By Gen Wright
Sometimes, when you are stuck in a rut it can be difficult to evaluate your life from an unbiased perspective. Even when things seem to be clicking along just fine, we can feel like something is not quite right. Yet, when it comes down to identifying what we need to change or how to make those changes, we often need some help. Life coaches assist their clients in identifying and achieving personal goals, even when those goals are unclear to the client. As a relatively new profession, life coaches are somewhat difficult to define, but they almost always draw on a variety of disciplines from psychology and counselling to mentoring and coaching in order to help you clarify and reach your goals.
Life coaching is an increasingly sought-after profession, especially over the past 10 years or so. Your life coach should provide support, in the short- or long-term, in a non-judgemental partnership. Indeed, one of the hallmarks of life coaching is that you enter a partnership with your life coach rather than the traditional client-professional relationship as you would have with other counsellors. Life coaches will work with you one-on-one for as long as needs be for you to determine what aspects of your life need to be changed and how to change them. Your life coach’s success is ultimately your success.
Life coaches may take on different roles depending on their client. Sometimes your life coach will act as a mentor, while other times a more passive guide. The key to life coaching is that it is not the same for every client and even within a partnership, the life coaching role should change depending on your needs. A good life coach will help each individual client develop their own plan based on their own personal issues, strengths, weaknesses, and desires. Yet most importantly, your life coach should take a more passive role in your life than you might expect. The best life coaches do not take control of your life, they help you take control of your life. You should be making your own choices and decisions, and your life coach should simply help you to identify your goals and the best ways to achieve those goals.
Life coaches can help you in many aspects of your life. While there are more specific professionals who focus on career coaching, business coaching, health coaching, or financial coaching, a life coach works to help you achieve overall satisfaction. Perhaps you need to change your career or you need to get healthier in order to be happy, your life coach should help you to identify the areas in your life that you want to change and then should provide you with some techniques and tools for achieving these goals.
If you are not completely satisfied with some aspect of your life, whether it be personal or professional relationships, your family dynamic, or some other personal issue, a life coach will help you find solutions and will guide you through the process of overcoming the problems.
You can find many life coaches including career coaches at life coach directory www.noomii.com
How to Start a Life Coaching Business
By lifecoaching1
Are you thinking of becoming a certified life coach and starting a life coaching business? Are you looking forward to quickly replacing your day-job with your life coaching business? If you have answered yes to either of these questions, there is something that you need to hear before you go any further:
The dirty little secret in the industry is that most coaches do their life coach training and get their life coach certification and never actually get a coaching business off the ground.
It’s sad, because in many cases, these people are talented life coaches, but they are just not great at business.They start out with unrealistic expectations of what their business will achieve in the first year, fanned by the over-the-top enthusiasm and salesmanship of coaching schools. They waste critical start-up money on things that they don’t need until they have 200+ hours of coaching experience under their belt.
The good news is that starting a life coaching business is actually easy and affordable if you know what to focus on.After making many mistakes starting my own life coaching business and wasting lots of money, I am happy to show you how I would start my business now, if I were able to do it all over again.
Don’t give up the day job just yet
I hear stories about coaches, and I am one of them, who give up their day job and decide to coach full time. This is a great idea if it inspires you and you have a second income to live on while you build up your business.
If you are thinking of giving up your day job and you do not have a second income to live on, I highly recommend that you consider taking apart time job while you build your business. This will help you pay your bills and keep food on the table.
There is literally nothing more unattractive to potential clients than a hungry life coach! Plus, by being responsible and realistic in your business, you are setting the right example for your clients.
Get the professional advice you need but stick to the basics
It is important to check with accounting, bookkeeping, legal and insurance advisers to make sure that you are in compliance with the rules and regulations for small businesses within your country and region. In many cases you will probably get one free or low cost initial interview to discuss your needs.
Tell them that you are starting a coaching business, are coaching a handful of clients for money and expect to earn X amount each month (number of clients per month x the session rate). Don’t be embarrassed if it is a low amount, this could even qualify you as a hobby and reduce your tax and insurance obligations. Besides, we all have to start somewhere!
One mistake I made when I started out was spending about $600 on intellectual property advice in my first financial quarter. The investment was a total waste of money because once I had completed 200 hours of coaching, my business ideas were different so the legal advice I needed was different.
On top of that, my legal bill ate up money that could have kept me from going back to a normal day job for another 1-2 weeks. Two mistakes like this and I’ve lost out on a whole month of time I could have used to build my business!
Build your brand on a shoestring
I cannot think of one coach in my coaching class (of about 30 students) who is still running the same business 5 years later and I’m confidently guessing that 9/10 are not even in the coaching business any more. So don’t invest money on logos and branding until you know you are here to stay.
For now, just use your name and create a simple website and business card for free.
Here’s how to do it:
Create a website for free
These days you need a basic web page because it tells the world what you do and is more cost effective and flexible than printing. You can get a website for free in a matter of minutes by visiting wordpress.
Keep it simple. Find out how to add pages and ignore the rest. Make sure you have the following 4 pages on your site: About you, your product list, benefits of working with you/a life coach, your contact details. Keep it simple.
Get a business card for free.
For now all you need on your card is: your name, your title e.g. ‘Life Coach’, your mobile/cell number, your website address e.g. ‘www.YourName.wordpress.com’.
Get 250 business cards for free from www.vistaprint.com. Yes, they do it for free, plus postage. The catch is that Vista Print adds a small promotional slogan on the back of each card.
When you are starting out it pays to be frugal. People really don’t care about your card anyway. They are either interested in you or they are not your card is not going to make a difference. Think of your first business card as an easy way to give out your contact information.
Design a seamless client management system
Having an end-to-end system in place for managing a client, from your first meeting with them through to the completion of a coaching program with you, is like having an extra boost of confidence up your sleeve. Clients are impressed when you have structure supported by documentation. They feel that you know what you are doing and are professional.
I have to admit that, in the beginning, I had bits and pieces for my clients but didn’t combine everything into a smooth client management system until probably my second year! It would have saved me a lot of heartache if I had just sat down, documented a simple process and used it consistently with all of my clients.
If you want to see a list of tools and templates I use in my client management system, check out www.coachingstarterkit.com and feel free to borrow ideas.
Build relationships with well-connected people who like and trust you
If you want to build a business that involves one-on-one life coaching, then you need to meet people and form trusting relationships with them. The secret to building business relationships is not about how many people you meet and give your card to. It is about knowing a handful of well-connected people who like and trust you.
A great way to build this sort of relationship for a life coach is to commit to a networking group like Business Network International (www.BNI.com) because you are forced to have the discipline needed to form trusting business relationships. If you are just starting out as a coach and are not sure of your niche I would highly recommend joining a BNI chapter in your area. You will befriend business owners who know people who need your services. However, if you are coaching a niche group like doctors or accountants, then you should become a member of the networks of that industry instead as BNI is mainly a gateway to small business owners and their contacts and is not focused enough for your needs.
In conclusion, if you want a good start to your life coaching career, start a simple, low-cost business that will help you get 200+ hours of coaching under your belt. If you can pull that off, you will prove that you have the strength and commitment needed to succeed in the industry and take your business to the next level.
We helps you by providing the best coaching client management system, a model for converting prospects to clients, and 9 essential coaching templates that you need to run a professional coaching business. Further details about life coaching career please visit our website.
How To Choose A Business Coach
By Gen Wright
In today’s competitive economic climate, an increasing number of professionals are turning to business coaches to help them achieve their ultimate goals. Business coaches may help an individual with personal development or may even work with an organization with human resource development. If you are seeking a personal business coach, you are likely looking for somebody who can provide feedback and advice to help you improve the effectiveness, profitability, or efficiency of your business. Business coaches can also help you improve communication, set priorities, make sound business choices, and expand on your strengths. So how then do you approach choosing a business coach?
As is the case with any professional relationship where you are paying for services, compatibility is a key factor. Do you have a good rapport with your coach? Do you have a similar approach or does your business coach’s approach help you develop better skills for reaching your goals? Can you communicate easily and comfortably with your business coach? These are all very important questions. In order to have a successful relationship with your business coach, you really need to come from a place of common ground. If your values and expectations differ widely from those of your business coach, there is little chance the experience will be a positive one.
In addition, your business coach should demonstrate appropriate experience and training in your field. A woman who worked for 40 years in the restaurant industry is not likely going to be equipped to coach you about software development, for example.
Ask potential business coaches the tough questions. Your business coach should be able to show you a history of success coaching individuals in similar fields or with similar challenges. At the moment, business coaching is a relatively new field and there are few regulations to become a business coach.
As such, it becomes your responsibility to speak to several potential business coaches to ensure you find an individual who is qualified to help you.
Indeed, research is an important aspect of choosing a business coach. Wherever possible, speak to current or past clients about how the coach is helping them and decide whether you feel that the coach’s approach will be effective for you. Moreover, research your business coach’s own professional background. You should also have a keen understanding of how the coach operates before you make the final decision on your own business coach.
Ultimately, a good business coach will engage you in the process and provide support to enhance your key skills and abilities.
Rapport and compatibility, experience and training, and a track record of success are aspects of business coaching that you as the client can easily evaluate. Choosing a business coach should be a process that includes careful consideration of all these factors.
Please find career coaches and life coaches in the largest directory noomii.com
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