Be Prepared. Maximize Your Investment.
1. Be Prepared
Set an intention for each session. Prior to your session, give thought as to what would make the biggest difference for you and the assistance and coaching you may need. Generally, sessions that are focused with a specific intention will make you feel more complete and focused. The coaching also handles whatever “shows up”, helping you stay present with the realities of your life.Prepare for each coaching session by spending 5-10 minutes reviewing your original coaching goals, recent progress and listing any new areas that you want to focus on during the upcoming session. You will work with your coach during each session to create actions to complete for the next session. These actions will help you to move towards your goal. Make sure you do what you promise and turn up prepared each time. Completing these actions may be challenging at times, but the real work happens between sessions: in your business, work and life. Not prepared? Spend the first five minutes of your coaching conversation preparing with your coach!
2. Focus on What’s Most Important to You
Get clear before you call your coach about what you want to focus on and what is the most important to you right now. Talk about what matters most to you. Talk about anything you want during your coaching sessions: your goals, your life, your needs, what you want to improve. Even stuff that may not appear to be all that ‘useful’ to talk about. Focus on what you need to talk about, not what you feel you ’should’ talk about. This approach will give you the most value from your sessions.
3. Do Your Homework
Often, you will have homework to accelerate your progress and the change between coaching sessions. Usually, the homework can be completed in 1-3 hours. Forgetting, skipping or ignoring the homework will affect the effectiveness of your coaching. If you’re having difficulty completing an assignment, please email your coach between sessions for assistance.
4. Focus on Feelings Too
Focus on what you are feeling, not just on what you want to produce. Sometimes, clients feel the need to focus the coaching time on how to produce more tangible or financial results. But intangibles, such as feeling happier, more peaceful and more inspired, are equally important.
4. Be Responsible
Be responsible for your own actions. This also means raising with your coach, in real time, anything that you are unhappy about within your coaching relationship. Don’t relinquish power to your coach. Coaching is a partnership and you need to be responsible for your own actions.
5. Be Committed
The coaching process takes absolute commitment. To achieve anything extraordinary in business and life, you need to be willing to engage, work hard and move past obstacles and your own fears. Make sure you are ready to take on the commitment when you start your coaching sessions. Being clear about your commitment will help you get through the challenges you will face along the way.
6. Be Selfish
Become incredibly selfish. Coaching is about you and what you most want. So, go ahead, and put yourself first. Yes, be selfish in the sense that you are what matters most. When you are happy and do well, others will benefit also.
7. Be Open
Be open to seeing things differently. In coaching, you will be working with your goals (the ‘what’) and your strategies to reach these goals (the ‘how’) and all the time working on you (the ‘who’). Coaching becomes exciting when you re-look at some of your assumptions, ways of thinking, expectations, beliefs and approaches to success. It often is exciting to evolve and arrive at newly developed concepts.
8. Remove Obstacles and Drains
Get rid of your “psychic sappers.” Coaching works because it focuses you in two areas. First, you get to stretch and take more actions than you would on your own. Secondly, you will be reducing/eliminating things that drain you, such as toleration, stressful situations, difficult relationships and recurring problems. Bring these areas to the coaching session.
9. Create Space
Get more space, not just time, in your life. Coaching needs room in order to work. If you’re too busy, rushed, adrenalined, or burdened, you’ll be using your coaching sessions to push harder instead of smarter. When you begin, consider reducing your roles, install personal management systems, etc. Get simple. Simplification gives space. Space is needed to learn and evolve yourself beyond where you are today.
10. Change Your Environment To Do Some of the Work for You
Strengthen your personal/business foundation. Use part of your coaching time to design the perfect environment in which to live and work. Where you live and how you live are key to your success. Hang out with people who will cheer your success, not your failure. Be willing to invest time and money in improving your environment so that you feel supported to be your best!