A great coach can help clients develop and manage their empathy.

 

The upcoming course on Values, Needs, and Strengths (the three most important subjects in coaching); will help you develop and manage those skills and abilities.

 

But get started with the FREE Become a Coach eBook:

 

Get a free Become a Coach eBook here.

 

 

PS: I still love horses.

 

Topics: become a life coach, Master Certified Coach, coaching schools, coaching skills, coaching call, Strengths, Needs, Values, setting boundaries, highly sensitive, self care, Empaths, empathy

Why There Are No Mother-In-Laws In Coaching

Posted by Julia Stewart

There are no mother-in-laws in coaching

The phrase, "There are no mother-in-laws in coaching", could help you avoid common coaching mistakes.

Read on to learn tools that will keep you out trouble, make your coaching sessions easier, and provide much greater value to your coaching clients...

Every coach gets requests for coaching on topics such as these:

  • How can I get my boss to stop yelling at me?
  • How can I get my kids to argue less?
  • How can I get my husband to stop placating his meddling mother?

 

The wording of the request and the relationship/s involved may vary but the request is basically the same:

 

Please coach me to make someone else different.

 

What's the problem with this coaching topic?

 

You can't coach anyone but your client.

 

And within that problem also lies the solution: The simplest response is to empathize but tell your client you can't coach anyone but them. That said, if they want, you can coach them to manage these and other conflicts more effectively so they are less of a problem for them. Sometimes when the client changes their own behavior the other people change as well because we all fit our environments like keys fit locks. If you change one, the other has to change or the locks won't work anymore.

By the way, the lock and key metaphor works more often than the explanation that people we don't like are our mirror images. According to the mirror-image theory, things we don't like about others are really what we don't like about ourselves. This is often true but not always and it can put undue responsibility on someone who may genuinely be victimized and doesn't have the power to change the other. Never make your client responsible for other people's behavior. And never coach them to get somebody else to change. That tends to backfire. We can only change ourselves. If others change too, that's a bonus.

 

So how can you coach a client who's having issues with someone else?

 

As always, ask more than you tell. For example:
  • How would you like it to be?
  • When have you resolved a situation like this before?
  • What could you do differently next time?
  • How can you take care of yourself going forward?

But do share some reframes such as:
  • Other people's reactions are always about them, not you.
  • Everybody's doing the best they can even when we're sure they aren't.
  • We become who we hang out with.
  • We can only take care of our own stuff.

 

Do offer a tool or two. Here's something interesting. The Karpman Drama Triangle offers a simple way to look at conflict. In every conflict those involved are all playing one of three roles (often all three): The Persecutor (It's all your fault!) The Victim {Poor me!) The Rescuer (Let me help you.) Ask your client which role they've been playing. Hint: Almost everybody thinks they are the Victim. And f they've been playing the Rescuer, they've probably been making it worse, not better.

To help them get out of the triangle, mention The Empowerment Dynamic. The Persecutor becomes the Challenger. The Rescuer becomes the Coach. The Victim becomes the Creator. Whichever role your client has been playing, ask them how they could take on the empowered version of that role.



Coach vs. Rescuer: Be sure you're always being the coach, not the rescuer. Your client never needs to be rescued.

 

Some persecutors are more difficult than others. As much as 10% of society is made up of people who are called High Conflict Personalities (HCPs). They tend to seek out people to blame and torment. If your client is dealing with an HCP, they may benefit from therapy, but the following book can be a great resource: The Five Types of People Who Can Ruin Your Life by Bill Eddy.  I recommended it to someone recently who'd been having trouble with her boss for years. After reading it she said dealing with her boss is now a piece of cake!

In short, everybody has conflicts and your clients will want your help with theirs. Don't rescue them and don't coach them to change others. Do coach them to alter how they show up with those others, because you can't coach their boss, their kids, their spouse, or their mother-in-law!

Want to upgrade your coaching skills and get ready to coach whatever your clients ask? Check out the Certified Competent Coach Course. In eight weeks, you'll upgrade your skills, get all your questions answered and get certified. Download the Fact Sheet below:

 

Get the Certified Competent Coach Fact Sheet

Topics: coaching skills, certified competent coach

Coaching vs. Consulting: What's the Difference?

Posted by Julia Stewart

Business Coach If you're a business consultant, then you may be wondering if you should get some coaching skills.

Or you may wonder if you're already coaching, now. Many people wonder what the difference between business consulting and business coaching really is.

The truth is, the difference depends on the coach, or the consultant. Both professions are about as varied as the individuals who call themselves coaches and consultants. Here are some differences, from my point of view...

1. Coaches ask more than they tell. Savvy consultants also ask a lot of questions, but they usually are in the "information gathering" mode. A good coach is just naturally curious. This is one of the reasons coaching is so effective. Even though your client hired you for your expertise, they will probably feel uncomfortable sharing their (or their business') problems and weaknesses with you. Chances are, they'll cover up what's really going on. But the same client will open up with a coach who is naturally curious.

2. A Consultant's expertise is usually the main thing they share with clients. Coaches have expertise too, but it's usually the last thing they share. That's not to say that expertise isn't important. Sometimes it's the thing the client most needs. By following their curiosity and the curiosity of their clients, coaches find out what's really going on and what the client really wants. Then they can share expertise in a customized and targeted manner, providing exactly what the client needs, when they need it.

3. Consultants often do a lot of measuring and testing. They then have metrics to share and specific recommendations about what to do. A coach may administer assessments, but they are less about the raw data and more about the meaning behind the data. Sometimes what a client really needs is the hard data. That's when they need a consultant. Other times a client needs to get clear about where they really want to go and what they really value. If that's the case, the data may be extraneous and they are better off with a coach.

4. Consulting is mostly a "left-brained" activity. It's about taking linear steps toward a specific goal. Coaching is predominately "right-brained". It's about growth and evolution. That said, consultants and coaches, use both sides of their brains!

5. Consultants usually offer training to their clients. So do coaches.

6. The truth is, most consultants do a little coaching and most coaches do some consulting. Both professions require practice to master. Good training can speed that up.

If you're a consultant and want to add coaching skills to your business, the Certified Competent Coach Course is perfect for you. Learn more...

Become a Certified Competent Coach

Topics: business coach, Coaching, coach training, coaching clients, business consultant, coaching skills, consulting

Top Ten Reasons to Become a Certified Group Coach

Posted by Julia Stewart

Become a Certified Group CoachYou've probably heard that group coaching is a must-have for your coaching business, but you may never have thought about becoming a Certified Group Coach.

In my opinion, you don't have to offer group coaching, but if you're ready to branch out from just one-to-one coaching clients, group coaching is the next logical place to go. Yes, information products are great, but dollar for dollar and hour for hour, you'll make more from group coaching, especially if you don't already have a mailing list of thousands.

There are probably hundreds of good reasons to add group coaching to your business, but I've highlighted ten from my own experience below, just to give you an idea.

Group coaching is an advanced skill set, combining many of the skills of one-to-one coaching with group facilitation and more. I thought it would be easy for me, because I was a very good one-to-one coach with 15 years of experience as a college professor. In the beginning, it was a lot harder than I thought! But if you think group coaching is something you want to learn more about and if you'd like to become a Certified Group Coach, skip to the bottom of this blog post and check out an upcoming opportunity.

Top Ten Reasons to Become a Certified Group Coach:

1. Make more money

In 2003, my first coaching groups were focused on a hot new certification from the IAC, which used Thomas Leonard's Proficiencies. I was teaching the Proficiencies at the time, so offering a mentor group to help coaches master them, was a natural for me. I filled my first group up with 10 people and had to open a second one quickly, because even more people wanted to join. It kicked up my income very nicely, even though the groups themselves were a bargain to join.

2. Charge less to your clients

As I said, I charged bargain fees to my clients for those first groups, only $75 per month, per person. But with 20 new clients, that was $1,500 more income per month and about $250 per contact hour. Nice pay ~ and very affordable for my clients! Actually, you can charge much more for group coaching, depending on your market. Generally, groups meet for three to six hours per month, with group sizes ranging from 3 to 10 clients. And most coaching groups cost $150 to $350 per month, per person. Do the math. Group coaching saves money for the client and makes more money for you.

3. Grow your fan base faster

I mentioned your email marketing list earlier, because your True Fans are a vitally important element in your coaching success. Building that list with just one-to-one clients can be murder. Coaching groups with 3 to 10 members each, will help you build that list 3 to 10 times faster.

It's an incredible amount of work to design ebooks, white papers and other information products to attract new people to your list, but coaching is customized in the moment, so there is far less upfront work, while far more value is delivered - and at a higher price that clients gladly pay. People simply view in-person, customized service as more valuable than pre-designed, canned content - because it's far more effective.

Contrary to what you may have heard, coaching clients don't need to buy cheap products from you before they hire you to be their coach. For most of them, you being a credible coach who is in the right place at the right time, with an appealing specialty or niche, is all it takes.

4. Give more value to your clients

Here's where it gets interesting: your group clients will actually get a lot more value from each other than they would from you alone, so a group of ten will multiply value by ten. Why? Groups are organized around commonalities between the members of the group and their mutual goals. So guess what? They have experiences, know-how and resources that you don't have and they tend to share them generously - so long as you know how to set up a bonded  synchronous group, which is one of those advanced skill sets I mentioned.

5. Upsell to one-to-one coaching

It's natural to balance group coaching with one-to-one coaching, because sometimes your clients need you to drill down deeper with an issue than you have time for during the group meeting. This is an important value add for your clients, which gives them the benefits of one-to-one coaching plus group coaching. You can easily add an option for each group member to have one or two individual coaching sessions per month with you and of course, you can charge extra for that.

6. Increase your credibility

As you become known for certain specialties or niches in your coaching groups, you'll become known for those specialties and niches in all your coaching. Once I offered the Get Certified Coaching Groups, which I mentioned above, I became known as a mentor coach who helps coaches get certified. This became an important part of my one-to-one coaching practice for several years, as well - until I leveraged my reputation and what I had learned to start School of Coaching Mastery. You see, over the years, I became an expert on this type of coaching and potential clients saw me as someone they wanted to work with on this. In other words, I developed the credibility to do well with this niche and specialty.

Back then, there was very little training in group coaching, so I had to teach myself and it took years of trial and error. There were no group coaching certifications, but if there had been, I'd have gotten one. Credibility is everything when you're in business for yourself.

7. Decrease your work hours

You can work day and night on a membership site, on information products and live events - or you can just coach. Group coaching pays you even more per hour than one-to-one coaching, so if a short work week is a goal for you, then group coaching needs to be a specialty of yours.

8. Add additional income streams

As you organize your coaching groups, you'll find yourself writing more, because it'll be an easy way to communicate with groups. The nice thing about that is that once you've written something, it can be re-purposed.

Remember how I mentioned that it's a lot of work creating information products? If you've already created something for a high-paying coaching group, you've been well-paid for your time. If you take that written piece and sell it as a free-standing product at a lower price, whatever you make from it will be profit. That's the easier, more profitable way to do it.

Also, working with groups of people will give you a good idea what kinds of solutions they're looking for. That may spark great ideas when you're ready to do live events or create products.

9. Upsell from information products

Remember how I said that clients don't have to try inexpensive products from you in order to be willing to hire you to coach them? Well that's true. And sometimes you'll attract people who were just looking for that inexpensive ebook that tells them how to do something, but upon reading it they'll realize what they really want is a coach. If you have both group coaching and one-to-one coaching options, you'll be able to reach more people in exactly the format they want.

10. Learn where your next opportunities are

Just as I mentioned in #8 above, working intensively with clients will give you ideas about what they really want and need next - even when they, themselves, can't tell you what that is. So group coaching is perhaps the most valuable form of R&D possible, because you get to know your coaching clients inside and out. For me, that took me from coach, to mentor coach, to founding my own coaching school. I knew what my clients wanted and needed because I had gotten to know them so well.

Where will group coaching take you and your business? Where ever it is, you'll get there much faster if you don't have to learn it all from the ground up. That's why we're offering the 8-hour Master Group Coaching Success module, which ends with a Group Coaching Certificate. You'll learn how to organize, market and facilitate successful coaching groups in these live tele-webinars, which come with written materials and more.

Want to become a Certified Group Coach? Take Master Group Coaching Success, described above, and then join the upcoming Certified Group Coach Mentor Group. I'll personally mentor you as you learn to lead your own groups and get started with your very first group. You must attend both the learning module and the mentor group in order to become a Certified Group Coach.

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Topics: group coaching, coaching clients, Become a Master Coach, becoming a certified coach, Coach Certification, Thomas Leonard, Become a Certified Coach, coaching skills, IAC, Coaching Certificate, True Fans

How to Become a Successful Life or Business Coach

Posted by Julia Stewart


How to Become a Life CoachWondering how you can become a successful life or business coach?

There are three main approaches to becoming a successful business or life coach. The first, I call the Entrepreneurial Coach. The second, is the Professional Coach. The last is the Sweet Spot. Let me explain:

1. The Entrepreneurial Coach* usually has a strong business, marketing and sales background and either a juicy niche or a smoking hot specialty. This coach knows how to attract the right clients and how to encourage them to buy. However, if s/he over relies on her business smarts, s/he can get caught on the hamster wheel of constantly having to market and sell, in order to keep his/her coaching roster full.

Why? Unless clients experience fantastic results quickly, or at least maintain their motivation long enough to experience extraordinary results, they tend to drop out of coaching within a few months. That means the entrepreneur coach has to constantly close new sales just to maintain a good income. For most coaches, this is exhausting and unsatisfying.

Worse yet, if clients quit before they're delighted, the entrepreneur won't maximize their number of all-important testimonials, case studies and viral buzz - the stuff that makes for a friction-free marketing and sales engine.

2. The Professional Coach*, on the other hand, has great coaching skills, either from decades of coaching or from a few years of coach-specific training. S/he knows how to elicit amazing results for his/her clients and as a result, clients stay month after month, or buy again and again. However, s/he may know little about effective marketing and sales strategies and as a result, too few clients ever sign up in the first place. That means too few potential clients ever find out about the professional coach, so s/he's constantly searching for that rare client who's willing to pay his/her fees.

Sadly, this coach may have spectacular results to point to, but often fails to share them with potential clients, who increasingly, are looking for 'proof' that their coach really knows what s/he's doing.

* In both cases above, the coach is forced into a situation where s/he needs his/her clients. The entrepreneur always needs new ones. The professional needs to hang onto the ones s/he has. Otherwise, both risk losing their incomes. When you need your clients, your focus is on yourself, instead of on helping them. To reach the coaching sweet spot, your needs must be met, so you can focus all your energy on helping your clients get those awesome results. Otherwise, something's got to give. It's way harder to maintain a sustainable coaching business when you have to focus on your own needs instead of clients' needs.

However, there are some entrepreneur coaches who really are good at coaching and most of their clients are quite happy and loyal. And there are professional coaches who get it when it comes to marketing and sales, so they're not desperate to get and keep clients. These exceptional coaches are moving into the Sweet Spot.

3. The Sweet Spot: This is the coach who has the skill to produce awesome results quickly and to keep producing results for months or even years. That keeps current clients wanting more and paying for it happily. At the same time, this coach has his/her marketing message down cold, has expertise that new people will buy and knows how to communicate and form client relationships (a.k.a. marketing and sales). Of course, those ever important testimonials, case studies and viral buzz come easily to this coach.

When you reach the sweet spot, you aren't desperate to make new sales and you don't cling to your old clients, trying to squeeze out a few more more dollars. You naturally meet your own needs and you can focus all your energy on meeting your clients' needs and helping them get what they want. Happy clients attract more happy clients.

I call this coach The Master. Everything we do at School of Coaching Mastery is designed to move our coaching students into the sweet spot by helping them become masters, faster.

Marketing programs help entrepreneurs communicate and sell to clients, but are useless when it comes to the critical skill of getting coaching results and keeping clients.

And most coaching schools will only get you started on becoming a professional coach - who may never get clients. At SCM, we give away that part of our program for free and focus our real attention on helping our paid members become masters and enjoy that sweet spot, sooner.

Turn your five-figure business into a six-figure coaching business and turn your six-figure business into a seven-figure coaching business: Become a Master Coach.

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Topics: professional coach, become a life coach, become a coach, become a business coach, coaching clients, Become a Master Coach, master coach, coaching skills, coaching niche

Coaching with Fridges

Posted by Julia Stewart

Coaching refridgeratorGuest post by David Papini.

Last week, while I was coaching a buddy coach around the issue of “being afraid of making mistakes -> becoming anxious -> eating snacks” (loop endlessly), the association between errors and snacks (added with the fact that due to different time zones it was 8.30 pm and I was hungry) popped in my mind in the form of a clear image of my fridge, with magnets on it.

The vision narrowed to one magnet, reading as follows: “Always make new mistakes. - Ester Dyson"

I shared the image with my client and that allowed us to make a shift about the topic. We started discussing the fact that he could become very competitive in making more errors than everybody else, joking about that. And anxiety was gone.

So the magnet vision proved to be a good tool to re-frame  the problem and at the same time offer a structure to help the client in dealing with performance and anxiety issues.

After the session, thankful to the magnet, I gave a closer look to my fridge door.

That magnet has been there for five years and I meet it every morning, but it was the first time it became handy in a coaching session. I started looking at it as one of my professional coaching tools and a source of daily personal awareness. This put the whole bunch of magnets in a new light; I stared at the magnets with more respect.

Below is my magnet list:

  • “Some People walk in the rain, others just get wet - Roger Miller
  • “Always make new mistakes - Ester Dyson”
  • “What would you attempt to do if you knew you could not fail? - anonymous”
  • “Passion is the only way a man learn to create” (written with poetry magnets by myself)
  • A picture of my children, Alice and Francesco
  • Four magnets about New York
  • A small wooden heart with written “Mi manchi” (I miss you, in Italian)
  • One magnet with two white kittens

I let my magnets coach me and this is what each of them told me:

  • You can choose how you feel about everything. There are no problems in nature, just events
  • To create you need errors, to be happy and growing you need new ones every day. Dare!
  • Free your vision, don’t limit your options (at least in thinking and feeling)
  • To learn, you need emotions: connect with what you feel, the rest will follow
  • Your future is here and it has your children’s eyes
  • You are the places you love
  • Relationship is a dance between similarity and difference, presence and absence
  • Sometimes a magnet it’s just a magnet: use it to keep notes attached where you can see them

Back to the session, because the magnet citation was useful and helped us in making a shift, I told myself “that works, I could reuse this sentence [i.e. “always make new errors”] or even I can reuse the whole trick (magnet plus fridge image)”.

On a second thought I realized that “reusing it” is good for consulting or teaching, not for coaching, because what made the image powerful and effective was the fact that it popped during the coaching relationship. Effectiveness was related to that moment with that client. Moreover, as this blog post demonstrates, the image was powerful to the client and to the coach as well, so the right use for an effective image that helped in a session is honoring it, deepening the reflection on oneself as a coach; more than reusing it in another session or with another client.

In this sense and in my opinion, every coaching session is always a unique piece; it cannot be serialized. Do not bring your fridge programmatically to a coaching session: as it happens with hunger, thirst and the like, if you stay present in the session, it will show up when needed and that will be effective and artful coaching.

David was born in Florence in 1966 just a few months before the deluge, and that's a kind of destiny. As an executive is in charge for general management in a IT Firm, as a certified NLP counselor helps clients to explore their life experience, as a Coach helps clients getting what they really want , as a conflict mediator witnesses how tough and creative a relationship can be, as a trainer helps trainees in stretching their brain, growing and learning, as a public speaker enjoys co-creating experience on the fly, as a dad loves his two children. As a man he is grateful and worried that he’s got this wonderful life. And he’s fond of categorizing his professional roles :-). More about him at http://papini.typepad.com/lifehike/

Best Coaching blogs 2011

 

David's blog is entered in Best Coaching Blogs 2011. Check it out and vote for your favorite blogs while you're there.

Topics: life coach, Coaching, Life Coach Blog, Best Coaching Blogs, blog, contest, coaching skills

Ten Secrets to Finding Your First Coaching Clients Part 2

Posted by Julia Stewart

Happy coaches

Yesterday I wrote about the first five secrets to filling your coaching business with ease.

I recommend reading Part 1 first, but in a nutshell the first five secrets are: 1. Develop crystal clear goals, 2. Simplify everything, 3. Make sure all stake holders are on the same page, 4. Get the money handled, and 5. Tell everybody what you're up to. Let's get on with the last five:

6. Nix the Negative Nancies. Some people don't see the value of coaching. Worse, some people may not see the value in you. If you're surrounded by people who say things like, 'Why would anybody pay you for that?', they could stop you from succeeding. Seek out people who believe in you. Spend time with those who 'get' why coaching is such an amazing service (That's one of the hidden values of a good coaching school, by the way.). If the Negative Nancies in your life start to shift just by being around your inspired energy, or by you fully communicating what you're up to, great. But if they can't, you need to shield yourself from that doubtful energy. It's okay to simplify your life by not spending so much time with them.

7. Stay in motion - focused motion. Just because you trust the process, doesn't mean you aren't actively creating what you want. In fact, that's exactly what trusting the process does mean! Develop a plan for attracting your full practice. I've seen the Coach 100 process work for hundreds of coaches. You literally give away 100 coaching sessions to 100 different people and in the process, learn to fill your coaching practice. It works.

8. Coach a lot of people for free. Whether you call it Coach 100 or something else, you need to get a lot of experience as quickly as you can. Coaching lots of different people works much better than coaching one person 100 times. Be adventurous. Offer to coach that person you chatted with at Starbucks. Ask your friends to refer their friends to you. Share your big goal with people and they will want to help you, just like people help all those reality show contestants that you may watch. Everybody loves to get on board with an exciting big goal. Yours included.

9. Learn to notice when somebody wants to work with you. This is such an important skill! New coaches leave money on the table all the time, because they don't notice when someone is interested in working with them. Most clients need to be invited. You need to notice when someone wants to be invited to be your client.

10. Get your own coach. As a coach, you know tips are helpful, but customized conversations are transformative. What's more, a coach with integrity who doesn't have a coach, is likely to feel like a fraud. A good mentor coach will more than pay you back many times by helping you be more successful faster.

If you're a new coach, what are your challenges in building your business? Is the info in any of the tips above helpful?

If you're a veteran coach (or at least have your first client), please share what worked best for you, in the comments section below.

Coach 100I'm probably biased, but the Coach 100 Business Success program is a great value and it really works. Check out Coach 100 here.

Topics: coaching business, Coach 100, coaching clients, Coaching 100, coaching skills

Ten Secrets to Finding Your First Coaching Clients Part 1

Posted by Julia Stewart

 coach chasing client A major right of passage for any professional coach is getting your very first paid coaching client.

Some coaches feel a little anxious until they get their first client, especially if it doesn't happen quickly. But it doesn't have to be that way. My first client volunteered to work with me. In so doing, he inspired me to attract several new clients in my first year of coaching by following the following simple rules. It can be this easy for you, too. These principles can help you stop chasing and let your clients find you, instead.

Your 1st steps are really about setting the foundation for your coaching success. It's almost impossible to show up as a great coach if doubt, fear and anxiety are causing you to feel a little desperate. Here are several things you can do to make the whole process easy as silk and still maintain your enthusiasm.

1. Develop crystal clear goals. Both short term and long term goals need to be clarified. And you might be interested to know that according to the Wall Street Journal, the single variable that is most likely to predict how profitable a business will be is how big the original goal was. Just be sure you have a plan and can see how you will fulfill your really big goals. In the meantime, have smaller, doable goals, so you know you're on track. My 1st year goal for my coaching business was to break even each month, so that my coaching income at least equaled what I was paying for coach training and for my mentor coach. I achieved it. My 2nd year goal was to pay myself back for everything I had invested upfront in my coaching business, so I could make a genuine profit. I achieved that too. By the beginning of my 3rd year, I had a full coaching practice and what I was earning was virtually all profit. Sane goals like these will keep you on track while you're creating the business of your dreams.

2. Simplify everything, including your life and your business. Relationships, jobs, family, volunteer work, etc. can all derail your business plans, if you're not careful. Beware the 'Super Coach' mentality that says you just have to do it all. Nobody can do it all. Since in the beginning, filling your coaching business takes more energy than merely keeping it full, and since early on is when your coach marketing skills are likely at their weakest, plan on putting in lots of hours and energy into your business at least for the first year or two until it's full, with a waiting list, and you have a reliable marketing engine. That may mean learning to say, 'No', a lot more often. Resign from demanding volunteer positions. Explain to the kids that you may miss a soccer game or two. Delegate at work. If coaching is your calling, you owe it to yourself and the world to clear the decks to get your business set up successfully.

3. Make sure all stake holders are on the same page. Speaking of family, friends, etc. Guilt can make building your coaching business more challenging. But your loved ones can also assist you and make it easier. Rather than feel bad that you're not doing as much for everyone else, use your coaching skills to fully communicate what you're really up to. When you share your inspiration and how much this means to you with them, the people who care most about you will whole-heartedly join your team and they may even help you find clients. This is different than trying to convince someone of the value of coaching, by the way. See #6 in tomorrow's post.

4. Get the money handled. When you know you have enough money coming in already, you can afford to trust the process of attracting clients. Starting a business is not like starting a new job. You won't get a paycheck in two weeks. But your time investment will payoff handsomely, if you go the distance. This is a good time to simplify your financial life, along with everything else. Reduce debts by negotiating for lower interest rates. Stop paying for things you aren't using. If you're not confident you have enough money coming in already, consider getting a part-time job. Some of the most successful coaches I've known took service jobs before they became successful. That way, they could focus on what they wanted to create instead of worrying about the money.

5. Tell everybody what you're up to. This is technically known as marketing, a.k.a. telling people how you can help. In your first year of coaching, even if your coaching skills aren't fully honed, yet, share your excitement and inspiration about coaching with pretty much everybody. Don't be attached to getting them to understand coaching the way you do. They probably won't. Do share your energy. That's naturally attractive and even contagious. My first client volunteered to work with me (and paid me) because I shared my excitement with him about what coaching can do. That's all it took! And he continued coaching with me for 7 years. You don't  need to convince people that you can help them. Convincing never works. See below.

Come back tomorrow for the last five secrets of finding your first coaching clients.

Are the first five secrets helpful to you? Do you have secrets of your own to share with other coaches? Please post them in the comments section.

Coach 100 eBook

 

Download the free Coach 100 eBook for more ideas on how to find your first coaching clients.

Topics: coaching business, Coaching, Coach 100, coaching clients, Free, coaching skills

Master Coach Demos

Posted by Julia Stewart

Master Coach DemosWe've been working on a new digital product for coaches called, Master Coach Demos.

The idea is to let you listen in on coaching sessions with various certified coaches (probably all IAC Certified Coaches) and hear how they demonstrate masterful coaching skills. It could be priceless value for coaches who want to be the very best and have limited time or money to spend.

Here's my conundrum. The more I think about it, the more I want to do with this project. It started out as a CD or MP3 download product, but I'm not sure that would do it justice. I want it to be valuable to coaches and also  come in the format/s they need. It can't be all things to all people, but it can be optimal for most people.

I have a sample recording below that you can listen to, right now. It's uncut. As you listen, notice what you learn - and what you need to learn more from it.  Ask for what you need in the comments area, below. I'll be happy to answer your questions, so other coaches can learn from it, too.

Here are some potential ideas for Master Coach Demos:

  • Include full-length masterful coaching sessions with commentary on what's working and why
  • Include short coaching snippets of coaching that zero in on specific coaching skills and situations for fast, targeted learning
  • Verbal and/or written explanation of what's working (and maybe what isn't)
  • Interviews with the coaches, themselves, and maybe even with the clients, to hear what they experienced in the session, or as a result of it
  • Monthly or weekly updates/installments
  • Perhaps a membership site
  • Video?
  • Podcasts?
  • Hmmm...

I could use your help...

Would this product be helpful to you? What would you use it for? (Prep for certification; use it to help you with specific client situations; 'on the fly' learning when you're at the gym or driving your car; etc...)

What format would you prefer? (Monthly membership; one-payment digital product; interactive membership for questions and support; etc...)

As a Thank-you, I'm including this one-hour coaching session for you to listen to right here. It's me coaching a celebrity client. Yes, I hesitate to call my own coaching session a 'Master Coach Demo', because it could always be improved. As I tell my students, 'Even if I screw up, it's a great learning opportunity for you to catch it and learn why something worked or didn't work.'

This recording is uncut. And I'm not offering commentary right here - yet. I'd love for you to listen and ask what you want/need to know in the 'Comments' section. That'll help me understand the precise way to deliver a session like this to you for faster/deeper learning.

Listen now:

Topics: Coaching, School of Coaching Mastery, coach, certified coaches, Master Coach Demos, Masterful Coaching, masterful coaches, coaching skills, IAC

Coaching for Non-Coaches: Career Czar Podcast

Posted by Julia Stewart

Career CzarIf you are interested in coaching, but don't want to become a "coachpreneur", the world has caught up with you.

You don't have to call yourself a coach in order to get paid to have transformative conversations, anymore. People in all kinds of professions and industries, from education, to healthcare, to the travel industry, are bringing coaching skills to work with them.

Can you imagine a world where everyone gets coached everyday, at work or at school? I can and I'm liking it!

This is one way you can increase your employ-ability and your promot-ability and love your job more. 

I had a chance to talk with Paul Bruno, the Career Czar(R), about coaching for non-coaches in his weekly alltalkradio.net show.  This short show will give you a few things to think about, as far as becoming a "a coach who doesn't call yourself a coach".

And if you think now is a good time to beef up your coaching skills and your resume, check out our Coach Launch program. It's designed for non-coaches who want to coach. 


Topics: Coaching, Career, coaching skills, coachpreneur, transformative conversations

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