I’m a fairly recent convert to the idea of coaching – to tell the truth, I didn’t even know it existed until a little while ago but I do now find myself thinking "if only i'd discovered it earlier"! I have had numerous offers of help, support, advice and mentoring over the years but I always felt slightly nervous about the idea of accepting help from someone whose credibility and relevant experience was completely unknown.
I went into my first 2 hour coaching session as a blank canvas, waiting to be, “made better than I currently am” and for my business idea to be blessed with clarioty and vision. Imagine my surprise when I was asked, “Ok, so what do you want to achieve?” My coach, went on to grill me for an hour – a very liberating process, allowing me and encouraging me to talk about anything and everything that was going on in my personal and professional life.
About three quarters of the way through this first session, things started to fall into place for me – the subtle line of questions and prompts were gently guiding me towards answering many of my own questions (a lot of these questions, I hadn’t realised needed asking in the first place!).
I came away from this meeting exhausted, yet inspired and full of ideas. I was armed with a whole new list of questions racing through my mind andf a new burst of motivation. My coach is continuing to help me stay on track with my ambitious company growth plans, whilst simultaneously improving my work/life balance (my “have cake and eat it” strategy). So far, my goals have been achieved and it's meant i'm more accountable than i ever was.
The beauty of coaching for me is that the “advice” (even though coaching isn't about giving advice) ultimately comes from within – the coach takes away the emotional aspect of any given problem and helps to analyse the facts in isolation.
You could say that a good coach helps you discover, harness and enhance the powers of your own mind. Yes, this is exactly what i'm going to say coaching is.
Andy Smith
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