Starting my coaching practice

The time has now come to look at where I am going and start to set my own goals for my practice. To do this I need to start with the following:
1. By the end of 6 months there are 3 goals I wish to have.
1 - 3 paying clients. This to me will allow me to see that I have achieved something tangible.
2 - marketing plan in place - I not only want to have the marketing plan in place but I want to be using it.
3 - A long term plan for the products and services that I want to offer. This may take the place of a business plan or just a product specification.
What business structure do I want - I want my business structure to be simple and to just involve myself in the medium term. Future opportunities for growth will come as I identify other services and products.
What revenue target - well we all want to be rich but I will settle for 60 - 80K per year in the practice on my own.
Graduation - I plan on graduating by mid next year, this will be dependant on when I decide to start a family but should not blow this out too much.

It is in my nature to set a milestone so in 3 months I would like to be able to measure the above by the number of enquiries I can answer about a coach and what coaching does for people.

My 3 biggest barriers and fears about becoming a coach or starting a practice is stepping outside of my comfort zone - doing something that a lot of people are not necessarily aware of or understand. Working for myself - this is a big step going from a steady income to an unknown income. This is always a concern for a small business but it is something that I am hoping to overcome. Not being recognised - this is a large concern for me as I am not sure how many people can judge their success with a coach. I would like to be able to make all of my clients see what they have achieved but sometimes this is not tangible.

This entry will be my measuring tool - I will refer back to this regularly until in 3 months I hope to be able to tell you where I am at.

Hope you all have your fingers crossed for me :)

Thought of the day

Dreaming is the abillity to understand what we want, know what we deserve and ultimately set a goal we can achieve.

A coach is your partner to achieve that dream.

Peer Coaching

I am proud to say that I started with a peer coach last night. I must say that having never been coached before - always having been the coach. I found this a very fulfilling and 1 hour well spent. It is amazing how a conversation with a coach makes you feel, the way a coach makes you think and how they are able to boost your confidence whilst just talking with you. I do hope my own clients feel the same way after a session with me.

I am not setting too many goals with my peer coach as yet as I want to work on building the relationship to be able to understand the relationship from a coachees perspective - I believe however in the next couple of weeks the sessions could become very goal focussed.

I am following my own motto and "Preparing for success".

Taking it home

So, let me start this by asking a question that I have been searching for the answer for a long time - how do we take our skills that we can use so well with clients to our home? I would be lying to say that I thought I was even close to how to solve this problem as I seem to let it control me all the time. I never have a problem putting my coaching hat on and providing feedback and advice to people that I have a friendship and connection with but as soon as it comes to my family and people that I want to protect forever I turn into a raving lunatic trying to make them see my opinion or hear my suggestions - problem is I only ever end up getting angrier at myself in the situation so I cannot return to a civilised coach. (You can imagine an octopus in a bucket here!)

It would be great if I could learn how to give myself the opportunity to take that breath first or think about what I am saying but the emotion takes control of my brain and that is the end of it - even if the other person has no interest in what I am saying I am unable to stop. Hindsight is a wonderful thing but why does it always have to come to me when it is too late? The problem then is I start to build the what if scenario in my mind. What if I said too much, what if now they take the complete opposite to my advice and it effects them and then I start to blame myself for causing this now world ending scenario that I have built in my head and that I may as well give up now because unless I can coach at home then why be a hypocrite and help others through it! If I want to make it worse I can build the scenario now that the world is against me and that I should just try not to care and then maybe there would never be a problem and then I would not hurt myself because this is all that I ever end up doing.

The reality is that I do care but sometimes too much. I know my intentions are right - I never want anyone to have to face some of the things that I have had to in my life but is trying to protect them forever and make them not map out their own life going to help? I know the answer is no because how do you grow if you never get to venture out and find your own comfort zone or learn what is a right or wrong decision or even just one that should be thought about with a little more information. No one can supply a right or wrong answer for someones life decisions nor does anyone have the right to turn to you and say that you have made the wrong decisions and you will suffer from that because the reality is that there is never any suffering unless you force yourself to feel that way - but there is definitely always the ability to learn for next time. ( I accept that there are exceptions to this!)

Without kidding myself I have to admit that I will never be able to stop caring and wanting to protect my family and friends as I believe they deserve to be protected but sometimes I need to hide this part of me and remove the emotion from my advice. Everyone knows that if they need something that I will always be there regardless of when and where but I also need to be prepared to let them learn for themselves and when I provide that advice ask if I can first, ask if they are happy to hear it and never just make them want to hear it. Guide them rather direct them but most of all never just suspect they want to hear it.

I think I feel better now.

Still starting

Well, I have not achieved much more this week beyond the planning for the course and the business ideas. I have placed a simple page on my website www.rsrconsulting.com.au about career coaching but I am still working through what I really want to say so that I can sell me as a coach as well as our service offering. There are a lot of coaches out there but I am hoping that my passion for what I do will set me aside from the rest. I am not in it for the money but for the smile on someone's face when they achieve that little something that they never believed they could. Wish me luck!

I have 2 classes that I have scheduled in for this week but I will be aiming on picking up some more once I get use to it as I really enjoyed the first one. I am hoping that through the effective feedback that I am researching I will be able to achieve more with my project team in the coming weeks - if you ever want an interesting set of personalities to coach developers for IT are a good start! I am sure that their hearts are always in the best place.

I am planning on doing more tonight in relation to my website and also try and jump ahead with my reading. I want to stay on top of it all and ensure that my homework is just as it should be! So far so good.

Anyway, I will be back in a couple of days to let you know how I have gone with the classes and the update of the website. If anyone reads this and has a look at the site as it stands please feel comfortable to give me feedback I am happy to receive all comments and suggestions as it all helps.

Bek :)