My Essay Blog

I’ve had many ‘aha’ and self-congratulatory moments through coaching myself using self development workbooks. I refer to this as ‘Self-Coaching’.

Self-Coaching yourself in this way is great if you’re:

1. Shy;

2. Too busy for one-on-one coaching;

3. Someone who doesn’t like to go out much;

4. Trying to keep limiting beliefs to yourself;

5. Not ready to be coached by anyone else; and

6. Working on your own personal development without anyone else knowing &ndash that way no-one will be disappointed if you give it up or mess it up.

However to get the most out of this form of coaching you’ll need to be:

1. Committed to creating the change you want;

2. Disciplined;

3. Willing to do whatever it takes to develop yourself, eg spiritual development courses, up-skilling, coaching etc;

4. Aware of when you need outside help.

Please Note: From experience, self-coaching will not be enough if there are deeper issues needing to be resolved; and

5. The driver behind the wheel of change &ndash it’s your life; you’re in charge of your destiny.

Self-coaching can help (depending on the severity of the issue) find strategies to apply to:

1. A relationship break-up or make-up;

2. Work related issues;

3. Indecision - something you’ve always dreamed of doing is forever being pushed aside and you need to make a decision;

4. House move &ndash do I stay or do I leave?

5. Itchy feet and wanting to explore and experience a new lifestyle; and

6. Money problems.

A powerful step towards changing what you no longer want into something you really want is by remembering and experiencing what you’d like to change. Then, as you close the door of the past behind you, aim for and take action to making it happen.

Start by goal-setting the what, why, how of transformation, and when you want it to happen by.

A few more tips if you’re coaching yourself are:

1. Keep a diary or journal and write in it every day of how you worked towards achieving inner change. You’ll be able to look back and reflect upon your journey, how you did it, the frustrations, obstacles, and triumphs. It will also give you a sense of achievement, after all you did it.

2. Become aware of how you do things and ask yourself “if you could do this in a better way, how would you do it?”

3. As you coach yourself, at the end of every week summarise what you’ve written and determine what changes you can make easily for the following week.

4. Learn to meditate to give you inner peace as well as clarity not only whilst working with your situation but also to give yourself another self-help tool for your ‘life skill toolkit’.

5. Take up a spiritual development course and increase your intuition. People use their intuition practically every day without realising it, increasing your intuition can help in all areas of your life.

6. Inform everyone who needs to know that you’ll be offline for however long your self coaching sessions will be. Once you’ve organised your time, be ruthless and stick to your timetable. Failing to do this will result in a nasty thing called procrastination to hold you captive!

7. Make a special note of any limiting beliefs you discover about yourself. For example, maybe you have a hang up around earning an income, or maybe you’re not as confident as you like to believe you are. In this case if you are unable to find solutions to these beliefs it’s time to call upon the services of a transformational coach or other professional (this applies to anything you’re unable to effectively work through).

The success of any ‘Self-Coaching’ program is dependent on two things:

1. Your level of commitment; and

2. The quality and content of the workbook itself. It must be designed and developed by someone with coaching experience, an understanding of adult learning principles and the ability to encapsulate it all in ‘simple speak’.

Self-coaching has been an excellent ‘self-help’ tool for me over the years and may help you in some way too.

Michaela Scherr Transformational Coach

In a previous article we discussed the distinction between an Influencing Paradigm, and a Service Paradigm, to marketing your coaching business. We discussed how marketing your business is both ethically valid and commercially crucial, and how marketing is a critical process in achieving your coaching objective of having a positive impact on the lives of others.

To quickly surmise, we explained that people with an Influencing Paradigm mindset perceive marketing to be ‘leading’ and ‘salesy.’ They come from the paradigm that by marketing you are proactively influencing someone in their decisions. Or specifically that you may make someone do something they would not otherwise do.

People from the Service Paradigm school of thought accept that prospects are people that have identified for themselves their need to invoke change. And they’ve identified that a coach will assist them make that change. They recognise that the prospect has made the intellectual link between their needs and how they want those needs to be fulfilled.

To be a successful coach, or in fact successful in any business, it’s critical that you embrace a Service Paradigm mindset toward your marketing.

In this article we’re going to further explore exactly how you can develop a Service Paradigm marketing mindset.

Before we can begin to discuss how you can develop your Service Paradigm mindset, let’s look at some of the characteristics. Coaches with a Service Paradigm recognise that to assist clients meet their objectives, they need to:

- Recognise that everyone in business is in the business of marketing. Without clients they’ll have no one to deliver their services too and hence no one to assist.

- Actively promote their services through compelling advertising that clearly describes what they can offer clients.

- Ethically promote their services with vigilance.

- Recognise the cycle of life of their prospects and regularly promote their services for as long as prospects allow.

- Understand that hey are often in a superior position of knowledge to ascertain what their client needs to assist them attain their goals.

- Be empathic to the needs of clients and actively offer solutions to them through various products and services.

- Value their client’s intellect and decision making ability.

- Not pre-empt their client’s wants and hence limit the range and scope of products and services they offer them.

- Always acts as an ethical adviser.

As a coach, to outwit your competitors you must create a niche; and to build a successful business you must attain a Service Paradigm marketing mindset.

To develop your Service Paradigm marketing mindset:

1. Be determined to succeed. You need to be absolutely determined that you’re going to succeed. If you just want to succeed, but you’re not willing to go the extra mile, you’ll get swept aside by those that are more determined. If you are truly determined, you’ll be confident and this confidence will automatically show in your business and be transparent to prospective clients, peers and the general public. Prospective clients will want to be associated with you, and clients will want to continue their involvement.

2. Persevere. Coaches with a marketing mindset embrace challenges as part of life and part of business. If you perceive challenges as impassable barriers you’ll never develop a marketing mindset. It’s crucial you accept you’re going to confront hurdles as part of business. How you perceive these hurdles, as opportunities or barriers, will drastically influence your level of success. Perseverance is a key ingredient in developing a marketing mindset.

3. Remain positive. Literally nothing destroys a marketing mindset more than a negative attitude. A marketing mindset is a ‘can do’ attitude. Faced with the same challenge, the coach with a positive ‘can do’ marketing mindset will find a way; the coach with a defeatist attitude will submit and fail.

4. Set Goals. As a coach this is something you should know a lot about. Set yourself specific, achievable, stretch goals.

5. Plan a strategy. Establish a specific plan of action to attain your goals. Identify what resources you’ll need and the possible challenges you may confront.

6. Implement your plan. This is the most difficult part. Implementation of your plan. Modify it where required, change your goals as others are attained, modify your plan if flaws are perceived, but always continue implementing. Non-action is the precursor of business failure. If you continue to implement, your business will always sustain forward momentum. If you have momentum, your direction (goals and plans) can always be adjusted.

7. Keep marketing. Your success or failure hinges on your marketing. Always maintain your marketing mindset. Always be focussed on marketing. It’s a common trap to get caught up in the day to day ‘operation’ of your business and put marketing aside. This is a recipe for disaster. How effectively you market will be the most influential determinant on the success (or otherwise) of your business. Marketing is not difficult or confusing, but it does require significant ongoing diligence and attention. The moment you lose focus on marketing your business is the moment your business performance will suffer.