Coaching

If you are interested in being coached  and want to know more about the process or asking yourself “Do I need coaching?”, this article is for you.

What is coaching?

Let’s get clear about what coaching is and what coaching is not first. I feel it is important to explain as you can find a lot of coaches, who are not following the coaching guidelines, and so to speak, everybody calls himself a coach nowadays.

How come? First of all, coaching is not a regulated profession. Therefore, anybody can call oneself a coach, which can make finding the right coach for you harder.

And since many people call themselves a coach we might get a vague idea about what a coach does.

Let’s start by saying, that coaching was established in sports and therefore many people think about coaches as sport coaches.

Mentor vs Coach

Another misconception is that some people are after mentoring and talk about coaching. These two distinct professions might, and often do overlap, however there is a difference. A mentor is like a math teacher. When you start attending school, you don’t know much about math. The math teacher will explain and show you how to solve various math problems and you repeat after them.

On the other hand, a coach is like a philosophy teacher. They will question you. A LOT. They will lead you and might teach you something new, but the magic happens during discussion. There might be no right answers. We all have our own philosophy, although influenced by others.

© Tony Robbins

What a life coach can do for you:

Some of the most common steps clients take while working with life coaches include:

• Identifying goals and defining a vision for success
• Creating professional and personal action plans
• Identifying limiting beliefs
• Working toward financial independence
• Achieving work/life balance
• Learning to communicate more succinctly and effectively
• Fostering more powerful connections professionally and personally
• Winning promotions
• Achieving weight loss and/or fitness goals
• Starting a new business or growing an existing one
• Managing an important life or business transition
• Articulating core values

Do I need coaching?

Absolutely NOT!

Nobody needs coaching, many people would find it useful, however.

There are people who seek coaching because they see value in it. These are the people who understand, that it takes enormous effort and energy to coach yourself and it is much easier and faster to team up with a coach.

What I have observed is that people are not willing to invest into coaching until the pain or pleasure is great enough. This is typically after spending many months looking for free resources. That is certainly good for entry level, but you might also consider committing right away to save yourself that time.

Regardless, coaching is definitely for people who are committed.

Is coaching for everybody?

Absolutely NOT!

Not everybody is coachable. There are many people who only want to be listened to and are not willing to get their ego destroyed, which is part of learning new things.

While a good coach can help you to direct your attention, he cannot be responsible for the client. It took me several months to grasp this concept. I as a coach grew attached to helping, but no everybody wants to get helped and no matter what I would say or do would change that.

How can I find a great coach for myself?

A good coach will listen a lot and spend a lot of time to understand you first. They will have your good in mind at all times. A good coach will not try to be your friend but he or she will tell you fearlessly what he or she thinks.

Don’t be scared if a coach doesn’t have a formal training. There are many talented, experienced coaches without it. What is important for them as well as for you is if they are able to help you to solve your problem or reach your goals.

A good coach is not desperate.

This means, he will ask you questions about your goals. Based on that they  will be able to tell you if they can help you and if you two would be a good fit. This is particularly important distinction! Good coaches don’t take everybody to coach even if they have no clients at the time being.

How Much Does Coaching Cost?

This is probably the most interesting question for people. In general, one cannot say for sure. The prices are all over the place, while corporate/business coaches are much more expensive due to expected return of investment that is also measurable.

Coaching for private people can also be pretty expensive, ranging from about $25/hour to several hundreds per hour of coaching.

Coaching however can be bought also in packages with longer term commitment like three, six or twelve months. These packages mean higher investments but at the same time you get more for your money. Think about daily access to your coach via email or even coach on phone.

What you pay for coaching is not only for the time of the person! You pay for their experience, certifications and also their brand if they are well-known, which also indirectly implies their quality.

Do you have experience with the problems that you advice people with?

This, together with money question is asked often.

To answer the question I will get back to the definition and by definition coach does not advice you. That is a job of a mentor or counselor. The power of coaching is in asking questions that help the client with their goals.

That being said, it is certainly valuable to have similar experience but not necessary.

My two favourite answers to answer this question with, are:

1. When you go to a doctor, do you typically ask him if he overcame the same sickness you have?
2. Does it matter as long as I am able to bring you results you are after?

Yet another thing is how we experience emotions. If I as a coach have overcome addiction and you are an addict looking for help, there will be some similarities in our experience but there certainly will be some differences in our personal experience.

There is a limited number of problems and unlimited number of solutions. The right coach for you will be able to help you find the right solution for you.