In almost exactly 5 years of blogging on Life Coaching and self development I have never run back-to-back guest posts before.
Then earlier this week as I was scrambling to get a load of things done, not least of which is my latest book, when a juicy guest post dropped in my inbox.
Before I get to that, I do want to give you the heads up about the book. It is a really in-depth look at values and aimed at people who ultra-serious about self development and other Life Coaches.
Although it won’t be going on official sale for 3 or 4 weeks, I am going to run a special offer for my blog and newsletter readers next week.
It’s a juicy one, honest, so I hope you’ll pop back then and take advantage of it.
In the meanwhile, I’ll hand things over to Clint Cora and get back to finishing this book.
The Short Cut To Success
I was speaking to a neighbor who has been working on an internet business idea for quite some time and I asked him if he uses a mentor or coach.
I wanted to find out whom he learns from since I have some interest in this area as well. He basically told me that he doesn’t use other people and that he prefers to learn on his own.
Of course, he proceeded to ramble off all these technical terms that I, as a non-techie, didn’t understand. He’s one of these programmer types who always want to try and impress others with their tech talk. At the same time, judging from his progress so far, his venture is nowhere near getting off the ground.
When I Tried To Do Everything On My Own
I could somehow relate to my neighbors situation. There were many times when I tried to do certain projects insisting on learning everything on my own without anybody’s help.
As predicted, many times these projects didn’t get anywhere and the ones that were successful, took a heck of a long time to complete.
In one case, I was training on my own quite regularly to get from being a Level 1 certified to a Level 2 ski instructor.
Despite the hours I was putting on the ski slopes, I didn’t really seem to be significantly improving. This is not unusual since most snow skiers plateau out in terms of skills at some stage in their development.
Then I decided that I would take a special one-on-one training session with a senior instructor.
Well, this guy saw something in my skiing that I never even noticed before. It turned out that my weight transfer from one leg to the other was too late in my ski turn. Without getting too technical, my timing was off.
This is something that I never realized and none of my ski friends who were skiing at my level noticed either. They were probably doing the same thing as I was.
It took the eyes of a more experienced ski coach to bring out in the open what was really happening in my skiing. Fortunately, this was a quick and easy correction that resulted in a huge difference in my ski technique.
A similar thing happened during my quest to become a karate world champion. I was doing okay on the tournament circuit winning on a regular basis but not as consistently as I would have wanted. I just blamed it on unfair judges whenever I lost.
Then during one training session as a member of the Canadian National Karate Team, the coach told me that I was trying to do too many different karate techniques at once. He said that I should focus on the strong ones and leave out the weaker moves.
At first, I didn’t really know what to think of his feedback but when I reviewed video footage of my techniques afterwards with his comment in mind, he was absolutely right!
I was stunned!
I just couldn’t see where my weaker techniques were since I was too close to my own usual ways.
As soon as I stripped away the weaker techniques and just focused on the ones I did really well, I became a much more consistent winner.
I needed some external expert eyes to look at what I was doing objectively.
Even The Hall Of Famers Needed Coaching
NBA Hall of Famer Michael Jordan once said that even though he achieved pretty well everything that he hoped to achieve in basketball, he claimed that he still needed to play all those years of pro basketball under the watchful eyes of coaches.
It was through his coaches where he got valuable feedback that allowed him to excel on the basketball court.
When I was developing my main keynotes as a motivational speaker, I made sure that I had some trusted colleagues who were well versed in public speaking to listen to my first versions in front of live audiences.
Their feedback enabled me to turn my keynotes into their present forms today, which are significantly superior to the original versions.
Their extra ears and eyes on both myself as a speaker as well as the reactions from the audience gave me some much needed perspective that I otherwise would not have had. This is one of the real values of having a coach or a mentor.
Coaches Can Be Invaluable For Almost Anything In Life
This concept of using coaches or mentors for their eyes and ears (plus experience) can work for pretty well anything in life.
It can mean the difference between business success and failure when business mentors are used. Personal life issues can also be overcome much easier with the help of life coaches like Tim Brownson.
I am not saying that success is impossible if you go about things on your own.
You just might be lucky enough to get there solo. But it would probably take you a much longer time and use up more resources than if you did with a coach or mentor.
The extra eyes and ears will help you shave significant time required in your journey to the next level. Effective shortcuts you learn from a coach will get you to success much quicker compared to going at it on your own.
Seriously consider using the services of a coach or mentor in the areas that you want to excel in because the results may very well surprise you.
Clint Cora is a motivational speaker, author and Karate World Champion. See his FREE 3-part Personal Development Video Series to learn how to expand your comfort zone to conquer even your most daunting goals in life.
Hi Clint, seeing as you commented on my guest post, it’s only right that I return the favour!
Coaching can be seen sometimes as ‘expensive’, that it’s not worth the ‘extreme’ amounts of money that some coaches charge. It’s a shame that the majority think like this, as coaching can be quite the opposite to popular opinion.
If your coach is good, then you get some serious benefits. You get the chance to work with a great mind, the focus is purely on you all the time, and you learn more about yourself than you ever thought possible.
But that’s if the coach is good. Sometimes you can find a coach who is terrible at the work, and you can waste your money. You can also waste your money on good coaches that aren’t ‘right’ for you.
Bottom line – if you want coaching, do your research, speak with the coach beforehand, then decide. Don’t rush into something as big as coaching :-)
Yeh you pretty much nailed it there Stuart.
Firstly, very few people sit down to work out the ROI with coaching. They seem happy spend $2k on a vacation that seldom yields lasting change, but are horrified at the thought of investing half of that in their future.
OTOH, you’re right, there are a lot of bad, untrained coaches out there that are great at blogging and promoting themselves, but in no way qualified to be coaching people, and they screw with the industry.
It’s all about due diligence from the client.
Well said Stuart. Fortunately, I haven’t had a case of a bad coach I had to pay for. I’ve flown to other cities just to train with former martial arts world champs and they all turned out great. The business coaches I paid for were good too. I’ve actually had the odd ski coach that didn’t do much for me but fortunately I get many opps with different ones and many cases for free or very low cost since I’m with the ski instructor association up here.
But yes, do your research — maybe even check for reviews or contact those who did testimonials.
I was recently trained by Clinton Swaine, and two things he said that got stucked in my head:
“Be hungry for coaching.”
“Feedback is the breakfast for Champions.”
In the any area of performance, the key to become better and better lies in only one word – Feedback.
The assumption is that we are always trying to do our very best in any situation. But is our very best serving us well? Do we want to do better than now?
That is a good line about feedback being the breakfast of champions. Yes, doing good in the wrong direction doesn’t help us! That’s why feedback helps redirect where our directions should be.
So it’s not Weetabix then? ;-)
Good point Joseph, we should embrace feedback not get frightened of it.
Haha… I like the Weetabix joke, Tim.
I live in Asia and I’d say generally, people are rather fearful about receiving feedback, especially when it is done in front of an audience. It is a belief that when one receives a negative feedback, it makes him a bad person.
That got me to realize how important it is to learn the skills of providing feedback. To be completely congruent, and truthful, and what truly makes a difference is the person listening has gained something useful out of it.
Feedback leaving the person not knowing what to do or beating up himself, is just plain crapful critic.
This is why when giving feedback, I like using the sandwich technique. I always start with something positive to get some good vibes going. I always tell the person what I think he/she is doing great. Then I go over the areas for improvement followed by something positive at the end. People tend to listen better when presented with feedback like this in my observation whether it’s business or sports related.
When I saw that Clint Cora was going to be giving the guest post I knew it would be good. He has some amazing skills in martial arts and always shares a good story.
Thanks for giving him a sounding board Tim.
Bryce
I agree and I was amazed at how much Clint has achieved. Pretty remarkable for such a modest guy!
Thanks Bryce for seeing me around online. Again, I achieved what I did at the expense of not being able to do normal things like hit a baseball, golfball, tennis ball – or any type of ball for that matter.
“Even hall of famers need coaching”
This is such a great thought for all of us to consider.
While I haven’t worked specifically with a coach, I have been listening to and learning from several people. You can really get a lot of feedback from a mentor or coach, though.
Thanks for sharing!
Having a coach, especially if it’s a one-to-one level, will dramatically result in improvements. While learning from reading and listening is awesome, coaching just takes things on another level since the focus will be on you, rather than on the masses. Coaches work on specifically the things you need and want.
Grady, somebody once said to me “what’s make you think you know more about life than I do” I replied “Nothing and what makes Tiger Woods coach think he’s better at golf than Tiger is!”
Tim, I absolutely love this one about Tiger Woods. I’d like to have your permission to quote you for it.
Absolutely!
I got and paid big bucks for bad coaching, which I thought would be excellent because the fellow’s books had helped me so much – but he pawned me off to an associate, because he was so BIG….and then my Mother started dying and that was 24/7 care giving ….and I did not battle to get my money back.
I just try to read about 5 top coaching sites each week and I have won a couple of free sessions which were amazingly helpful.
It has taken me a great number of trial and error appointments to find a truly good for me pain relief coach – and yesterday in my acupuncture session I had 2 full hours of NO PAIN…which continued on for another 5 hours of basic living.
I think one on one coaching is truly a good thing…I know I need it to learn how to make money. When you do not have any income it is hard to purchase one on one…so I continue to work with what I can find for the price of my internet connection.
Group sessions are a waste of my time, I have learned, because there is always someone who monopolizes the session and one can not get to the focus for the self needs.
I think you make some excellent points here and I am glad Tim for the introduction to Clint and his ideas.
Sorry to hear about your past bad experiences with coaching Patricia. Yes, this is why it’s important to research reviews whenever possible. Authors do not necessarily make good coaches just like in my case, past world champions doesn’t always make a good coach. It’s a different skill set.
I wouldn’t write off group coaching altogether because if you end up with a good moderating who can keep control, there could be benefits from the group brainstorming as well as group support. Again, research is required on how good a group is.
That sucks donkey balls. I hate it when I hear stories like that and I’m really sorry Patricia. I understand if you don’t want to share, but I’m interested in who it was.
I have become more jaded about the self development industry lately and I wish that wasn’t the case because there are some great people doing great work.
I sent you an email Tim…
One of the top recommendations in my coaching practice and in my book, Positivity on Purpose, is to learn to ask for help. In school, we are taught that “collaboration” (otherwise known as cheating) will get you expelled. Rather, we should be taught how to best use our current resources to get the most out of ourselves.
Isn’t it always interesting to see yet another example of how our school education doesn’t always relate to real life? Thanks for your comment.
I know the feeling off trying to find a good coach. Stuart was right when he said it is not something to be rushed. I have have been looking for a personal development coach for a while now and have not really been able to find the right one.
I was looking for a coaches that lived in my area, but quickly realized that you have more options available if you are willing to compromise location.
I actually consider myself self someone who is able to give advice in this field. Like Clint said about Michael Jordon, even the greatest of the greatest are looking to get better.
Clint, I admire the fact that you were willing to travel to other cites to meet with other martial arts champions. You are right about one thing; your success will come to you much quicker with a coach in your corner.
Vic, if you interested, check out my store tab and then scroll to the bottom and you can download my free ebook ‘What the hell is Life Coaching?” It should give you all the info you need on hiring a coach and you don’t even need to sign up!
I did laugh that you came on to a Life Coaches website to tell us you can’t find the right coach. Maybe we should talk ;-)
Well you got it right there Vic. The right coach has to be one that you can relate to as well as get to (if there’s a requirement for face to face interaction). Plus, the price has to be right and such a coach must have availability. There are quite a lot of factors here.
You will also need different coaches for different things as well. The relationship coach will probably not be able to help you with your golf swing!
You guys make good arguments for the benefits of coaching, but please humour me while I play devil’s advocate for a bit. The website that Tim and I (and maybe a few others from here) got engrossed in last week left me feeling sullied, but there were a few valid points raised amongst the vitriol.
I’m not questioning anyone’s integrity here, by the way, so I hope no-one takes offence at what I’m saying.
I don’t think we can truly count on life coaches to give us an objective and impartial viewpoint on whether life coaching is worthwhile. It’s like going to a car dealership and asking the salesman if he think’s its a good idea for you to buy one of his cars.
I hope you can see that from that perspective, this guest post is virtually meaningless to me. It’s as reliable as those annoying leaflets you get stuffed in your favourite magazine trying to sell you 5 pairs of pyjamas for just $99.
What I would find really valuable are detailed testimonials from people who have had life coaching. It would need to be from at least 6 months after the coaching so that the customer has had time to properly reflect on its effects and whether it was truly worthwhile.
I don’t want them to just say, “Tim/Clint really helped me”. I want specifics and if possible I want them objectively measured. For example, if you had a struggling business which suddenly took off after life coaching, I want to know how much profit you earned before, how much after, and whether there were any other factors involved that you may not be giving enough credit towards (e.g. your bank manager gave you some highly useful advice on invoicing).
The problem is, as fallible humans, we all suffer from a wide range of cognitive flaws and biases, many of which we’re not consciously aware of. For example, if you pay a lot of money for something (e.g. life coaching), then you’re far more likely to rate the purchase as a good decision. Otherwise you can end up with rather uncomfortable cognitive dissonance.
For me I usually offer prospective clients the chance to speak with a handful of people I have worked with.
And I get that confirmation bias mate, but that’s true about anything, except that is, when it isn’t. There are enough people complaining about stuff to know that it’s not as common as you would imagine.
CB kicks in when somebody has had ok service, but when they have terrible service it’s rarely an issue for most people.
So what you’re saying is:
A) We can’t trust Life Coaches to be unbiased
B) We can’t trust people who have hired Life Coaches to be unbiased unless they can offer hard data because of conformation bias.
Seems fair ;-)
I think you’re right about CB. Certainly after 6 months or so, I imagine people would have time to reflect on the experience and CB probably has less effect.
One massive thing that goes in your favour is that it’s impossible to find anyone who wasn’t happy with the service you’ve provided. That’s pretty cool evidence right there.
Mind you, there are a lot of hungry alligators in Florida. Have you been feeding them your unhappy ex-clients?! :)
Oh and the chance to speak with people you’ve worked with – absolutely invaluable. I like it.
Tim commented above that he’s surprised that people won’t invest $1000 in their future in the form of life coaching. Well, I think people need to be very careful about calculating the Return On Investment (ROI) here. I want to hear from customers of Tim or Clint who can say, hand on heart, that they have seen an ROI of 200% or even 300%.
Of course it’s hard to measure things like how much happier you feel as a result of life coaching and equate that directly to a dollar value, but I think we at least need to try. I’m sure Michael Jordan could fairly accurately say something like, “After a month of intensive coaching on my shooting skills, I went from 40% on target to 50%” or something along those lines. How many life coaching customers can say something similar with cold hard facts?
In the book, “Staying Sane” by eminent psychologist Raj Persaud, the author argues that we should each learn how to become our own counsellors (rather than relying on long-term and expensive help from therapists). He outlines many reasons why this is a good idea, and I have to say that I tend to agree with him on the whole (though I don’t agree with everything he says in that book).
Yes, a life coach might be able to point out a useful nugget of wisdom that you’d overlooked, but I have to ask if there are alternative ways of getting the same guidance for much less cost.
I mean, come on! We live in the age of the Internet. It’s easy to find decent information online for free (just check out Tim’s blog for an excellent example!). And you can check Amazon reviews to find good books to teach yourself, if you’re willing to put in a bit of time. And then of course there are friends and mentors, many of whom will offer good advice for free. You just need to spend a little bit of effort seeking them out.
I love Tim Brownson. I love that he gives away so much awesome content for free, I feel his advice has helped me quite a bit over the last year. Though admittedly I’d struggle to calculate the ROI on it, I’m earning exactly the same as I was this time last year!
Do you mean eminent psychologist Raj Persaud that was suspended and I think later struck off for plagiarism and ripping other peoples ideas off?
“Of course it’s hard to measure things like how much happier you feel as a result of life coaching and equate that directly to a dollar value, but I think we at least need to try.”
A number of Universities are trying to do this but they haven’t cracked it yet.
That’s the chap! I didn’t know about the plagiarism. The book’s still great though.
Rob I’m stunned at some of the stuff you’re saying.
It’s not just about passing on advice, in fact it’s rarely about that. There is no doubt that Life Coaching works when the coach is competent.
If you want proof, go and read another of David Rocks books ‘Coaching With The Brain In Mind” because there’s a shit load in there about what happens to the brain during coaching that doesn’t happen during reading a book.
It’s very dry and academic unlike YBAW, but it has all the proof you need.
I’ll check it out, thanks.
It’s a VERY hard read and probably redundant for anybody that doesn’t want to coach professionally.
I do measure my happiness every day via a cool app on the iPhone called Mappiness. I’m pretty sure that if I measured the weekly averages over the last year, I might see a very marginal increase in happiness, though it wouldn’t be massive.
I balk at paying several hundred dollars per day for a builder to come to my house and replace my bathroom. But I know it’s worth it – not least because it’ll boost the value of my house.
I’m just far from convinced that it’s worth spending $1000 on advice that I might be able to either work out for myself, read in a book, find on the Internet or get told by a friend/mentor.
I’m perfectly happy to take a punt on a book that might cost a few dollars. If I think it’s crap then it’s no big loss. But I’m willing to risk $1000 on something unless I get some kind of guarantee that it’ll be worthwhile. Sorry Tim
I hope Tim and I can still be friends now that I’ve questioned his entire career and potentially put doubts in the mind of his prospective clients!
I have 2 questions for Tim and Clint:
1) How do you advise people to calculate the ROI of life coaching?
2) Do you offer money back guarantees if people don;t find the coaching beneficial?
Rob, seriously I couldn’t give a shit whether you think it’s worth it and I don’t have to justify it to you because you’re not looking to hire me. My only concern is to the people that hire me or are thinking of hiring me.
I’m not going to spend half my time trying to convince people about something they are skeptical about. That was what was happening on the other site. It’s pointless and I’m better focusing on people who can see the value.
1) I don’t advise them, because there could be a myriad of reasons.
2) No.
I’m sorry that I’ve upset you. You do appear to have taken this very personally. I don’t think I was being totally unreasonable, just looking for verifiable evidence that what you do works. I’d want to check out that my builder had a good reputation too.
I hadn’t totally ruled out ever hiring you, by the way. Just not at the moment. And I don’t think it’s pointless finding ways to help convince skeptics – you could tap into a large market.
Stop being a knob Rob, you haven’t upset me! You know me well enough by now.
The I couldn’t give a shit phrase was a throwaway line. Imagine we’re sat talking over a beer.
BTW, as an example, earlier this year my wife and I spent £30 (about $50) on an hour’s session with a qualified relationship counsellor from Relate. The advice he gave in just one hour vastly improved the quality of my marriage. Therefore I feel this represents tremendous value for money – just the price of a videogame. I’m just not sure I would get quite the same value/ROI from a $1000 investment in life coaching.
Apples and oranges.
Really? I don’t see how. It’s paying someone to help you solve certain problems.
Because it shows a fundamental misunderstanding of what ‘real’ coaching is all about and what coaches do, or rather, should be doing.
You got advice that anybody could have read in a book. Me offering advice is the last port of call if all else fails.
You pay a dentist to solve toothache which is a problem, is that the same as coaching?
Counseling is NOT coaching!
Most counselors see 8 clients a day, I can see no more than 3 because there is more prep, more follow up and the concentration levels I use are exhausting.
It’s a different animal, coaching is not counseling even though it may look similar on the surface.
I’ve had a look around your site, Tim, and I do see that you offer a money back guarantee. How long is that valid for?
Let’s say I bought the Gold package. I’d probably want to wait at least 6 months after the first session to see if it’s been worthwhile and try to get some decent objective measurements. Would you honour the money back guarantee after 6 months?
What percentage of clients ask for their money back?
It’s only after the first session. I cannot and would not offer a mbg for all clients because I could do an excellent job and they not take my advice etc.
It would be a like a doctor or gym instructor offering it.
In 6 years I have never had a client ask for a refund for anything other than unused sessions and I have only ever had one complaint and that was from a guy who didn’t pay and was bi-polar.
That’s compelling evidence, cheers.
BTW, I have just been granted an interview with David Rock. Any questions?
That’s fantastic news! Congratulations mate. No questions spring to mind.
I’m going to chime in here. First of all Rob, my article was not about life coaching. It was about the benefits of having a coach or mentor in general. I am NOT a life coach and I do NOT offer life coaching services. This is why I refer to Tim instead in this article.
From my experience, yes, there are a lot of things you can learn from books and other ways which are less expensive than direct coaching. But, I have also experienced faster gains over many different areas of life whenever I did have direct coaching. That’s why I brought out my ski and karate examples. These were my personal examples I went through. Sure you might be able to learn a few karate tricks from a book but it definitely does not compare to direct coaching. I did not become a Karate World Champion from reading a book! Nor did I learn to ski to an instructor level from a book either.
As for ROI, sometimes I don’t think you can but figures on it. For example, let’s take an extreme example. If there’s a guy who has say sexual hangups, I’m sure that he can go read a book for advice. But if this same guy gets counselling from an expert specialist and is able to get over his hangups, how do you measure the ROI on that?
Do you count the number of times he’s had sex since his ‘coaching’? How do you put a figure on sexual confidence and happiness? I think there are certain things in life that you can’t easily put a ROI on.
Yes, I think testimonials from clients of life coaches or any type of coaches for that matter are useful. But if a client fails to put an exact ROI on his or her progress as a result of coaching, I don’t that implies an unsatisfied client.
Thanks Clint, an excellent comment. To be fair with my intro and the fact that I’m a Life Coach it would be easy to presume you were pushing Life Coaching.
The main reason why I liked the post and published it was because it took a sideways look at coaching in general and wasn’t salesy in the least. I would never have run a guest post by somebody claiming coaching is the cure to all mans ills!
Hi Clint
Apologies for mistaking you for a coach. You have to admit, there’s a lot of overlap between being a motivational speaker and being a life coach. Or am I now being totally ignorant?
I’m not trying to be deliberately argumentative here, but it was Tim who first mentioned ROI in his comment, “Firstly, very few people sit down to work out the ROI with coaching”. I took that to mean that Tim feels people *should* calculate the ROI, hence my questions about how people could go about doing this.
Look, I feel I’ve touched a nerve here with my questioning. I didn’t mean to get anyone’s back up. I’m simply trying to approach this from a dispassionately scientific viewpoint where the focus is on objectively measurable evidence. I’m genuinely curious about coaching, but I’m also the kind of kind who likes to be certain he’s getting value for money. I do tonnes of research on any expensive purchases.
I didn’t mean to imply that a lack of ROI meant an unsatisfied client. What it does mean is that it’s hard to objectively judge the value that client received, other than they *feel* it helped.
I’m gonna back off now. I’m sorry for any offence/upset caused, that really wasn’t my intention.
In answer to your first question, yes sorry mate ;-)
The ROI was to make the point that some people will throw $100 on a football games that lasts 3 hours, or $500 on a new pair of boots she wears half a dozen times (no name, no pack drill!), or $5k on a vacation, but will just see the cost of coaching and not look past that to work out what the potential gains are.
Just one last thing, I promise! I hope this explains where I’m coming from a bit better.
If I was judging Builder A against Builder B, I’d look at their price. If A was 10 times as expensive as B, I’d want to know what it was that they did differently that justified the cost difference.
Maybe it’s the quality of the workmanship. Maybe it’s better quality materials. Maybe they cleaned up after themselves every day.
I think it’s perfectly reasonable for potential customers to ask the following:
1) Will this person (builder/life coach) give me the result I want?, AND
2) Can I get the same results cheaper elsewhere?
OK, I’m done. I’m banning myself from any more posts!
Yeh of course that’s reasonable, so that’s why I encourage the to do due diligence.
I can only use me as an example because it would be unfair to mention any other coaches.
These are the kinds of things I say to prospective clients.
Go and read my blog and see if it gels with you.
Read my testimonials and if you want to pull a couple at random I can see if those people will speak to you. If not, I can certainly get other ex-clients to speak with you.
I rarely point them toward my credentials because most people just aren’t bothered. Weird I know, but I almost never get asked if I’ve done any training.
And the reason why I’m not on a crusade Rob, is that it’s exhausting and often fruitless. Did you persuade anybody over at SD that I was anything other than a jerk?
Argh, I can’t resist! Must reply!
I wouldn’t expect you to go on a crusade to convince people who are dead set against life coaching. The people on that horrible website had already decided you were spawn of Satan and no amount of evidence would convince them otherwise.
I, on the other hand am a completely different kettle of fish. I’m genuinely interested and open minded about the potential benefits of hiring a life coach, but I’m currently a fence sitter because the huge cost puts me off. I feel that I could be persuaded that life coaching *could* be worth $1000, but I need you to show me how.
Speaking to ex-clients would definitely help, particularly if you had some who were trying to tackle a similar issue to me.
I just can’t help thinking that there’s a huge opportunity for you out there if you can convince fence sitters like me that $150+/hr is justified.
I would love to start my own business. Despite the fact that I’ve read a couple of books on the subject, I’m still racked with numerous doubts and feel paralysed. Perhaps it’s not you I’m doubting at all, it’s myself. I wouldn’t expect you to guarantee that my startup business would make me a millionaire, but if you could give me the confidence to go for the life of my drems, fuck me that would be invaluable! OK, I’m really going to stop now!
Rob, look at the URL of this post.
I wonder if you noticed it unconsciously?
That was the original title I came up with and then thought it was unfair to Clint because it really wasn’t about Life Coaching per se. I didn’t go back in and edit the permalink because it’s useful for SEO purposes.
BTW, if you want coaching I’ll do you 4 sessions for 200 quid, but I aint giving you a money back option you tight git.
Until now I’d always assumed that your life coaching would be kinda similar to your blog posts. I thought your blog posts are sort of “free samples”. But from what I can gather, that’s way off the mark.
I’ve been reading your “What the hell is life coaching” ebook to get me up-to-speed.
I’m feeling a bit humble and like a bit of a dumbass for making several assumptions about what life coaching is all about. Ah well, live and learn.
The £200 offer is tempting, but I don’t think that’s fair on your other customers. Why should I get a great deal just because I posted controversial views and skepticism on here?
That’s a prerogative I have mate ;-)
Oh and don’t worry about the assumptions, they’re not difficult to form. The blog gives advice simply because I can’t post a list of questions every week and do anything that requires immediate feedback.
Hi Clint & Tim,
A fresh set of eyes can never be underestimated…..and the value! difficult to put a price on it…..it’s priceless.
be good to yourselves
David
You got that right David. I would also say the same thing of motivational speakers. I use to work at companies where they had these big sales force meetings. The bar tab alone each night cost more than a motivational speaker’s fee. Points brought up by a motivational speaker can be used for life. I know that’s what happened to me when I first heard Les Brown live. Now how long do the benefits from an open bar last? Maybe until recovery from the hangovers!
‘The advice he gave in just one hour vastly improved the quality of my marriage’
This comment from Rob is why I am currently rewording my website towards results, not coaching.
Trying to provide reasons why someone should work with a coach is a lot harder than telling them you can help them achieve certain results that move them away from their pain points.
What Rob got value from was the result, an improvement in his marriage. It didn’t really matter who helped him get there or what tools they used. He got an outcome that made a part of his life that bit better. I could be very wrong but I hazard a guess to say that if he got the result of a ‘vastly improved marriage’ first and was advised the price afterwards, he wouldn’t have been opposed to paying 5 x that amount.
What Clint’s post pointed to is that reading a book or thinking about it himself hadn’t got Rob to that place. But a fresh set of unbiased and tainted eyes, and the right kind of questions and suggestions did. Coach, counsellor, mentor whatever. The name doesn’t matter. The opportunity for new information and growth does.
Hi Rachael. Thanks, you make some really interesting points.
I did find it a bit odd that despite following Tim’s blog for about a year, I had to trawl his website to understand exactly what results/benefits I could get from hiring Tim. It wasn’t until I looked through Tim’s “about” page and saw the list of bullet points towards the bottom that I formed a reasonably clear understanding of how Tim could help me.
If Tim’s blog is the shop window for his life coaching, then the glass in the window must be very foggy. I’ve spent a year following the blog but haven’t understood what life coaching really is! Or maybe I’m just really thick! Even the “What the hell is life coaching” ebook didn’t really clarify and hammer home the benefits of life coaching as much as I’d hoped.
Putting myself in the shoes of a casual Internet user stumbling across Tim’s website for the first time, the Home page blurb really is too long and it’s quite vague about what results I can expect from life coaching.
Tim, I think Rachael has got a really great point here. I think you’d attract more customers if you could find ways to more clearly describe the benefits of life coaching. If you can do this succinctly on your home page, even better.
I’m not saying that Tim’s the only life coach that seems to have problems communicating the benefits of life coaching. It seems to be an issue that affects the whole industry, perhaps because it’s relatively new.
Regarding how much I would have paid for the vastly improved marriage, you’re right Rachael. In my mind I’d estimated we’d need at least 2 or 3 sessions, and I’m still gobsmacked that the counsellor got the results he did in less than 5.
My opinion has almost come full circle again with regards to whether life coaching is significantly different from counselling or therapy. When you think about the results they generate, they all seem kinda similar to me. All that’s different is the techniques that are used (and these don’t matter to Joe Average as long as they work). Oh and life coaching is currently unregulated and sometimes looked down upon.
But I still think that the fundamental techniques used in counselling, therapy and life coaching are very similar. For example, you need to be an expert listener and be able to get to the root of a client’s personal (or inter-personal) problem very quickly. It’s mostly the methods of fixing the problems that seem different. (To my simple mind anyway).
My about page is my 2nd most read Rob and I think if anybody finds me looking for a coach would check that out.
Maybe a casual blog reader wouldn’t that’s true and that is part of the reason I recently had the bio box at the bottom of every post. It’s also why the widget is in the sidebar.
It’s a fine line Rob, and Life Coaching is really tricky to explain.
The home page is work in progress and is more aimed at SEO than anything, but I take on board what you’re saying and I will cast a critical eye over it later this week.
Rachael, I’ve just read your “10 Reasons…” blog post. It’s brilliant! I love your approach. And if I feel I need to talk to someone about my relationship with my wife again, I will certainly consider you vs the Relate counsellor.
Thanks Rob! Really appreciate your feedback.