Coaching Blog

3 Major Upgrades You Must Make to Become a Group Coach

Posted by Julia Stewart

Group CoachingIf you want to become a group coach and enjoy smooth sailing, you need to make three major upgrades, first. Make these three important upgrades and you and your clients will experience the power of groups and coaching success - and you'll be a happy coach.

Why would you want to become a group coach, anyway? Most coaches offer a variety of services within their businesses and group coaching is often the first additional service, beyond one-to-one coaching, that they add, because it allows them to leverage their time, offer a lower-priced option, while making more money. And clients may get even more value from a coaching group, than from personal coaching, so it's a win-win all around.

Here are the 3 Major Upgrades You Need to Make to Become a Successful Group Coach:

Upgrade #1: Your coaching skills. Ten years ago, when I first became a group coach, I thought group coaching would be easy for me to add to my business, because I had been facilitating groups for decades as a college professor. And although my first foray into group coaching was so successful that I had to immediately add a second group to make room for all my clients, I found that coaching a group is much more challenging than I had expected.

Many group coaches make the mistake of leading a workshop or teleclass, instead of coaching a group and they miss the opportunity to customize the experience for each group member. I knew the distinction, but had to learn the hard way how to run a genuine coaching group. It's not as easy as it looks.

Let's face it, most workshops and teleclasses sell for far less money than group coaching; some are even free. If you're going to charge the average group coaching fee of $200 per month, per person, for 4-8 people to coach with you 3-4 hours per month, you need to provide far more value and personalization for each member than you would in a workshop or teleclass. Learn these advanced skills and hit the ground running with your very first group.

Upgrade #2: Your marketing. Lead great coaching groups and you'll have 4-8 times as many happy clients raving about you and your coaching. That's the good news. Filling groups has its own set of challenges. You'll need to reach more people who want to work with you in a group and they need to be able to meet at the same time each week. One common frustration to filling coaching groups is that you'll sometimes attract people who really want to join your group, but can't meet at the same time. This means you need to get really smart about attracting the right people, so you always have a group of eager potential clients with whom to fill your coaching groups - and you need to get smart about scheduling them.

Will you attract group coaching clients with an amazing blog that's optimized for search engines? Or maybe you should attract them by becoming a networking whiz. Or maybe your speaking skills will attract coaching groups to you. Be extra smart: develop multiple ways for clients to find you.

Upgrade #3: Business Administration. Once you start coaching groups, you need to expand your administrative tools and practices. Even getting paid gets dizzyingly complicated if you don't have a great system in place. Get an online payment gateway to manage your clients' payments. Get an email system to keep them up-to-date (and also use it for marketing). Get a virtual assistant if you're not tech savvy (or don't want to be). You'll also need an upgraded approach to scheduling. It's much harder to get 8 people together at the same time than just two.

If you'd like to learn more about coaching groups, sign up for the upcoming Q&A: How to Coach Groups class coming up in two weeks. If you're really serious, take our Group Coaching Mastery course or join the Become a Certified Group Coach program. (Your 'How to Coach Groups' fee can be applied to the course and program if you decide to join them later.)

Register for How to Coach Groups

Topics: group coaching, mentor coach, becoming a certified coach, How to Become a Certified Coach, How to, teleclass

What is Coaching Success?

Posted by Julia Stewart

Coaching Success Kit You could say that all coaches are in the business of success.

Our clients hire us to help them succeed at big goals, life dreams and personal growth. Good coaches know they transform their client's lives, so it's only natural that every coach wants to feel successful with their own goals and dreams.

Just like our clients, we coaches have our own personal definitions of success.

My definition of success is that I get to be my best self, doing work that I love, that is changing the world for the better. Oh yeah, and I get paid for that! I know I'm succeeding when I'm lit up daily and having fun most of the time.

To reach this level of success, I had to learn and relearn my vision of myself and how the world works. I then had to practice thousands of hours to master this new way of seeing, being, and doing. Along the way, I had to craft a business that would support me while I spread this thing called 'coaching' that seems to change everything.

How do you define coaching success for yourself?

If you could use some help with your definition, I've put together our top 3 most popular ebooks into one free 'Coaching Success Kit':

  • It starts with 'Become a Coach!', an ebook designed to help the new coach get started in this booming industry and it includes 8 hours of recorded coach training, plus a side-by-side comparison of some of the top coach training schools.
  • Next, there's the Coach 100 Business Success ebook, with tools to get you started with one of the most effective processes for filling a coaching practice EVER (while becoming a masterful coach, at the same time).
  • Finally, there's the Seven Secrets of Mastery Certification ebook, with tools and tips on how to inspire yourself and achieve an elite coach certification. It includes a quiz that will help you determine, once and for all, whether you even need to get certified. 

If you know how to coach masterfully and you know how to fill your practice with clients, then you have what you need to achieve coaching success, however you define it.

Coach Michael Jay Sullivan left this unsolicited comment about the Coaching Success Kit on Facebook last week:

"It's amazing how transformative for me Julia's free Coaching Stuff in a box has been. Better than some of the paid training I've gotten." 

I love unsolicited testimonials; they are usually the most honest!

Get your Coaching Success Kit

 

Get your free Coaching Success Kit here.

By the way, please tell us how YOU define coaching success, in the 'comments' section, below.

Topics: coaching business, become a coach, Coach 100, coaching success, Facebook, Coach Certification, How to Become a Certified Coach, Become a Masterful Coach, how to become a certified life coach, coach training schools

Master What Coach Certifiers Are Looking For

Posted by Julia Stewart

IAC Coaching Masteries

Harvard is studying us.
The CEO of Google is bragging about us.
Even the Wall Street Journal has great things to say about coaching.

Guess what? The ‘wild west' days of coaching are over.

Cliches about coaching that held true ten years ago, like that  coaches really don't need to be certified, aren't holding up like they used to.

Our surveys show that about 70% of coaches want coach certification, not because they're insecure, but just because it feels right to them. And since other surveys find that untrained, uncertified coaches are less likely to succeed, that intuition is well founded.

But coaches are busy with their businesses, so actually getting certified gets shoved to the back burner. It's a Catch 22. 

So we're giving you a one-time-only reason to pay close attention and get certified, right now: Starting November 16th, three certifiers (Natalie Tucker Miller, IAC-CC, Elizabeth Nofziger, IAC-CC, and Julia Stewart, IAC-CC)* are getting together for an eight hour course to teach you in detail what you need to pass certification. We've rolled it into three packages, so if you need a refresher course, first, you'll get that, and if you're ready to record your coaching sessions, you can get that too and save money.

2010 could be the year that you put those coveted letters after your name. 

Click below to find out more and choose the package that fits your needs best. Or call 877-224-2780 to ask about further customization to help you get certified. 

*We'll be working with the IAC Coaching MasteriesTM. We were the first coach training company in the world to be licensed to teach them and collectively, we've taught mentored or certified most of today's IAC Certified Coaches. In fact, Natalie and Elizabeth are current IAC Certifiers. But we are representing School of Coaching Mastery in this course, not the IAC, itself. 

If you'd like to hear a recording that will give you a taste of the learning you'll get from this value-packed course, the three of us  just did a call for the IAC North American Virtual Chapter and you'll immediately get a copy of that recording for joining, which is free.  

Certified Coach

Go here for more info about Certified Coach: Master What the Certifiers Are Looking For 

Topics: How to Become a Certified Coach, IAC, certified coach

New IAC Certified Coach Tells How She Did It

Posted by Julia Stewart

Jan O'Brien, IAC-CCJan O'Brien, IAC-CC, is the latest coach that we have helped get certified.

I talked to Jan by phone yesterday, because I knew our readers would be curious about how she did it and what it was like. Jan is one of the 25% of coaches whose applications are passed by the IAC Certifiers. She's also one of an even smaller number of coaches who pass on the first try. I wasn't surprised to hear that, because Jan is a wonderful coach. And as I said in our interview, it's a big accomplishment and now she's a member of 'the club'!

What follows are a few excerpts from our conversation and then the entire 23-minute recording, so you can listen in. There also is a link at the bottom to a new SCM program called, Certified Coach: Master What the Certifiers Are Looking For.

Disclaimer: Jan says some extremely nice things about School of Coaching Mastery  and of course, she was saying them to the owner of the school, so take it with a grain of salt if you like, but I believed her. ;-)

On what it means to her to be an IAC Certified Coach now: ‘Profound meaning to me. Professionally that makes a big difference in the coaching business. I'm an IAC-CC and it's wonderful to put that after my name. But knowing that I stayed with it that. I was committed and it was what I really wanted and I'm absolutely passionate about it!'

Her background and how she got into coaching: ‘I'm an intercultural trainer and consultant, cultural orientation training. Originally I'm from the UK and am now living in Houston, Texas. I came into coaching via my coach who is a totally astounding and wonderful coach, called Mattison Grey. I just was so impressed and so assisted by being coached. I thought, Wow this might be a really amazing job to do!'

On what she learned while preparing for certification: ‘I found that going through your certification course was, my experience of person development, was very profound, more than I could have imagined. It seemed to get deeper and deeper and deeper. And that's my own experience...I want to do that, anyway. It also put me on the fast track for that personal development. So that's a very significant piece for me.

I found the instruction to be absolutely excellent, classes with you and Natalie. They were very well facilitated and you both held us in the highest respect even when we were struggling. And it's not easy! There was so much more to this!

I had to hold onto the stair rails very tightly at times. And it was through those challenging times that I so appreciated everybody, the instructors as well as the other people in the class.'

On IAC grading: ‘Challenging. Very high standards. You don't get away with anything, and not that I was trying to get away with anything, but even the masteries I thought I had really gotten well in the recordings. Everything is thoroughly sliced and diced and of course also very honoring...That was little surprising only because I didn't know what to expect.'

Advice for coaches who want to get certified: ‘The practicums are extremely helpful in getting the feedback you need. In addition...I personally have been working with a group of wonderful coaches here in Houston in a study group. That's been absolutely wonderful.
I would also recommend that to get ones own coach whilst you're working on it. There might be things that come up...old deep-seated fears...working with a coach to remove some of the blocks that come up.'

It's an absolutely just glorious feeling!'

Listen to the entire recording here:

Topics: Coach Certification, How to Become a Certified Coach, Mattison Grey, Certification Practicum, Become a Masterful Coach, IAC, certified coach

You're Coaching, But Are You Actually Open for Business?

Posted by Julia Stewart

Are you open for business?Most of the coaches I talk to fit the following description:

Coaching, But Not Actually Open for Business

They think they're in business, but they're not. Confusion is holding them back. Confusion turns away coaching clients, just like the business in this picture turns away customers. 

The reason I know this is that unlike most coaching schools, I (or someone else at SCM) actually talk to the coaches who visit our site. We listen to what they are up to and help them find the resources they need. It's a labor-intensive process that average coach training schools skip. But we're not average.

Our Enrollment Advisor, Donna Miller, commented on this to me the other day. Most coaches are either coaching, but have no business, or they've started a business, but they're not sure how to coach. Those are bad combinations. They send the same mixed message as the business pictured above. The open sign is on, but the security gate is closed.

If your coaching business is struggling, ask yourself if you're actually open for business.

Here's My Stand:

There is (or should be) an enormous difference between amateurs who coach and professional coaches. If you want a successful coaching business, you need to  be coaching a whole lot better than your client's best friend, next door neighbor and office mate, because those folks are all "coaching" too (and a most of them are coaching for free).

A good coaching school will give you clarity and clarity creates success. It's not magic, but it feels like magic. Mixed signals will keep you stuck. If you are stuck, get the clarity you need. 

One place you can get clarity is in our "How to Become..." free mini-course series. The next one is on How to Become a Certified Coach.

red asterisk

Register for 'How to Become a Certified Coach' Here

Topics: coaching business, free coach training, becoming a certified coach, Coach Certification, Become a Certified Coach, How to Become a Certified Coach, Certified Coach Training, coach training schools, coaching career, IAC, certified coach

How to Become a Certified Coach Free Course

Posted by Julia Stewart

Certified CoachIf you're a professional business or life coach who is considering coach certification, you're not alone.

One of the biggest trends in coaching, in 2009, is that veteran coaches are finding for the first time that they need coach certification. For years, prospective clients and employers didn't even ask about it, but that has changed. However, if you've been coaching professionally for a while, you don't want to go back to the very beginning and start your coach training at an accredited coaching school.

And you really don't want one of those embarrassing fly-by-night certifications

So what are your options? That's what our free 4-hour mini-course on how to become a certified coach is all about. It's led by SCM President, Julia Stewart, IAC-CC. It'll cover some of the pros and cons of various certifications, plus it'll hook you up with some valuable resources that can help you get there faster. 

The 'How to Become a Certified Coach' course is taught live via webinar (or you can just access it by phone) on two separate days. Each class is a total of 2-hours long, broken down into 90 minutes of instruction, followed by 30 minutes of Q&A.

You'll come away with clarity, tools and a path to success. It may not take you as long as you might think to qualify for a respected coach certification.

 

The free course has been completed. Check our course catalog for upcoming courses, including some that are free.

 

Are you ready to get started and quickly become a certified coach?

 

Join the Certified Competent Coach Course Now

Topics: ICF, becoming a certified coach, Become a Certified Coach, How to Become a Certified Coach, Life coaching school accreditation, coaching schools, get certified, IAC, certified coach

Get Coach Certification: New SCM Certified Mastery Coach Designation

Posted by Julia Stewart

Confident Certified Coach

I want to share with you some exciting news with you: School of Coaching Mastery is now offering the SCM Certified Mastery Coach Designation to masterful coaches.

We continue to successfully prepare coaches for IAC Certification, but in view of developments that we’re experiencing in our *laboratory* for coaching mastery, which is SCM itself, we feel a need to offer another path to coach certification.

Here’s one problem that we face: Once a certification standard has been defined and adopted, it already is becoming an artifact of the past. And since coaching is always evolving, we want to know we have a certification that recognizes truly great cutting-edge coaching, while allowing coaches to explore and develop new, unheard-of approaches to delivering transformative conversations.

This has been a difficult issue ever since coach certification was invented.

Given that the bar for great coaching is constantly being raised by the brilliant new coaches who join our ranks every year, it’s necessary that a certification that attempts to measure “mastery” be flexible.

So I am building into our new certification an “inter-developmental” component. In other words, the certifiers won’t just be looking for what we’ve already defined as great coaching; we will also be looking for how each coaching session expands our understanding of coaching mastery.

In other words we expect to learn from you.

This decision was based on numerous events, including listening to the preferences of our amazing students, who coach within their own unique styles and although they are committed to mastery and would love the stamp of approval that certification brings, they don’t want to be cookie-cutter coaches or get stuck in a quantified box called “Coach Certification.”

That wouldn’t serve them. Nor would it serve the coaching profession.

I applaud their courage, creativity and genius. The Certified Mastery Coach designation is for them and for YOU if you want it – and if you can teach us something!

Natalie Tucker Miller, IAC-CC (SCM Master Instructor, IAC Certifier and former President of the IAC) and I have had numerous conversations about this new certification and she will join me, along with Elizabeth Nofziger, IAC-CC (SCM Instructor and IAC Certifier) in preparing and grading coaches to be SCM Certified Mastery Coaches.

As you know, we’ve been successfully preparing coaches for IAC certification for several years. And I’m not suggesting that IAC Certification isn’t still the gold standard. What I’m saying is that even the IAC isn’t a perfect fit for everybody. Some of the greatest coaches I know have been talking to me about the need for a certification with extremely high standards, that has expansion and new possibilities built right into it.

The only way I can see for this to happen is for the certifiers (our certifiers) to relinquish our “expertise” and approach every coaching session with beginners’ minds.

Is this possible? I believe it is!

And I’m so excited, I got started right away with the February Certification Practicum. I'm already grading SCM students with our automatic system, which allows certifiers to score in real time, rather than spending hours listening to recorded sessions, taking notes, analyzing and discussing the details, before agreeing on a numeric score. This feels much more coach-like to me and it gives the certifiers the opportunity to override the grading system, if they feel the coach has demonstrated coaching mastery in a new way.

If you would like to be among the very first to set a whole new standard in coach certification…

Then join me on four Tuesdays, April 7 - 28, 8 -10 PM Eastern/NY Time

You’ll be one of 8 coaches who will coach, be recorded, get feedback and grading on your coaching. If your sessions are strong enough, you can get certified by us, and/or turn in your recorded sessions for IAC Certification.

We already have 4 coaches. We have room for 4 more.

This is the ideal way for advanced coaches to become even more masterful and if you are an outstanding coach then, even if you don’t conform to our pre-conceived notions, if you expand our understanding of coaching greatness, you will likely pass.

Even if you don’t, I promise what you learn will be priceless.

So what price would you pay for this? The 8-hour practicum which I just described is $325. Normally, the certification would separately be $400, but if you register to join this group of pioneer coaches by Friday, you can pay for the 8-hour practicum plus certification and get the certification for half price, if you use the following coupon code:

Use this Code: CERTIFIEDCOACH

Save $200. Get both for $525 by Friday, March 27th, if we still have room. Remember we only have 4 seats left.

I want to be clear:

  • What you learn in this practicum will be transformative
  • You will have a chance to record one coaching session in the practicum
  • You'll get verbal feedback, right away
  • I will grade your session for SCM Certification
  • You will get written feedback, using the IAC Learning Guides
  • Your recorded session can also be submitted to the IAC for certification
  • To get certified by either SCM or IAC, you will have to submit two coaching sessions
  • We can help you record your other session for no extra charge
  • To pass SCM certification, you will also need 5 letters of reference, either from 5 clients, or from 3 clients and 2 IAC Certified Coaches who have coached you for at least three months (In the future, we will also accept recommendations from SCM Certified Mastery Coaches)
  • Two passing sessions and 5 recommendations is all it takes to become an SCM CMC, but you must be a masterful coach

If this feels like something you want to do, I recommend that you register now. SCM students get all of this and much more for fre*e, but I’m opening it to the larger coaching community at a special price and I know it will fill up.

You may also just register for the practicum for $325, but if you decide later that you want SCM certification, you will need to pay the full $400 for SCM Certification.

As I mentioned, SCM Coach Training Program students get both SCM and IAC certifications at no extra charge. They also get up to three 8-hour practicums included in their tuition. We continue to offer the highest standards and value at the lowest tuition of any coach training school, but I can’t emphasize enough that our current fees will be going up.

Here is the link to register for BOTH the 8-hour practicum AND SCM Coach Certification: http://tinyurl.com/SCM-PRAX-CMC

To Save $200, use this code when you register: CERTIFIEDCOACH

To register for just the Certification Practicum for $325, go here and scroll to M12: Certification Practicum and register:  http://www.schoolofcoachingmastery.com/life_coaching_courses.html

For questions about the SCM practicum, certification and our training programs, call: 877-224-2780

Thanks for supporting us and for being committed to coaching greatness!

Topics: School of Coaching Mastery, Coach Certification, Become a Certified Coach, How to Become a Certified Coach, Mastery Coach, Julia Stewart, IAC, certified coach

School of Coaching Mastery First in the World to Get IAC License

Posted by Julia Stewart

IAC Certified Coach

 

 

Last night, Angela Spaxman, IAC President, emailed me that the license for the new IAC Coaching Masteries was finally ready. After a few glitches, I succeeded to buying a license for School of Coaching Mastery and our parent company, Julia Stewart Coaching & Training LLC.

 


I think we are the first!! Good thing! We've been teaching them for over a year and a half!

SCM students probably won't notice any difference, since we've been operating with a verbal agreement all along, but it's nice to have bragging rights!

Personally, I'd like to see more hoops for schools and mentors to leap through in order to become IAC licensees. As it stands, it's a lot easier to buy a license than to become an IAC Certified Coach. That could lead to a lot of disappointed coaches who may study with folks who are clueless about what it takes to pass this tough certification.

Then again, maybe I'm just being self-serving since all of our instructors, mentors and advisors are IAC Certified Coaches, some are founding members of the IAC and some contributed to the establishment of this certification and are or have been Certifiers for the IAC. Collectively, we've taught, mentored or certified most of the current IAC Certified Coaches.

Maybe I just want to crow a little!

Topics: coach training, School of Coaching Mastery, become a coach, Coach Certification, Become a Certified Coach, How to Become a Certified Coach, Julia Stewart, IAC, certified coach

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