How to Start Your Coaching Practice

SUMMARY

So, you want to become a coach, but you're not sure what to do first? Stick with me because in this episode, I'm going to show you how to get started in your coaching practice.

Hi, this is Grant Herbert, Emotional Intelligence Speaker and Trainer of the Year and Master Coach Trainer, and this week, I want to continue our conversation around stepping up and entering the wonderful world of coaching by showing you the three key areas to focus on as you start your coaching practice. These are the foundations of building the coach before we go out there and try to become one.

1. Know your ‘Why’.

2. Establish your Message.

3. Design your Journey

So, there you have it. They are the first three things that you need to do to become a coach.

Well, that's it from me for another week. Join me again next week as we continue this conversation around becoming a coach, where I will answer that question that many people ask me, and that is, "Do I need to get certified to become a coach?" I'll see you then.

TRANSCRIPT

So, you want to become a coach, but you're not sure what to do first? Stick with me because in this episode, I'm going to show you how to get started in your coaching practice.

Hi, this is Grant Herbert, Emotional Intelligence Speaker and Trainer of the Year and Master Coach Trainer, and this week, I want to continue our conversation around stepping up and entering the wonderful world of coaching by showing you the first steps to take to become a coach.

Many emerging coaches get overwhelmed and frustrated by all the different information that's out there, whether that is from coach training companies or other people that they see as coaches. There are many ways to get started as a coach. The challenge is with most of those, it all talks about doing rather than what I believe is the first step that we need to deal with, that we need to work on to become a coach, and that is in, "Who do I need to be so that I can become a coach?"

So, what I want to do in this short episode is give you three key areas to focus on as you start your coaching practice. These are the foundations of building the coach before we go out there and try to become one.

It might sound a little bit confusing, but that's okay. I totally understand that. When I got started in my coaching journey many, many years ago, there was so many options out there. There are so many people that have different ideas, and the challenge is that a lot of them are confusing. Everybody starts where you're starting right now, and therefore, it's only appropriate to know what you need to know at that step. I'm a great believer in just-in-time learning rather than just-in-case learning. What I want to do is instead of getting you all overwhelmed and thinking about, "Well, what's my niche?", and, "Do I need a website?", and all these many questions that emerging coaches are asked, I want you to be able to narrow your focus right now and just look at three key things for a coach who's getting started. The rest of that will come as you continue to grow and you'll need to know more things then, but right now let's keep the overwhelm out and focus on these three things. Let me give them to you now.

The first thing that you need to do to become a coach is get super clear on your reason for doing it. You need to get focused on your "why". Why do you want to become a coach? Why do you feel that coaching is right for you right now? What is your overall purpose and where does coaching fit into that? The more clarity that we can get in this area, the better to be able to decide which of the many avenues that you could choose in your coaching to go down. So if you know that my coaching is a part of another goal, a part of my life purpose, then it can come out of your heart and it doesn't just become something else that you do. So, the first thing is get clear on your "why".

The second area that we need to focus on is what is your message. What a lot of coaches do and

a lot of coach training organisations teach is for you to work out who it is that you're going to serve, who it is that you're going to work with. What's your market? I learned many years ago that what I stand for and what my message is, is way more important to start with than who it is that I'm going to coach. Your message will attract the right people for you. Your message will have experiences. It will have victories, overcomings. It'll have mistakes and failures that resonate with the people who you are meant to coach. So, the second area that I want you to focus on is, "What is my message?", and I'm going to give you a simple way to do that.

So, there's two types of message here. There's your overall message that runs your life. It's filled with your values, your beliefs about the world and about how things should be. And then there's a message that we structure in a way that draws coaching clients to us. But, what I want you to do is start up here. Get clear on who you are and what you stand for. So, imagine that you've just been given a 15 minute window, a time slot, where every single person around the world, all seven and a half billion of them were going to be tuning in and listening to you. I know. A bit scary, right? Just work with me. Imagine that's happening. You're only ever going to get one opportunity to do that. What is the message that you want to get across to them? Now, that message, I'm sure, is not going to be about coaching or about things that you know or do. It's going to be what's on your heart. It's going to be what you truly stand for and what you truly believe in. And then if you had a magic wand and could wave it across the earth, you would make this change. So, invest in some bandwidth in your time and your energy before going any further to work that out. What would you want to tell me? What would you want to impart? And that, my friend. is your message. Then from there, we can go down and go, "Okay. How does that relate to things that are going on in the world?" Things that people could be experiencing, problems that they could have, but first, we want to chunk it up. We want to go, "Who am I and what do I stand for?" So, the second area is to get clear on your message.

Now that we've got clear on why it is that you want to become a coach and what it is that you stand for, now the third step is to design your journey. Instead of just jumping in and going, "Look, let's get certified", or, "Let's do a course", or, "Let's start telling my friends", or whatever it is, stop, pause, and work out what your journey of becoming a coach looks like. Now, we've talked about this before in many of the episodes that I've done, where I like to use a reverse-engineering process. So, what I'd love you to do is use that same R4 method that I've taught you before to go, "Okay, where do I want to be 12 months from now? What are the results that I want to have?", then reverse-engineer that and go, "Okay, where am I now?" And if you're just getting started, it's at zero, and that's okay. Now, I know there'll be some of you watching this who have already started your journey, and you're wanting to do some tweaks and adjustments so that you can get some more traction.

So, what is your current reality? Then, look at, "Well, what are the things that could stop me from going from where I am now to where I want to go?", and get clear on the roadblocks that exist. A lot of those roadblocks, as you know, will be internal roadblocks. And there's one thing I want to get across, and I'll continue to come back with, and that is becoming a coach does not mean you've got it all together. You don't need to have everything worked out in your own life to be able to coach others. You need to be on a continual journey of learning and constant improvement, but there's never going to be a place where you're perfect. So, those roadblocks that exist in you are going to be part of you being able to help others as you overcome them as well. The full thought is to now look at, "Okay, so what are the resources that I need to add to overcome those roadblocks and for me to be able to achieve those results that I want a year from now?" So, to design your journey is about getting clear on where you want to go. You know why you want to get there. You know what it is that you want to share with the world. So, now we're setting up a plan for you to actually achieve those results.

So, there you have it. They are the first three things that you need to do to become a coach. I know none of those are technical and none of those have got anything to do with how to coach and all those things. However, in working myself for many, many years and with thousands of other coaches and trainers and consultants around the world, I know that this is the key step that most people miss out. By missing out this key step, they get frustrated and they struggle, and a lot of people don't continue with their journey as a coach. They give up, they go back to getting a job or whatever it is because they haven't set these foundations. So, the first things I'd work out who you are, why you want to become a coach, and how you're going to get there. You can become a coach by following these three simple steps to get started, but the first thing you need to do is make a decision to become a coach. So if you're still thinking about whether or not this is for you, make a decision that it is. Do the exercises I've just given you and see what comes out of that.

Well, that's it from me for another week. Join me again next week as we continue this conversation around becoming a coach, where I will answer that question that many people ask me, and that is, "Do I need to get certified to become a coach?" I'll see you then.