What Is Coaching?

What Is Coaching?

No longer just for athletes, coaching is an increasingly powerful tool in the management, life, and career arena. As a Master Coach for some years now, I am always asked, What is coaching?

I truly believe in celebrating diversity, therefore, coaching is something else to each person, and yet, it is a game that more and more people join.

Michael Jordan, Mia Hamm and Tiger Woods would credit coaching for playing a key role in their accomplishments. With someone giving them a fresh outside perspective on their performance they were able to take their game to higher levels. Coaching is a term often associated with sports, yet it is an increasingly popular success factor in the business, life and career arena.

For instance, Executives hire coaches to make important decisions, explore career growth issues, bring balance to their lives, develop key skills, take inventory of their current situation and clarify a future direction.

Coaching takes the form of confidential 1-to-1 meetings for several weeks or months. Coaches are trained in moving clients from concern to action.

Clarifying and achieving meaningful goals is usually the central part of coaching and there is much more, including increased self-care, clearing up your present life, building a strong personal foundation and balancing different areas such as work, family and creativity.

What Does a Coach Do?

•  Helps you set larger, clearer, more rewarding personal and professional goals.
• Assists you in creating possibilities and breakthroughs by helping you identify and activate your values, needs, and visions.
•  Speaks with you at least weekly (or as mutually agreed upon) to help you strategize and take action.
•  Asks more of you than you, or others, might ask of yourself.

Why Does a Person Hire a Coach? 

• To set clearer, more accurate goals.
• To reach your goals faster, through a professional strategic process.
• To simplify your life.
• To reduce stress by not putting up with things you now "tolerate."
• To improve your relationships with clients, co-workers, boss, family.
• To design and live an 'awesome' life.
• To get ahead professionally or become more financially successful.
• To make more effective decisions that work best for YOU!
• To strengthen personal foundations.
• To have someone to collaborate with.
• To make significant changes or facilitate life transitions.

With Coaching you can expect to:

• Become more effective at prioritizing what is most important in life.
• Reduce stress and anxiety from overwhelming you and preventing you from taking action toward your commitments, in a non-stress environment.
• Create balance in your life based on YOUR priorities, not the unreasonable "shoulds" and "wants" of others or yourself.
• Do the things in life you are REALLY committed to.
• Enhance the quality and satisfaction of your relationships.
• Learn how to be most effective with your time.
• Realize the value of taking EXCEPTIONAL care of you.
• Minimize the influence of things that you now "put up with" in your life.
• Learn how to say "No."
• Discover new ways of 'Being' that provides you with daily fulfillment, vitality, and optimism, rather than dread, regret, or frustration.
• Create peace, joy, excitement, and success in your life.

When describing Coaching I use the Mountain Story, to exemplify how coaching could be a process of Discovery. I truly believe that Coaching is a journey of Self Discovery:

The Mountain Story

A son and his father were walking on the mountains. Suddenly, his son falls, hurts himself and screams:
"AAAhhhhhhhhhhh!!!"
To his surprise, he hears the voice repeating, somewhere in the mountain:
"AAAhhhhhhhhhhh!!!"
Curious, he yells: "Who are you?"
He receives the answer: "Who are you?"
And then he screams to the mountain: "I admire you!"
The voice answers: "I admire you!"
Angered at the response, he screams: "Coward!"
He receives the answer: "Coward!"

He looks to his father and asks: "What's going on?"
The father smiles and says: "My son, pay attention."
Again the boy screams: "You are a champion!"
The voice answers: "You are a champion!"
The boy is surprised, but does not understand.

Then the father explains: "People call this ECHO, but really this is LIFE.
It gives you back everything you say or do.

Our life is simply a reflection of our actions.
If you want more love in the world, create more love in your heart.
If you want more competence in your team, improve your competence.
This relationship applies to everything, in all aspects of life;
Life will give you back everything you have given to it."

YOUR LIFE IS NOT A COINCIDENCE. IT'S A REFLECTION OF YOU!

For more information on coaching contact Sara@Coach-in.com  or visist http://www.coach-in.com/