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Is this your dream scenario: your organization makes an outstanding profit, year after year. Your clients rave about your service, your innovation. Your people brag from the rooftops about the great place where they work. Your stakeholders wear huge smiles. Together we can make this a reality! Tell me your dreams, share your company vision and your plans to make it happen. We'll look at the obstacles and find an innovative way around them. If you're like many of your peers, a coaching partnership is the catalyst turning dreams into reality. Call me now for a complimentary coaching session: phone: 780-468-1097 email: martin@coachingworks.ca To learn more about coaching, read the following article: WHAT IS COACHING ANYWAY?
Tom Landry once said “A coach
is someone who tells you what you don’t want to hear, who gets
you to see what you don’t want to see so that you can become the
person you always wanted to be.”
There are close parallels
between the work of coaches hired by elite athletes and those
hired by men and women wanting to achieve
‘gold’ in their own lives. The olympic coach does not, and often
is not, able to do her clients' work on their behalf but
nevertheless draws from them much more then they can achieve
alone. In the same way, working with the right coach, the client
is able to achieve more, go further and get there faster.
As coaches we often say that
coaching is not something which can be described in words, it
must be experienced. On one occasion when I was asked to speak
unexpectedly, I followed a few headlines
hastily scribbled in the
‘little black book’ I always carry. Afterwards, some of my
audience shared with me that this was the first time they had
ever understood exactly what coaching was.
To the best of my recollection, this is what I said.
“To get a handle on what we
mean by ‘coaching’ let’s look at four of its aspects:
Who comes
to be coached?
Typically the coaching client
is someone with something inside them
something strongly desired struggling to get out, some
significant advance in their business, career or personal life,
a new skill to be mastered. Sometimes clients recognise the
seeds of greatness within but don’t know how to make them
germinate, become strong plants, flourish and bear good fruit.
Nearly always the coaching client has huge goals. With executive
and business clients we may be working on creating a corporate
culture which honours the organisation’;s values and produces
the bottom line results which were always wanted. Another focus
might be to increased sales, productivity or profitability, to
improve interpersonal skills, be a better manager reduce staff
turnover or increase customer loyalty.
Very often the personal
client is seeking more of something - perhaps life balance, a
more fulfilling life, more peace, better relationships and yes,
we do address money too!
Most importantly, regardless
of the focus of the relationship, the client recognises that
with this catalyst called coach, he or she can go further and
get there faster.
Who is the
right coach?
For you to dare to recognise,
name, achieve. meet and exceed the goals which are uniquely
right for you, it is crucial that your relationship with your
coach includes a special synergy. There must
be mutual respect. I would even say that coach and client must
like each other. Coaching involves asking
the tough questions that everyone else around you will avoid.
Your coach must be fearless in doing that and able to do
so in a way which you are able to accept. The quality of the
match is equally important for coach and client; it is so vital
that many coaches offer an initial session without charge to
evaluate whether the partnership has the interpersonal
ingredients necessary for success.
What is the
process?
The coach client relationship is a partnership. Coaches meet with their clients either individually or in groups, face-to-face or remotely via telephone. Many people ask “But does telephone coaching work?” and the answer is unequivocally affirmative. In my experience the nuances of meaning expressed by characteristics of speech such as voice quality, rythmn, pitch, tone, pause etc more than compensate for body language unseen.
Typically coaching meetings
are regularly scheduled, typically three per month for 30, 45 or
60 minutes at a specific time. Some
executive clients hire their coaches simply to be available when
they have a challenge to discuss and there is no predetermined
timetable.
Pure coaching is a process of
questioning. But those questions will enable you to see life and
work as you’ve never seen them before. My intuition is
incredibly important. I have learned that when a question comes
to mind during a coaching session it must be asked. I have found
too that my intuition is never wrong ...........and must quickly
add that when it is, there’s a small pause
before the client replies, “No, Martin, that’s not it”
but then exclaims “But I’ll tell you
what it is!” The wrong question is close enough to the right one
to draw out the insight or revelation needed.
Many coaches have a ‘welcome
package’ including assessments for the client to complete before
the first call to ensure that the relationship is accurately
focused from the very start. Following the meeting the coach
will usually set fieldwork which the client is free to accept,
reject or negotiate. Much rejection will typically lead to the
firing of the client by the coach because it shows the required
synergy is absent.
The Role of
Coach:
Your coach's task is not to elicit a continuing state of euphoria, it is to question, empathise, encourage, support, challenge, share messages, hold you accountable and sometimes provoke. Your coach might work with you and support you while you build a successful corporation, quadruple sales, introduce a new corporate culture, solve some interdepartmental personality clashes, enrich existing relationships, stop smoking, build a healthier eating regime, start an exercise program, develop new friendships, decide which horizons you are comfortable to maintain, which new worlds you are determined to explore and what it takes to get there. Your coach walks beside you as you develop your plans and implement them, perhaps suggesting specialists to consult along the way. Your coach is someone whose sole objective is to assist you to be the best person you possibly can be, living the life which at the end of the day will leave no regrets about things undone, contributions unmade or people unmet. Why not talk to one today?”
© Martin Sawdon May, 2002.
Martin can be visited on the web at www.thinktanksummit.com and emailed at martin@coachingworks.ca.
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Martin Sawdon Principal Coaching Officer, Coaching-Works! Tel: 780 468 1097 Fax: 780 435 7993
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